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Full Idea
The tradition of conceiving being in terms of persisting presence, and meaning in terms of pure intelligibility or logos potentially present to the mind, finds itself dismantled by resources internal to its own construction.
Gist of Idea
The idea of being as persistent presence, and meaning as conscious intelligibility, are self-destructive
Source
report of Jacques Derrida (works [1990]) by Simon Glendinning - Derrida: A Very Short Introduction 6
Book Ref
Glendinning,Simon: 'Derrida: a Very Short Intro' [OUP 2011], p.73
A Reaction
[compressed] Glendinning says this is the basic meaning of de-construction. My personal reading of this is that Aristotle is right, and grand talk of Being is hopeless, so we should just aim to understand objects. I also believe in propositions.
Related Idea
Idea 578 Cratylus decided speech was hopeless, and his only expression was the movement of a finger [Cratylus, by Aristotle]
| 8210 | Deconstructing philosophy gives the history of concepts, and the repressions behind them [Derrida] |
| 8211 | The movement of 'différance' is the root of all the oppositional concepts in our language [Derrida] |
| 6840 | Derrida came to believe in the undeconstructability of justice, which cannot be relativised [Derrida, by Critchley] |
| 8216 | Deconstruction is not neutral; it intervenes [Derrida] |
| 21881 | We aim to explore the limits of expression (as in Mallarmé's poetry) [Derrida] |
| 21883 | Sincerity can't be verified, so fiction infuses speech, and hence reality also [Derrida] |
| 21882 | Sentences are contradictory, as they have opposite meanings in some contexts [Derrida] |
| 21934 | The idea of being as persistent presence, and meaning as conscious intelligibility, are self-destructive [Derrida, by Glendinning] |
| 8987 | On the surface of deconstructive writing, technicalities float and then drift away [Scruton] |
| 8992 | Deconstruction is the last spasm of romanticism, now become hopeless and destructive [Scruton] |
| 22234 | Post-structuralism focused on exterior determinants of thought, rather than the thinker [Oksala] |