155 ideas
19608 | Wisdom is just the last gasp of a dying civilization [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Wisdom is the last word of an expiring civilization, the nimbus of historic twilights, fatigue transfigured into a vision of the world, the last tolerance before the advent of newer gods, and of barbarism. A vain attempt at melody among the death rattles. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Twilight') | |
A reaction: I didn't quite get what he said there, but I picked up the tone all right. But I thought wisdom was something sought in the early stages of western civilization, and now relegated to the wings as an idle dream? |
19631 | The history of ideas (and deeds) occurs in a meaningless environment [Cioran] |
Full Idea: The history of ideas, like that of deeds, unfolds in a meaningless climate. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 3) | |
A reaction: This is the 'Tory' view of the history of ideas (as opposed to the 'Whig' view of directedness - a distinction made by historians). I would say there are periods where a certain inevitable sequence is worked out, but then there are dislocations. |
19645 | Some thinkers would have been just as dynamic, no matter when they had lived [Cioran] |
Full Idea: A Kierkegaard, a Nietzsche, had they appeared in the most anodyne age, would have had no less tremulous, no less incendiary an inspiration. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'Truths') | |
A reaction: He is saying that some (only some) thinkers are independent of the age and culture in which they live. Personally I think of those two as distinctive products of a romantic age. Diogenes of Sinope seems a bit of a misfit! |
19624 | Intelligence only fully flourishes at the end of a historical period [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Intelligence flourishes only in the ages when beliefs wither. ...Every period's ending is the mind's paradise, for the mind regains its play and its whims only within an organism in utter dissolution. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Felicity') | |
A reaction: I wouldn't have thought that the facts of history supported this very well. The golden ages of philosophy are the Age of Pericles, the Aristotelian Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and the early twentieth century. |
19599 | Ideas are neutral, but people fill them with passion and weakness [Cioran] |
Full Idea: In itself, every idea is neutral, or should be; but man animates ideas, projects his flames and flaws into them. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Genealogy') | |
A reaction: If it isn't neutral (if, say, it expresses love or hatred) then presumably it doesn't qualify as an 'idea'. Are ideas as neutral as mathematical theorems. It's a nice remark, and a good epigraph for a book on the history of ideas. |
19629 | A nation gives expression to its sum of values, and is then exhausted [Cioran] |
Full Idea: A nation cannot create indefinitely. It is called upon to give expression and meaning to a sum of values which are exhausted with the soul which has begotten them. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 3) | |
A reaction: This phenomenon is obvious. Is it the people who run out of steam, or the ideas and values to which their nation is giving expression? Is this a reason to break up nations every few centuries, and re-form them differently? Break up the UK! |
19621 | Originality in philosophy is just the invention of terms [Cioran] |
Full Idea: The philosopher's originality comes down to inventing terms. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Farewell') | |
A reaction: Analytic philosophers are just as obsessed with inventing terms as their continental rivals. Kit Fine, for example. It can't be wrong to invent terms. Scientists do it too. |
19618 | I abandoned philosophy because it didn't acknowledge melancholy and human weakness [Cioran] |
Full Idea: I turned away from philosophy when it became impossible to discover in Kant any human weakness, any authentic accent of melancholy; in Kant and in all the philosophers. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Farewell') | |
A reaction: An interesting challenge, but if I set out to develop a philosophy based on human weakness I'm not sure where I would start, once I had settled the 'akrasia' [weakness of will] problem. |
19607 | The mind is superficial, only concerned with the arrangement of events, not their significance [Cioran] |
Full Idea: The mind in itself can be only superficial, its nature being uniquely concerned with the arrangement of conceptual events, and not with their implications in the spheres the signify. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 'The Abstract') | |
A reaction: This may be excessively pessimistic, and any decent philosopher must partially concede the point. Thoughts about the significance of historical events just recede into the mist. |
19638 | Metaphysics is a universalisation of physical anguish [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Every metaphysic begins with an anguish of the body, which then becomes universal. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'Underside') | |
A reaction: Not sure if I understand this, but anyone who registers the physical aspect of abstract thought gets a nod of approval from me. |
19620 | Great systems of philosophy are just brilliant tautologies [Cioran] |
Full Idea: The great philosophical systems are no more than brilliant tautologies. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Farewell') | |
A reaction: This makes them sound pointless, but the terms used in the system all have some kind of reference, so the systems are in some way about the world, and not mere private games. At the very least, they are a wonderful branch of poetry. |
