“
Evil is something that, when you see it, when you know it, it's intimate. It's almost sensual. That is why people who have been tortured know it by instinct. They don't need to be told what it is, and they may have a very hard time putting it into words. ... That's the nature of the phenomenon. It's hard to put into words.
— Kanan Makiya
What It Means
This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "Evil is something that, when you see it, when you know it, it's intimate. It's almost sensual. That is why people who have been tortured know it by instinct. They don't need to be told what it is, and they may have a very hard time putting it into words. ... That's the nature of the phenomenon. It's hard to put into words." in the context of "" to mean that wisdom is timeless.
Source:
The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app
Tags
About Kanan Makiya
Kanan Makiya (born 1949) is an Iraqi-American academic and a professor of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at Brandeis University.
About Kanan Makiya
Kanan Makiya (born 1949) is an Iraqi-American academic and a professor of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at Brandeis University.
View all quotes →