39 ideas
| 8766 | In much wisdom is much grief [Anon (Ecc)] |
| Full Idea: In much wisdom is much grief. | |
| From: Anon (Ecc) (21: Book of Ecclesiastes [c.200 BCE], 01.18) | |
| A reaction: If this is true, then the question is of what there is in wisdom that will compensate for the grief. Personally I doubt the whole claim. Some wisdom involves grief, but most of it involves pleasure, even when understanding of evil is the target. |
| 21887 | Derrida focuses on other philosophers, rather than on science [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: We should focus on other philosophers, and not on science. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21888 | Philosophy is just a linguistic display [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Philosophy is entirely linguistic, and is a display. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21896 | Philosophy aims to build foundations for thought [Derrida, by May] |
| Full Idea: Derrida points out that the project of philosophy consists largely in attempting to build foundations for thought. | |
| From: report of Jacques Derrida (works [1990]) by Todd May - Gilles Deleuze 1.04 | |
| A reaction: You would first need to be convinced that there could be such a thing as foundations for thinking. Derrida thinks the project is hopeless. I think of it more as building an ideal framework for thought. |
| 21893 | Philosophy is necessarily metaphorical, and its writing is aesthetic [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: All of philosophy is necessarily metaphorical, and hence aesthetic. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 7494 | Laughter is mad; of mirth, what doeth it? [Anon (Ecc)] |
| Full Idea: I said of laughter, It is mad: and of mirth, what doeth it? | |
| From: Anon (Ecc) (21: Book of Ecclesiastes [c.200 BCE], 02.02) | |
| A reaction: Not much of an argument, but an interesting support for the extreme anti-hedonistic puritanical view. Most people would praise laughter as an end in itself, so 'what doeth it?' seems to miss the point. |
| 8767 | Sorrow is better than laughter [Anon (Ecc)] |
| Full Idea: Sorrow is better than laughter: for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better. | |
| From: Anon (Ecc) (21: Book of Ecclesiastes [c.200 BCE], 07.03) | |
| A reaction: This writer fails to see the good in laughter. If he did, he would have a more balanced view, and we could take this opinion more seriously. Theatre audiences always seem keen to hunt out jokes where none are intended. |
| 21892 | Interpretations can be interpreted, so there is no original 'meaning' available [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Because interpretations of texts can be interpreted, they can therefore have no 'original meaning'. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 20934 | Hermeneutics is hostile, trying to overcome the other person's difference [Derrida, by Zimmermann,J] |
| Full Idea: Derrida described the hermeneutic impulse to understand another as a form of violence that seeks to overcome the other's particularity and unique difference. | |
| From: report of Jacques Derrida (works [1990]) by Jens Zimmermann - Hermeneutics: a very short introduction App 'Derrida' | |
| A reaction: I'm not sure about 'violence', but Derrida was on to somethng here. The 'hermeneutic circle' sounds like a creepy process of absorption, where the original writer disappears in a whirlpool of interpretation. |
| 20925 | Hermeneutics blunts truth, by conforming it to the interpreter [Derrida, by Zimmermann,J] |
| Full Idea: Derrida worried that hermeneutics blunts the disruptive power of truth by forcing it conform to the interpreter's mental horizon. | |
| From: report of Jacques Derrida (works [1990]) by Jens Zimmermann - Hermeneutics: a very short introduction 3 'The heart' | |
| A reaction: Good heavens - I agree with Derrida. Very French, though, to see the value of truth in its disruptiveness. I tend to find the truth reassuring, but then I'm English. |
| 21895 | Structuralism destroys awareness of dynamic meaning [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Structuralism destroys awareness of dynamic meaning. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21934 | The idea of being as persistent presence, and meaning as conscious intelligibility, are self-destructive [Derrida, by Glendinning] |
| Full Idea: The tradition of conceiving being in terms of persisting presence, and meaning in terms of pure intelligibility or logos potentially present to the mind, finds itself dismantled by resources internal to its own construction. | |
| From: report of Jacques Derrida (works [1990]) by Simon Glendinning - Derrida: A Very Short Introduction 6 | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Glendinning says this is the basic meaning of de-construction. My personal reading of this is that Aristotle is right, and grand talk of Being is hopeless, so we should just aim to understand objects. I also believe in propositions. |
| 21881 | We aim to explore the limits of expression (as in Mallarmé's poetry) [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: The aim is to explore the limits of expression (which is what makes the poetry of Mallarmé so important). | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21883 | Sincerity can't be verified, so fiction infuses speech, and hence reality also [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Sincerity can never be verified, so fiction infuses all speech, which means that reality is also fictional. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21882 | Sentences are contradictory, as they have opposite meanings in some contexts [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Sentences are implicitly contradictory, because they can be used differently in different contexts (most obviously in 'I am ill'). | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 4756 | Derrida says that all truth-talk is merely metaphor [Derrida, by Engel] |
