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8216
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Deconstruction is not neutral; it intervenes [Derrida]
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Full Idea:
Deconstruction, I have insisted, is not neutral. It intervenes.
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From:
Jacques Derrida (Positions [1971], p.76)
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A reaction:
This, I think, is because there is in Derrida, as in most French philosophers, a strong streak of Marxism, and a desire to change the world, rather than merely understanding it. Idea 8213 shows the sort of thing he wants to change.
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8213
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I try to analyse certain verbal concepts which block and confuse the dialectical process [Derrida]
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Full Idea:
I have tried to analyse certain marks in writing which are undecidables, false verbal properties, which inhabit philosophical opposition, resisting and disorganising it, without ever constituting a third term, withour ever leaving room for a solution.
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From:
Jacques Derrida (Positions [1971], p.40)
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A reaction:
[I have simplified his sentence!] Much of Derrida seems to be a commentary on the Hegelian dialectic, and the project is presumably to figure out why philosophy is not advancing in the way we would like. Interesting...
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16616
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Substances 'substand' (beneath accidents), or 'subsist' (independently) [Eustachius]
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Full Idea:
It is proper to substance both to stretch out or exist beneath accidents, which is to substand, and to exist per se and not in another, which is to subsist.
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From:
Eustachius a Sancto Paulo (Summa [1609], I.1.3b.1.2), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 06.2
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A reaction:
This reflects Aristotle wavering between 'ousia' being the whole of a thing, or the substrate of a thing. In current discussion, 'substance' still wavers between a thing which 'is' a substance, and substance being the essence.
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16585
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Prime matter is free of all forms, but has the potential for all forms [Eustachius]
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Full Idea:
Everyone says that prime matter, considered in itself, is free of all forms and at the same time is open to all forms - or, that matter is in potentiality to all forms.
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From:
Eustachius a Sancto Paulo (Summa [1609], III.1.1.2.3), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 03.1
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A reaction:
This is the notorious doctrine developed to support the hylomorphic picture derived from Aristotle. No one could quite figure out what prime matter was, so it faded away.
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13097
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Force in substance makes state follow state, and ensures the very existence of substance [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
By the force I give to substances, I understand a state from which another state follows, if nothing prevents it. ...I dare say that without force, there would be no substance.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Lelong [1712], 1712), quoted by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 7.1
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A reaction:
[the whole quote is interesting] This remark, more than any other I have found, places force at the centre of Leibniz's metaphysics. He is using it to resist Spinoza's one-substance view.
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