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22344 | Freud is pessimistic about human nature; it is ambivalent motive and fantasy, rather than reason [Freud, by Murdoch] |
Full Idea: Freud takes a thoroughly pessimistic view of human nature. ...Introspection reveals only the deep tissue of ambivalent motive, and fantasy is a stronger force than reason. Objectivity and unselfishness are not natural to human beings. | |
From: report of Sigmund Freud (works [1900], II) by Iris Murdoch - The Sovereignty of Good II | |
A reaction: Interesting. His view seems to have coloured the whole of modern culture, reinforced by the hideous irrationality of the Nazis. Adorno and Horkheimer attacking the Enlightenment was the last step in that process. |
3032 | I can form no notion of what the good is [Amphis] |
Full Idea: What the good is I no more can form a notion of, than of the good of Plato. | |
From: Amphis (comedies (frags) [c.350 BCE]), quoted by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 03.1.22 | |
A reaction: It was evidently a running joke in the ancient world that no one could define Plato's Form of the Good. He was said to have written a book on it, now lost. |