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Single Idea 19579

[filed under theme 1. Philosophy / C. History of Philosophy / 1. History of Philosophy ]

Full Idea

The history of philosophy up to now is nothing but a history of attempts to discover how to do philosophy.

Gist of Idea

The history of philosophy is just experiments in how to do philosophy

Source

Novalis (Logological Fragments I [1798], 01)

Book Ref

Novalis: 'Philosophical Writings', ed/tr. Stoljar,M.M. [SUNY 1997], p.47


A Reaction

I take post-Fregean analytic metaphysics to be another experiment in how to do philosophy. I suspect that the experiment of Husserl, Heidegger, Derrida etc has been a failure.

Related Idea

Idea 19583 Philosophy only begins when it studies itself [Novalis]


The 32 ideas from Novalis

Desire for perfection is an illness, if it turns against what is imperfect [Novalis]
Philosophy is homesickness - the urge to be at home everywhere [Novalis]
The basic relations of nature are musical [Novalis]
Persons are shaped by a life history; splendid persons are shaped by world history [Novalis]
General statements about nature are not valid [Novalis]
Nature is a whole, and its individual parts cannot be wholly understood [Novalis]
The whole body is involved in the formation of thoughts [Novalis]
Novalis thought self-consciousness cannot disclose 'being', because we are temporal creatures [Novalis, by Pinkard]
The history of philosophy is just experiments in how to do philosophy [Novalis]
If the pupil really yearns for the truth, they only need a hint [Novalis]
A problem is a solid mass, which the mind must break up [Novalis]
Morality and philosophy are mutually dependent [Novalis]
Philosophy only begins when it studies itself [Novalis]
Whoever first counted to two must have seen the possibility of infinite counting [Novalis]
Every person has his own language [Novalis]
Life isn't given to us like a novel - we write the novel [Novalis]
Poetry is true idealism, and the self-consciousness of the universe [Novalis]
Philosophers feed on problems, hoping they are digestible, and spiced with paradox [Novalis]
Philosophy aims to produce a priori an absolute and artistic world system [Novalis]
The highest aim of philosophy is to combine all philosophies into a unity [Novalis]
Logic (the theory of relations) should be applied to mathematics [Novalis]
Philosophy relies on our whole system of learning, and can thus never be complete [Novalis]
Delusion and truth differ in their life functions [Novalis]
Experiences tests reason, and reason tests experience [Novalis]
The seat of the soul is where our inner and outer worlds interpenetrate [Novalis]
If man sacrifices truth he sacrifices himself, by acting against his own convictions [Novalis]
Refinement of senses increasingly distinguishes individuals [Novalis]
Religion needs an intermediary, because none of us can connect directly to a godhead [Novalis]
Everything is a chaotic unity, then we abstract, then we reunify the world into a free alliance [Novalis]
Only self-illuminated perfect individuals are beautiful [Novalis]
Empiricists are passive thinkers, given their philosophy by the external world and fate [Novalis]
The whole point of a monarch is that we accept them as a higher-born, ideal person [Novalis]