119 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] |
5278 | Philosophy is no more than abstractions concerning observations of human historical development [Marx/Engels] |
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] |
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] |
9038 | We must distinguish what the speaker denotes by a name, from what the name denotes [Evans] |
5824 | How can an expression be a name, if names can change their denotation? [Evans] |
9042 | A private intention won't give a name a denotation; the practice needs it to be made public [Evans] |
9041 | The Causal Theory of Names is wrong, since the name 'Madagascar' actually changed denotation [Evans] |
19632 | An axiom has no more authority than a frenzy [Cioran] |
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] |
5287 | Philosophical problems are resolved into empirical facts [Marx/Engels] |
16129 | Evans argues (falsely!) that a contradiction follows from treating objects as vague [Evans, by Lowe] |
16459 | Is it coherent that reality is vague, identities can be vague, and objects can have fuzzy boundaries? [Evans] |
16460 | Evans assumes there can be vague identity statements, and that his proof cannot be right [Evans, by Lewis] |
16457 | There clearly are vague identity statements, and Evans's argument has a false conclusion [Evans, by Lewis] |
14484 | If a=b is indeterminate, then a=/=b, and so there cannot be indeterminate identity [Evans, by Thomasson] |
16224 | There can't be vague identity; a and b must differ, since a, unlike b, is only vaguely the same as b [Evans, by PG] |
14895 | 'Superficial' contingency: false in some world; 'Deep' contingency: no obvious verification [Evans, by Macià/Garcia-Carpentiro] |
11881 | Rigid designators can be meaningful even if empty [Evans, by Mackie,P] |
23078 | Opinions are fine, but having convictions means something has gone wrong [Cioran] |
23073 | Convictions are failures to study anything thoroughly [Cioran] |
7639 | The Homunculus Fallacy explains a subject perceiving objects by repeating the problem internally [Evans] |
12580 | Experiences have no conceptual content [Evans, by Greco] |
7643 | We have far fewer colour concepts than we have discriminations of colour [Evans] |
5303 | For the proletariate, law, morality and religion are just expressions of bourgeois interests [Marx/Engels] |
23872 | 'Society determines consciousness' is contradictory; society only exists in minds [Weil on Marx/Engels] |
5277 | Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life [Marx/Engels] |
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] |
23794 | Some representational states, like perception, may be nonconceptual [Evans, by Schulte] |
16366 | The Generality Constraint says if you can think a predicate you can apply it to anything [Evans] |
19633 | We use concepts to master our fears; saying 'death' releases us from confronting it [Cioran] |
12575 | Concepts have a 'Generality Constraint', that we must know how predicates apply to them [Evans, by Peacocke] |
23065 | If only we could write like a reptile, of endless sensations and no concepts! [Cioran] |
5280 | Language co-exists with consciousness, and makes it social [Marx/Engels] |
5825 | Speakers intend to refer to items that are the source of their information [Evans] |
5823 | The intended referent of a name needs to be the cause of the speaker's information about it [Evans] |
9039 | If descriptions are sufficient for reference, then I must accept a false reference if the descriptions fit [Evans] |
9043 | We use expressions 'deferentially', to conform to the use of other people [Evans] |
9040 | Charity should minimize inexplicable error, rather than maximising true beliefs [Evans] |
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] |
5276 | The nature of an individual coincides with what they produce and how they produce it [Marx/Engels] |
5281 | Consciousness is a social product [Marx/Engels] |
21998 | Bourgeois interests create our morality, law and religion [Marx/Engels] |
19646 | Values don't accumulate; they are ruthlessly replaced [Cioran] |
19614 | Lovers are hateful, apart from their hovering awareness of death [Cioran] |
5289 | When aristocracy or the bourgeoisie dominate, certain values dominate with them [Marx/Engels] |
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] |
23069 | Fear cures boredom, because it is stronger [Cioran] |
19644 | History is the bloody rejection of 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] |
5274 | Young Hegelians proposed changing our present consciousness for liberating critical consciousness [Marx/Engels] |
21992 | Producing their own subsistence distinguishes men from animals [Marx/Engels] |
5275 | Men distinguish themselves from animals when they begin to produce their means of subsistence [Marx/Engels] |
5292 | Individuals are mutually hostile unless they group together in competition with other groups [Marx/Engels] |
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] |
5293 | Only in community are people able to cultivate their gifts, and therefore be free [Marx/Engels] |
5273 | Young Hegelians think consciousness is chains for men, where old Hegelians think it the bond of society [Marx/Engels] |
5283 | In communist society we are not trapped in one activity, but can act freely [Marx/Engels] |
5282 | If the common interest imposes on the individual, his actions become alienated and enslaving [Marx/Engels] |
5288 | The class controlling material production also controls mental production [Marx/Engels] |
5290 | The revolutionary class is opposed to 'class', and represents all of society [Marx/Engels] |
5294 | To assert themselves as individuals, the proletarians must overthrow the State [Marx/Engels] |
5302 | Modern governments are just bourgeois management committees [Marx/Engels] |
5304 | Communism aims to abolish not all property, but bourgeois property [Marx/Engels] |
5307 | Many of the bourgeois rights grievances are a form of self-defence [Marx/Engels] |
5285 | Slavery cannot be abolished without the steam-engine [Marx/Engels] |
5284 | Communism abolishes private property and dissolves the powerful world market [Marx/Engels] |
5306 | The free development of each should be the condition for the free development of all [Marx/Engels] |
5291 | The law says private property is the result of the general will [Marx/Engels] |
19625 | The ideal is to impose a religion by force, and then live in doubt about its beliefs [Cioran] |
5305 | Communists want to rescue education from the ruling class [Marx/Engels] |
19605 | Despite endless suggestions, no one has found a goal for history [Cioran] |
5279 | Human history must always be studied in relation to industry and exchange [Marx/Engels] |
5286 | Most historians are trapped in the illusions of their own epoch [Marx/Engels] |
5301 | The history of all existing society is the history of class struggles [Marx/Engels] |
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] |