5 ideas
| 21852 | Nomads are the basis of history, and yet almost unknowable [Deleuze] |
| Full Idea: There is no history from the viewpoint of nomads, although everything passes through them, to the point that they are like the noumena or the unknowable of history. | |
| From: Gilles Deleuze (Many Politics [1977], p.107) | |
| A reaction: Nomads have the same place in society that indeterminate 'stuff' has in an object-orientated metaphysics. Deleuze seems to be romanticising nomads the way the late Victorians romanticised gypsies. |
| 13007 | Archimedes defined a straight line as the shortest distance between two points [Archimedes, by Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Archimedes gave a sort of definition of 'straight line' when he said it is the shortest line between two points. | |
| From: report of Archimedes (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Gottfried Leibniz - New Essays on Human Understanding 4.13 | |
| A reaction: Commentators observe that this reduces the purity of the original Euclidean axioms, because it involves distance and measurement, which are absent from the purest geometry. |
| 18925 | If talking donkeys are possible, something exists which could be a talking donkey [Williamson, by Cameron] |
| Full Idea: Williamson's view on modality is that everything that could exist does exist: since there could exist a talking donkey there actually exists some thing that could be a talking donkey. | |
| From: report of Timothy Williamson (Modal Logic as Metaphysics [2013], n20) by Ross P. Cameron - Truthmaking for Presentists n20 | |
| A reaction: Well that thing certainly isn't me, or Tim Williamson. I'm guessing that the thing is an actual donkey, probably a rather bright one. Actually, I think this is one of those views that invites the incredulous stare. (Barcan formulae). |
| 21853 | We are currently extending capitalism to the whole of society [Deleuze] |
| Full Idea: What characterises our situation is ….the extension of capitalism to the whole social body. | |
| From: Gilles Deleuze (Many Politics [1977], p.110) | |
| A reaction: This is driven by the naïve people who think all problems can be solved by market forces, and that to everything that goes bankrupt we should just say 'good riddance'. |
| 21851 | The State requires self-preservation, but the war-machine desires destruction [Deleuze] |
| Full Idea: There will always be a tension between the State apparatus with its requirement for self-preservation, and the war-machine in its undertaking to destroy the State, to destroy the subjects of the State, and even to destroy itself. | |
| From: Gilles Deleuze (Many Politics [1977], p.106) | |
| A reaction: This seems to fit WWI quite well, but the desire of the war-machine to destroy the State which pays for it sounds unlikely. Nevertheless war is appalling for the state, but it is the whole point of the war-machine, which gets restless. |