Teacher: And even if this word, earlier esteemed by you as a valuable suggestion, is no longer suitable, it could make clear to us that meanwhile we have come to confront something ineffable.

Scholar: This word is Heraclitus' word.

Scientist: From which fragment did you take it?

Scholar: This word struck me because it stands alone. It is that word, which, all by itself, constitutes Fragment 122.

Scientist: I don't know this shortest of Heraclitus' Fragments.

Scholar: It is scarcely noticed by others either, because one can do hardly anything with a single word.

Scientist: How does the fragment read?

Scholar: Ἀγχιβασίην

Scientist: What does it mean?

Scholar: The Greek word translates as "going toward."

Scientist: I regard this word as an excellent name for designating the nature of knowledge; for the character of advancing and moving toward objects is strikingly expressed in it.

Scholar: It appeared so to me too. That is also probably why it occurred to me in our first conversation, when we spoke of the action, the achievement, the work inherent in modern scientific knowledge, and, above all, in research.

Scientist: Actually, one could use this Greek word to make clear the fact that scientific research is a kind of attack on nature, but one which nevertheless allows nature to be heard. Ἀγχιβασίην ; "going toward": I could think of Heraclitus' word as keyword in an essay on the nature of modern science.

Scholar: For that reason, too, I have hesitated to utter the