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Full Idea
Whether it is spoken by a grocer or a philosopher, the word 'being', apparently so rich, so tempting, so charged with significance, in fact means nothing at all; incredible that a man in his right mind can use it on any occasion whatever.
Gist of Idea
The word 'being' is very tempting, but in fact means nothing at all
Source
E.M. Cioran (The Trouble with Being Born [1973], 12)
Book Ref
Cioran,E.M.: 'The Trouble with Being Born', ed/tr. Richard Howard [Penguin 2012], p.166
A Reaction
I entirely agree. It resembles the redundancy view of 'true' (with which I do not agree).
| 24112 | To think about being we must have an opinion about what it is [Nietzsche] |
| 24131 | There is no 'being'; it is just the opposition to nothingness [Nietzsche] |
| 5657 | Frege's logic showed that there is no concept of being [Frege, by Scruton] |
| 23077 | The word 'being' is very tempting, but in fact means nothing at all [Cioran] |
| 10787 | Is being just referent of the verb 'to be'? [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 21847 | Before Being there is politics [Deleuze] |
| 21903 | Ontology does not tell what there is; it is just a strange adventure [Deleuze, by May] |
| 21904 | Being is a problem to be engaged, not solved, and needs a new mode of thinking [Deleuze, by May] |
| 12332 | The modern view of Being comes when we reject numbers as merely successions of One [Badiou] |
| 12326 | The primitive name of Being is the empty set; in a sense, only the empty set 'is' [Badiou] |