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3 ideas
| 20447 | The problems is not justifying ethics, but motivating it. Why should a self seek its good? [Critchley] |
| Full Idea: The issue is not so much justification as motivation, that in virtue of which the self can be motivated to act on some conception of the good. ...How does a self bind itself to whatever it determines as its good? | |
| From: Simon Critchley (Impossible Objects: interviews [2012], 2) | |
| A reaction: That is a bold and interesting idea about the starting point for ethics. It is always a problem for Aristotle, that he can offer no motivation for the quest for virtue. Contractarians start from existing motivations, but that isn't impressive. |
| 23208 | Caesar and Napoleon point to the future, when they pursue their task regardless of human sacrifice [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: In nature's such as Caesar and Napoleon we intuit something of a 'disinterested' laboring on one's marble, regardless of any sacrifice of human beings. The future of the highest human beings lies on here: to bear responsibility and not collapse under it. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1885-86 [1886], 1[056]) | |
| A reaction: Hideous. Nietzsche at his absolute worst. You would think there was some wonderful higher good to which they were leading the human race, when they just strike me as people who liked fighting, and adored winning. |
| 23193 | Napoleon was very focused, and rightly ignored compassion [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: With Napoleon only the essential instincts of humanity came into consideration during his calculations, and he had a right not to take notice of the exceptional ones e.g. of compassion. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1885-86 [1886], 34[131]) | |
| A reaction: Napoleon was notoriously indifferent to casualties, and I find it depressing that Nietzsche supports him. Napoleon brought misery to Europe for nearly twenties, mainly because he loved winning battles. Nothing über about that. |