14 ideas
| 7914 | To try to be wise all on one's own is folly [Rochefoucauld] |
| Full Idea: To try to be wise all on one's own is sheer folly. | |
| From: La Rochefoucauld (Maxims [1663], 231) | |
| A reaction: I agree strongly with this. There are counter-examples, of whom Spinoza may be the greatest, and Nietzsche thought that philosophy was essentially a solitary business, but most of us are not Spinoza or Nietzsche. |
| 7719 | European philosophy consists of a series of footnotes to Plato [Whitehead] |
| Full Idea: The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. | |
| From: Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929], p.39) | |
| A reaction: Outsiders think this is a ridiculous remark, but readers of Plato can only be struck by what a wonderful tribute Whitehead has come up with. I would say that at least 80% of this database deals with problems which were discussed at length by Plato. |
| 10656 | With 'extensive connection', boundary elements are not included in domains [Whitehead, by Varzi] |
| Full Idea: In Whitehead's theory of extensive connection, no boundary elements are included in the domain of quantification. ...His conception of space contains no parts of lower dimensions, such as points or boundary elements. | |
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Achille Varzi - Mereology 3.1 | |
| A reaction: [Varzi says we should see B.L.Clarke 1981 for a rigorous formulation. Second half of the Idea is Varzi p.21] |
| 15389 | In Whitehead 'processes' consist of events beginning and ending [Whitehead, by Simons] |
| Full Idea: There are no items in Whitehead's ontology called 'processes'. Rather, the term 'process' refers to the way in which the basic things - which are still events - come into existence and cease to exist. Whitehead called this 'becoming'. | |
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Peter Simons - Whitehead: process and cosmology 'The mature' |
| 7118 | La Rochefoucauld's idea of disguised self-love implies an unconscious mind [Rochefoucauld, by Sartre] |
| Full Idea: La Rochefoucauld is one of the first to have made use of the unconscious without naming it: for him, amour-propre conceals itself in the most diverse disguises. | |
| From: report of La Rochefoucauld (Maxims [1663]) by Jean-Paul Sartre - Transcendence of the Ego I (C) | |
| A reaction: It seems odd that no one before that ever thought that someone might have hidden motives of which even they themselves were unaware. How about Iago, or Macbeth, or Hamlet? It is a profound change in our view of human nature. |
| 468 | Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.] |
| Full Idea: In singing and playing the lyre, a boy will be likely to reveal not only courage and moderation, but also justice. | |
| From: Damon (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B4), quoted by (who?) - where? |
| 7912 | Judging by effects, love looks more like hatred than friendship [Rochefoucauld] |
| Full Idea: If love be judged by its most visible effects it looks more like hatred than friendship. | |
| From: La Rochefoucauld (Maxims [1663], 072) | |
| A reaction: Presumably he is thinking of pursuit, possession and jealousy. The remark is plausible if you add the word 'sometimes' to it, but as a universal generalisation it is ridiculous, the product of a society where they competed to exceed in cynicism. |
| 7915 | Supreme cleverness is knowledge of the real value of things [Rochefoucauld] |
| Full Idea: Supreme cleverness is knowledge of the real value of things. | |
| From: La Rochefoucauld (Maxims [1663], 244) | |
| A reaction: Good. Right at the heart of wisdom is some kind of grasp of right values. It is so complex and subtle that it seems like pure intuition, but I am sure that reason is involved. 'Intelligent' people tend to be better at it. Some justifications can be given. |
| 7917 | Realising our future misery is a kind of happiness [Rochefoucauld] |
| Full Idea: To realise how much misery we have to face is in itself a kind of happiness. | |
| From: La Rochefoucauld (Maxims [1663], 570) | |
| A reaction: Probably true. Knowing that you have got hold of the truth is a sort of happiness in any area, no matter how grim the truth. However, a happy life could easily be poisoned by brooding on the future. Should the happily married brood on future solitude? |
| 7913 | Virtue doesn't go far without the support of vanity [Rochefoucauld] |
| Full Idea: Virtue would not go far without vanity to bear it company. | |
| From: La Rochefoucauld (Maxims [1663], 200) | |
| A reaction: Rochefoucauld's cynicism gets a bit tedious, but lovers of virtue must face up to this possibility when they consider what motivates them. At the heart of Aristotle there is a missing question, of what is so good about right-functioning and virtue. |
| 7916 | True friendship is even rarer than true love [Rochefoucauld] |
| Full Idea: Rare though true love may be, true friendship is rarer still. | |
| From: La Rochefoucauld (Maxims [1663], 473) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be true. Our culture doesn't encourage friendship as a high ideal. Are women better at friendship than men? Which culture, past or present, led to the greatest flourishing of friendship? Epicurus's Garden? |
| 9299 | We are bored by people to whom we ourselves are boring [Rochefoucauld] |
| Full Idea: Almost always we are bored by people to whom we ourselves are boring. | |
| From: La Rochefoucauld (Maxims [1663], 555) | |
| A reaction: An obvious exception would be a celebrity being bored with their fans. Their very excess of interest is precisely what is boring. If two people communicate well, it is unlikely that either of them will ever be bored. |
| 15247 | Whitehead held that perception was a necessary feature of all causation [Whitehead, by Harré/Madden] |
| Full Idea: On Whitehead's view, not only is a volitional sense of 'causal power' projected on to physical events, but 'perception in the causal mode' is literally ascribed to them. | |
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Harré,R./Madden,E.H. - Causal Powers 3.II | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a close relative of Leibniz's monads. 'Perception' is a daft word for it, but in some way everything is 'responsive' to the things adjacent to it. |
| 16962 | Whitehead replaced points with extended regions [Whitehead, by Quine] |
| Full Idea: Whitehead tried to avoid points, and make do with extended regions and sets of regions. | |
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Willard Quine - Existence and Quantification p.93 |