83 ideas
19608 | Wisdom is just the last gasp of a dying civilization [Cioran] |
23064 | So-called wisdom is just pondering things instead of acting [Cioran] |
19624 | Intelligence only fully flourishes at the end of a historical period [Cioran] |
19599 | Ideas are neutral, but people fill them with passion and weakness [Cioran] |
19631 | The history of ideas (and deeds) occurs in a meaningless environment [Cioran] |
19645 | Some thinkers would have been just as dynamic, no matter when they had lived [Cioran] |
19629 | A nation gives expression to its sum of values, and is then exhausted [Cioran] |
19618 | I abandoned philosophy because it didn't acknowledge melancholy and human weakness [Cioran] |
19621 | Originality in philosophy is just the invention of terms [Cioran] |
19607 | The mind is superficial, only concerned with the arrangement of events, not their significance [Cioran] |
19638 | Metaphysics is a universalisation of physical anguish [Cioran] |
19620 | Great systems of philosophy are just brilliant tautologies [Cioran] |
23072 | Systems are the worst despotism, in philosophy and in life [Cioran] |
22140 | The greatest philosophers are methodical; it is what makes them great [Grice] |
23075 | A text explained ceases to be a text [Cioran] |
19630 | No great idea ever emerged from a dialogue [Cioran] |
19636 | Truth is just an error insufficiently experienced [Cioran] |
19642 | Eventually every 'truth' is guaranteed by the police [Cioran] |
23066 | Negation doesn't arise from reasoning, but from deep instincts [Cioran] |
19632 | An axiom has no more authority than a frenzy [Cioran] |
17818 | How many? must first partition an aggregate into sets, and then logic fixes its number [Yourgrau] |
17822 | Nothing is 'intrinsically' numbered [Yourgrau] |
17817 | Defining 'three' as the principle of collection or property of threes explains set theory definitions [Yourgrau] |
17815 | We can't use sets as foundations for mathematics if we must await results from the upper reaches [Yourgrau] |
17821 | You can ask all sorts of numerical questions about any one given set [Yourgrau] |
23077 | The word 'being' is very tempting, but in fact means nothing at all [Cioran] |
23068 | People who really believe anti-realism don't bother to prove it [Cioran] |
13856 | Conditionals are truth-functional, but we must take care with misleading ones [Grice, by Edgington] |
8948 | The odd truth table for material conditionals is explained by conversational conventions [Grice, by Fisher] |
13767 | Conditionals might remain truth-functional, despite inappropriate conversational remarks [Edgington on Grice] |
10990 | Conditionals are truth-functional, but unassertable in tricky cases? [Grice, by Read] |
14277 | A person can be justified in believing a proposition, though it is unreasonable to actually say it [Grice, by Edgington] |
23078 | Opinions are fine, but having convictions means something has gone wrong [Cioran] |
23073 | Convictions are failures to study anything thoroughly [Cioran] |
19626 | Our instincts had to be blunted and diminished, to make way for consciousness! [Cioran] |
23076 | If people always acted without words we would take them for robots [Cioran] |
19633 | We use concepts to master our fears; saying 'death' releases us from confronting it [Cioran] |
23065 | If only we could write like a reptile, of endless sensations and no concepts! [Cioran] |
7751 | Meaning needs an intention to induce a belief, and a recognition that this is the speaker's intention [Grice] |
7752 | Only the utterer's primary intention is relevant to the meaning [Grice] |
7753 | We judge linguistic intentions rather as we judge non-linguistic intentions, so they are alike [Grice] |
22330 | Grice said patterns of use are often semantically irrelevant, because it is a pragmatic matter [Grice, by Glock] |
18045 | Grice's maxim of quality says do not assert what you believe to be false [Grice, by Magidor] |
18044 | Grice's maxim of manner requires one to be as brief as possible [Grice, by Magidor] |
10991 | Key conversational maxims are 'quality' (assert truth) and 'quantity' (leave nothing out) [Grice, by Read] |
18046 | Grice's maxim of quantity says be sufficiently informative [Grice, by Magidor] |
19615 | I want to suppress in myself the normal reasons people have for action [Cioran] |
23071 | We could only be responsible if we had consented before birth to who we are [Cioran] |
23070 | We morally dissolve if we spend time with excessive beauty [Cioran] |
19628 | At a civilisation's peak values are all that matters, and people unconsciously live by them [Cioran] |
19646 | Values don't accumulate; they are ruthlessly replaced [Cioran] |
19614 | Lovers are hateful, apart from their hovering awareness of death [Cioran] |
19634 | Man is never himself; he always aims at less than life, or more than life [Cioran] |
19619 | To live authentically, we must see that philosophy is totally useless [Cioran] |
19622 | The pointlessness of our motives and irrelevance of our gestures reveals our vacuity [Cioran] |
19617 | Evidence suggests that humans do not have a purpose [Cioran] |
19612 | The universe is dirty and fragile, as if a scandal in nothingness had produced its matter [Cioran] |
19604 | Unlike other creatures, mankind seems lost in nature [Cioran] |
19606 | We can only live because our imagination and memory are poor [Cioran] |
19601 | Life is now more dreaded than death [Cioran] |
23074 | In anxiety people cling to what reinforces it, because it is a deep need [Cioran] |
19640 | No one is brave enough to say they don't want to do anything; we despise such a view [Cioran] |
19602 | You are stuck in the past if you don't know boredom [Cioran] |
19641 | If you lack beliefs, boredom is your martyrdom [Cioran] |
23062 | It is better to watch the hours pass, than trying to fill them [Cioran] |
23069 | Fear cures boredom, because it is stronger [Cioran] |
19644 | History is the bloody rejection of boredom [Cioran] |
19613 | It is pointless to refuse or accept the social order; we must endure it like the weather [Cioran] |
19627 | Opportunists can save a nation, and heroes can ruin it [Cioran] |
19625 | The ideal is to impose a religion by force, and then live in doubt about its beliefs [Cioran] |
19605 | Despite endless suggestions, no one has found a goal for history [Cioran] |
19637 | History is wonderfully devoid of meaning [Cioran] |
19610 | Religions see suicide as insubordination [Cioran] |
19611 | No one has ever found a good argument against suicide [Cioran] |
19609 | If you have not contemplated suicide, you are a miserable worm [Cioran] |
23067 | Suicide is pointless, because it always comes too late [Cioran] |
19639 | We all need sexual secrets! [Cioran] |
19603 | Why is God so boring, and why does God resemble humanity so little? [Cioran] |
19616 | As the perfect wisdom of detachment, philosophy offers no rivals to Taoism [Cioran] |
19600 | When man abandons religion, he then follows new fake gods and mythologies [Cioran] |
19643 | A religion needs to motivate killings, and cannot tolerate rivals [Cioran] |
23063 | The first man obviously found paradise unendurable [Cioran] |
19623 | Circles of hell are ridiculous; all that matters is to be there [Cioran] |