Combining Philosophers

Ideas for Gilles Deleuze, Friedrich Schiller and C.S. Lewis

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7 ideas

1. Philosophy / B. History of Ideas / 1. History of Ideas
Nomads are the basis of history, and yet almost unknowable [Deleuze]
     Full Idea: There is no history from the viewpoint of nomads, although everything passes through them, to the point that they are like the noumena or the unknowable of history.
     From: Gilles Deleuze (Many Politics [1977], p.107)
     A reaction: Nomads have the same place in society that indeterminate 'stuff' has in an object-orientated metaphysics. Deleuze seems to be romanticising nomads the way the late Victorians romanticised gypsies.
1. Philosophy / C. History of Philosophy / 1. History of Philosophy
The history of philosophy is an agent of power: how can you think if you haven't read the great names? [Deleuze]
     Full Idea: The history of philosophy has always been the agent of power in philosophy, and even in thought. It has played the oppressor's role: how can you think without having read Plato, Descartes, Kant and Heidegger.
     From: Gilles Deleuze (A Conversation: what is it? What is it for? [1977], I)
     A reaction: I find it hard to relate to this French 1960s obsession with everybody being oppressed in every conceivable way, so that 'liberation' is the only value that matters. If you ask why liberty is needed, you seem to have missed the point.
1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 1. Philosophy
Thought should be thrown like a stone from a war-machine [Deleuze]
     Full Idea: Thought should be thrown like a stone by a war-machine. …Isn't this what Nietzsche does with an aphorism?
     From: Gilles Deleuze (A Conversation: what is it? What is it for? [1977], II)
     A reaction: It sounds as if philosophy should consist of nothing but aphorisms.
1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 5. Aims of Philosophy / a. Philosophy as worldly
Philosophy aims to become the official language, supporting orthodoxy and the state [Deleuze]
     Full Idea: Philosophy is shot through with the project of becoming the official language of a Pure State. The exercise of thought thus conforms to the goals of the real State, to the dominant meanings and to the requirements of the established order.
     From: Gilles Deleuze (A Conversation: what is it? What is it for? [1977], I)
     A reaction: [He cites Nietzsche's 'Schopenhauer as Educator' as the source of this] Is Karl Marx included in this generalisation, or Diogenes of Sinope? Is conservative philosophy thereby invalidated?
1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 7. Limitations of Analysis
When I meet objections I just move on; they never contribute anything [Deleuze]
     Full Idea: Not reflection, and objections are even worse. Every time someone puts an objection to me, I want to say: 'OK, OK, let's get on to something else'. Objections have never contributed anything.
     From: Gilles Deleuze (A Conversation: what is it? What is it for? [1977], I)
     A reaction: I know it is heresy in analytic philosophy, but I love this! In analytic seminars you can barely complete your first sentence before someone interrupts. It's like road range - the philosophical mind state is always poised to attack, attack.
1. Philosophy / H. Continental Philosophy / 1. Continental Philosophy
'Difference' refers to that which eludes capture [Deleuze, by May]
     Full Idea: 'Difference' is a term which Deleuze uses to refer to that which eludes capture.
     From: report of Gilles Deleuze (Difference and Repetition [1968]) by Todd May - Gilles Deleuze 3.03
     A reaction: Presumably its ancestor is Kant's noumenon. This is one of his concepts used to 'palpate' our ossified conceptual scheme.
We must create new words, and treat them as normal, and as if designating real things. [Deleuze]
     Full Idea: Let us create extraordinary words, on condition that they be put to the most ordinary use and that the entity they designate be made to exist in the same way as the most common object.
     From: Gilles Deleuze (A Conversation: what is it? What is it for? [1977], I)
     A reaction: This sounds like the attitude of someone creating a computer game. A language game! The idea is to create concepts with which to 'palpitate' our conceptual scheme, in order to reveal it, and thus put it within our power.