> 
> Rousseau's strategy in both Emile and the Social Contract is to
>  develop artificial environments which enable us to approximate our
>  rational nature given our foreseeable human limitations.  
> 
>  — *Routledge philosophy guidebook to Rousseau and the social contract*, chhp. 1, by Christopher Bertram
> 
> 
> 

It might seem that this "approximate" means the same thing as "approach". But I think "approach" refers the subject only to an external object, whereas "approximate" can also mean the subject reaching a new state of itself. Am I right?