| Full Idea: Derrida's view is that every discourse is metaphorical, and there is no difference between truth-talk and metaphor. | |
| From: report of Jacques Derrida (works [1990]) by Pascal Engel - Truth §2.5 | |
| A reaction: Right. Note that this is a Frenchman's summary. How would one define metaphor, without mentioning that it is parasitic on truth? Certainly some language tries to be metaphor, and other language tries not to be. |
| 21877 | True thoughts are inaccessible, in the subconscious, prior to speech or writing [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: 'True' thoughts are inaccessible, buried in the subconscious, long before they get to speech or writing. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction | |
| A reaction: [My reading of some Derrida produced no quotations. I've read two commentaries, which were obscure. The Derrida ideas in this db are my simplistic tertiary summaries. Experts can chuckle over my failure] |
| 21878 | Names have a subjective aspect, especially the role of our own name [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: We can give a subjective account of names, by considering our own name. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21889 | 'I' is the perfect name, because it denotes without description [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: 'I' is the perfect name, because it denotes without description. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21879 | Even Kripke can't explain names; the word is the thing, and the thing is the word [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Even Kripke can't explain names, because the word is the thing, and also the thing is the word. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 10938 | The extremes of essentialism are that all properties are essential, or only very trivial ones [Rami] |
| Full Idea: It would be natural to label one extreme view 'maximal essentialism' - that all of an object's properties are essential - and the other extreme 'minimal' - that only trivial properties such as self-identity of being either F or not-F are essential. | |
| From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008]) | |
| A reaction: Personally I don't accept the trivial ones as being in any way describable as 'properties'. The maximal view destroys any useful notion of essence. Leibniz is a minority holder of the maximal view. I would defend a middle way. |
| 10940 | An 'individual essence' is possessed uniquely by a particular object [Rami] |
| Full Idea: An 'individual essence' is a property that in addition to being essential is also unique to the object, in the sense that it is not possible that something distinct from that object possesses that property. | |
| From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008], §5) | |
| A reaction: She cites a 'haecceity' (or mere bare identity) as a trivial example of an individual essence. |
| 10939 | 'Sortal essentialism' says being a particular kind is what is essential [Rami] |
| Full Idea: According to 'sortal essentialism', an object could not have been of a radically different kind than it in fact is. | |
| From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008], §4) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as thoroughly wrong. Things belong in kinds because of their properties. Could you remove all the contingent features of a tiger, leaving it as merely 'a tiger', despite being totally unrecognisable? |
| 10934 | Unlosable properties are not the same as essential properties [Rami] |
| Full Idea: It is easy to confuse the notion of an essential property that a thing could not lack, with a property it could not lose. My having spent Christmas 2007 in Tennessee is a non-essential property I could not lose. | |
| From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008], §1) | |
| A reaction: The idea that having spent Christmas in Tennessee is a property I find quite bewildering. Is my not having spent my Christmas in Tennessee one of my properties? I suspect that real unlosable properties are essential ones. |
| 10933 | Physical possibility is part of metaphysical possibility which is part of logical possibility [Rami] |
| Full Idea: The usual view is that 'physical possibilities' are a natural subset of the 'metaphysical possibilities', which in turn are a subset of the 'logical possibilities'. | |
| From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008], §1) | |
| A reaction: [She cites Fine 2002 for an opposing view] I prefer 'natural' to 'physical', leaving it open where the borders of the natural lie. I take 'metaphysical' possibility to be 'in all naturally possible worlds'. So is a round square a logical possibility? |
| 10932 | If it is possible 'for all I know' then it is 'epistemically possible' [Rami] |
| Full Idea: There is 'epistemic possibility' when it is 'for all I know'. That is, P is epistemically possible for agent A just in case P is consistent with what A knows. | |
| From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008], §1) | |
| A reaction: Two problems: maybe 'we' know, and A knows we know, but A doesn't know. And maybe someone knows, but we are not sure about that, which seems to introduce a modal element into the knowing. If someone knows it's impossible, it's impossible. |
