17 ideas
| 23825 | We seek truth only because it is good [Weil] |
| Full Idea: Truth is sought not because it is truth but because it is good. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.233) | |
| A reaction: A perfect instance of modern platonism. A few weird people seem to enjoy lying. Personally I cannot find enough content in the word 'good' in such claims. |
| 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? |
| 23826 | Beauty, goodness and truth are only achieved by applying full attention [Weil] |
| Full Idea: The authentic and pure values - truth, beauty and goodness - in the activity of a human being are the result of one and same act, a certain application of the full attention to the object. Teaching should only aim to train the attention for such an act. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.234) | |
| A reaction: A distinctive Weil idea, that absorbed 'attention' produces almost mystical results. I am not convinced that a great still life painter (than which there is no higher criterion of attention) achieves contact with goodness thereby. But attention is good! |
| 23833 | The good is a nothingness, and yet real [Weil] |
| Full Idea: The good seems to us a nothingness, since there is no thing that is good. But this nothingness is not unreal. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.278) | |
| A reaction: A neat move in the notoriously difficult platonic problem of specifying the actual nature of the good. |
| 23808 | There are two goods - the absolute good we want, and the reachable opposite of evil [Weil] |
| Full Idea: There are two goods - one which is the opposite of evil, and one which is the absolute. …That which we want is the absolute good. That which is within our reach is the good which is correlated with evil. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.142) | |
| A reaction: Elsewhere she seems in tune with the thought of Nietzsche (whom she despised) that good and evil are false social constructs which are quite different from healthy values. Weil, of course, sees the absolute as transcendent. |
| 23831 | The essence of power is illusory prestige [Weil] |
| Full Idea: Prestige, which is an illusion, is the very essence of power. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.255) | |
| A reaction: It is hard to maintain illusory prestige if there is no actual power behind it. |
| 23830 | A group is only dangerous if it endorses an abstract entity [Weil] |
| Full Idea: Any group which has not secreted an abstract entity will probably not be dangerous. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.255) | |
| A reaction: Written in the 1930s, the era of many political -isms. No group can be united if it lacks a clear label, and a few simple slogans. |
| 23809 | Our only social duty is to try to limit evil [Weil] |
| Full Idea: Our only duty with regard to the social is to try to limit the evil of it. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.143) | |
| A reaction: This is one of Weil's occasional remarks that have an anarchist flavour. I increasingly sympathise with this less idealistic view as I get older. |
| 23807 | The collective is the one and only object of false idolatry [Weil] |
| Full Idea: The Great Beast is the great object of idolatry, the only ersatz of God. …Only one thing can be taken as an end, for in relation to the human person it possesses a kind of transcendence: this is the collective. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.140) | |
| A reaction: [Society as the Great Beast is in Republic Bk 6] She is referring to both fascist and communist states. Weil seems to be a left-wing liberal, with a tendency towards anarchism, because her priority is the individual, not the group. |
| 22252 | Capitalism may actually be the best way to foster community [Conway,D] |
| Full Idea: Not only is there no good reason for supposing capitalism inimical to community, but there is reason to think it more conducive to community than the feasible alternatives to it. | |
| From: David Conway (Capitalism and Community [1996], I) | |
| A reaction: Conway is defending an obviously unorthodox view, while attacking the hopes of communitarians. |
| 22253 | Capitalism is just the market, with optional limited government, and perhaps democracy [Conway,D] |
| Full Idea: There are three types of capitalism: 1) the market - private ownership, labor contracts and profit, 2) limited government - the state provides goods the market cannot do, 3) limited government with democracy - with political freedom and elections. | |
| From: David Conway (Capitalism and Community [1996], II) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] I would have thought that capitalism is compatible with a fair degree of workplace democracy, which would make a fourth type. |
| 22256 | Capitalism prefers representative democracy, which avoids community decision-making [Conway,D] |
| Full Idea: By opting for representative rather than direct democracy, capitalism is said to preclude political community, for which the citizens of a state must possess a common will, which needs their direct participation in decisions. | |
| From: David Conway (Capitalism and Community [1996], V) | |
| A reaction: Conway does not accept this claim. I'm beginning to wonder whether the famous British electoral system is actually a capitalist conspiracy against the people. |
| 22255 | Capitalism breaks up extended families, and must then provide welfare for the lonely people [Conway,D] |
| Full Idea: It is said that capitalism encourages the breakup of extended families, which creates the need for extensive state welfare for those indigent members of society who can no longer rely on their own family to take care of them. | |
| From: David Conway (Capitalism and Community [1996], V) | |
| A reaction: Conway does not accept this claim. It seems to simplistic to say that capitalism is the sole culprit. Any rise of mechanisation in agriculture would break up rural extended families. |
| 22257 | Capitalism is anti-community, by only valuing individuals, and breaking up families [Conway,D] |
| Full Idea: Communitarns say capitalism is inimical to family community, because it encourages an individualistic mentality which only values self-fulfilment, and because it demands labour mobility which is disruptive of families. | |
| From: David Conway (Capitalism and Community [1996], VI) | |
| A reaction: Chicken-and-egg with the first one. Small entrepreneurs are individualists who seek their own gain. It is big capitalism that sucks in the others. Traditional community is based on labour-intensive agriculture. |
| 23810 | Charity is the only love, and you can feel that for a country (a place with traditions), but not a nation [Weil] |
| Full Idea: We must not have any other love than charity. A nation cannot be an object of charity. But a country can be one - as an environment bearing traditions which are eternal. Every country can be that. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.146) | |
| A reaction: This definitely strikes a chord with me. I am English and British to the core, but don't feel any love at all for the current central institutions of the state. But I love my island, and its history, and its culture, and its style. |
| 23811 | If effort is from necessity rather than for a good, it is slavery [Weil] |
| Full Idea: To strive from necessity and not for some good - ...that is always slavery. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.180) | |
| A reaction: It is usual to see the possibility of anarchism as the starting point for political thinking, but I think for Weil the state of slavery has that role. |
| 23765 | The soul is the intrinsic value of a human [Weil] |
| Full Idea: The soul is the human being considered as having a value in itself. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Gravity and Grace (9 extracts) [1943], p.294) | |
| A reaction: [from 'Gravity and Grace'] A rather modern view, treating the soul as an abstraction, rather than as an entity. |