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Full Idea
The history of ideas, like that of deeds, unfolds in a meaningless climate.
Gist of Idea
The history of ideas (and deeds) occurs in a meaningless environment
Source
E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 3)
Book Ref
Cioran,E.M.: 'A Short History of Decay', ed/tr. Howard,Richard [Penguin 2010], p.123
A Reaction
This is the 'Tory' view of the history of ideas (as opposed to the 'Whig' view of directedness - a distinction made by historians). I would say there are periods where a certain inevitable sequence is worked out, but then there are dislocations.
| 12104 | All ideas must be understood historically [Comte] |
| 12105 | Our knowledge starts in theology, passes through metaphysics, and ends in positivism [Comte] |
| 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] |
| 19629 | A nation gives expression to its sum of values, and is then exhausted [Cioran] |
| 19645 | Some thinkers would have been just as dynamic, no matter when they had lived [Cioran] |
| 7460 | The great moments are the death of Aristotle, Machiavelli, and Romanticism [Berlin, by Watson] |
| 21852 | Nomads are the basis of history, and yet almost unknowable [Deleuze] |
| 7461 | The three key ideas are the soul, Europe, and the experiment [Watson] |
| 7464 | The big idea: imitation, the soul, experiments, God, heliocentric universe, evolution? [Watson] |