| 21890 | Heidegger showed that passing time is the key to consciousness [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Heidegger showed us the importance of transient time for consciousness. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21880 | 'Tacit theory' controls our thinking (which is why Freud is important) [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: All thought is controlled by tacit theory (which is why Freud is so important). | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction | |
| A reaction: This idea is said to be the essential thought of Derrida's Deconstruction. The aim is liberation of thought, by identifying and bypassing these tacit metaphysical schemas. |
| 21884 | Capacity for repetitions is the hallmark of language [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: The capacity for repetitions is the hallmark of language. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21935 | The sign is only conceivable as a movement between elusive presences [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: The sign is conceivable only on the basis of the presence that it defers, and moving toward the deferred presence that it aims to reappropriate. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Simon Glendinning - Derrida: A Very Short Introduction 6 | |
| A reaction: [Glendinning gives no source for this] I take the fundamental idea to be that meanings are dynamic, when they are traditionally understood as static (and specifiable in dictionaries). |
| 21930 | For Aristotle all proper nouns must have a single sense, which is the purpose of language [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: A noun [for Aristotle] is proper when it has but a single sense. Better, it is only in this case that it is properly a noun. Univocity is the essence, or better, the telos of language. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Simon Glendinning - Derrida: A Very Short Introduction 5 | |
| A reaction: [no ref given] His target seem to be Aristotelian definition, and also formal logic, which usually needs unambiguous meanings. {I'm puzzled that he thinks 'telos' is simply better than 'essence', since it is quite different]. |
| 21933 | Writing functions even if the sender or the receiver are absent [Derrida, by Glendinning] |
| Full Idea: Writing can and must be able to do without the presence of the sender. ...Also writing can and must he able to do without the presence of the receiver. | |
| From: report of Jacques Derrida (works [1990]) by Simon Glendinning - Derrida: A Very Short Introduction 6 | |
| A reaction: In simple terms, one of them could die during the transmission. This is the grounds for the assertion of the primacy of writing. It opposes orthodox views which define language in terms of sender and receiver. |
| 21886 | Meanings depend on differences and contrasts [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Meaning depends on 'differences' (contrasts). | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21894 | Madness and instability ('the demonic hyperbole') lurks in all language [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Madness and instability ('the demonic hyperbole') lurks behind all language. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21931 | 'Dissemination' is opposed to polysemia, since that is irreducible, because of multiple understandings [Derrida, by Glendinning] |
| Full Idea: The intention to oppose polysemia with dissemination does not aim to affirm that everything we say is ambiguous, but that polysemia is irreducible in the sense that each and every 'meaning' is itself subject to more than one understanding. | |
| From: report of Jacques Derrida (works [1990]) by Simon Glendinning - Derrida: A Very Short Introduction 5 | |
| A reaction: The key point, I think, is that ambiguity and polysemia are not failures of language (which is the way most logicians see it), but part of the essential and irreducible nature of language. Nietzsche started this line of thought. |
| 21885 | Words exist in 'spacing', so meanings are never synchronic except in writing [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Words only exist is 'spacings' (of time and space), so there are no synchronic meanings (except perhaps in writing). | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction |
| 21891 | The good is implicitly violent (against evil), so there is no pure good [Derrida] |
| Full Idea: Even the good is implicitly violent (against evil), so there can be no 'pure' good. | |
| From: Jacques Derrida (works [1990]), quoted by Barry Stocker - Derrida on Deconstruction | |
| A reaction: Is good implicitly non-violent? Appropriate anger seems to be good behaviour, and I can't see why it is impure. Maybe anger and violence lack the control needed for pure goodness. |
| 8765 | All is vanity, saith the Preacher [Anon (Ecc)] |
| Full Idea: Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity. | |
| From: Anon (Ecc) (21: Book of Ecclesiastes [c.200 BCE], 01.02) | |
| A reaction: If we are swamped by vanity, then there is presumably no hope for the other virtues. A more balanced view would say that we should aim for a mean on the scale of self-esteem, which probably requires an effort to be objective about ourselves. |
| 8768 | Books are endless, and study is wearisome [Anon (Ecc)] |
| Full Idea: Of making many books there is no end; and much study is weariness of the flesh. | |
| From: Anon (Ecc) (21: Book of Ecclesiastes [c.200 BCE], 12.12) | |
| A reaction: Does anyone share my occasional sinking heart on entering a large library or bookshop? I truly believe that there is nothing better in the world than books. And yet, and yet... |