6267 | A culture needs to admit that knowledge is more extensive than just 'science' [Putnam] |
Full Idea: The acknowledgement that the sphere of knowledge is wider than the sphere of 'science' seems to me to be a cultural necessity if we are to arrive at a sane and human view of ourselves or of science. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro) | |
A reaction: A very nice remark, with which I intuitively agree, but then you are left with the problem of explaining how something can qualify as knowledge when it can't pass the stringent tests of science. How wide to we spread, and why? |
6272 | 'True' and 'refers' cannot be made scientically precise, but are fundamental to science [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Some non-scientific knowledge is presupposed by science; for example, I have been arguing that 'refers' and 'true' cannot be made scientifically precise; yet truth is a fundamental term in logic - a precise science. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI) | |
A reaction: We might ask whether we 'know' what 'true' and 'refers' mean, as opposed to being able to use them. If their usage doesn't count as knowledge, then we could still end up with all actual knowledge being somehow 'scientific'. |
19807 | Both nature and reason require that everything has a cause [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Under the law of reason nothing takes place without a cause, any more than under the law of nature. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.04) | |
A reaction: Is this the influence of Leibniz? Note that the principle is identified in two different areas, so in nature we may say 'everything has a cause', and in rationality we may say 'there is a reason for everything'. But are these the same? |
19630 | No great idea ever emerged from a dialogue [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Nothing monumental has ever emerged from dialogue, nothing explosive, nothing 'great'. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 3) | |
A reaction: This may be an argument in favour of dialogue! It smacks of the creepier side of Nietzsche's thinking. I suspect individuals have had many great ideas during dialogues, though not as part of them. Greek schools were all dialogue. |
6276 | 'The rug is green' might be warrantedly assertible even though the rug is not green [Putnam] |
Full Idea: 'The rug is green' might be warrantedly assertible even though the rug is not green. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: The word 'warranted' seems to be ambiguous in modern philosophy. See Idea 6150. There seem to be internalist and externalist versions. It seems clear to say that a belief could be well-justified and yet false. |
19636 | Truth is just an error insufficiently experienced [Cioran] |
Full Idea: What we call truth is an error insufficiently experienced. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 5) | |
A reaction: I'm not sure how to go about refuting that claim! Turn the tables, I suppose. 'Tell me, Cioran, are you claiming that this idea is true?' |
19642 | Eventually every 'truth' is guaranteed by the police [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Once a belief is established the police will guarantee its 'truth' sooner or later. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'Views') |
6266 | We need the correspondence theory of truth to understand language and science [Putnam] |
Full Idea: A correspondence theory of truth is needed to understand how language works, and how science works. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro) | |
A reaction: Putnam retreated from this position to a more pragmatic one later on, but all my sympathies are with the present view, despite being repeatedly told by modern philosophers that I am wrong. See McGinn (Idea 6085) and Searle (Idea 3508). |
6277 | Correspondence between concepts and unconceptualised reality is impossible [Putnam] |
Full Idea: The great nineteenth century argument against the correspondence theory of truth was that one cannot think of truth as correspondence to facts (or 'reality') because one would need to compare concepts directly with unconceptualised reality. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: Presumably the criticism was offered by idealists, who preferred a coherence theory. The defence is to say that there is a confusion here between a concept and the contents of a concept. The contents of a concept are designed to be facts. |
6264 | In Tarski's definition, you understand 'true' if you accept the notions of the object language [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Anyone who accepts the notions of whatever object language is in question - and this can be chosen arbitrarily - can also understand 'true' as defined by Tarski for that object language. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro) | |
A reaction: Thus if we say "'snow is white' is true iff snow is white", then if you 'accept the notion' that snow is white in English, you understand what 'true' means. This seems to leave you with the meaning of 'snow is white' being its truth conditions. |
6265 | Tarski has given a correct account of the formal logic of 'true', but there is more to the concept [Putnam] |
Full Idea: What Tarski has done is to give us a perfectly correct account of the formal logic of the concept 'true', but the formal logic of the concept is not all there is to the notion of truth. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro) | |
A reaction: I find this refreshing. A lot of modern philosophers seem to think that truth is no longer an interesting philosophical topic, because deflationary accounts have sidelined it, but I take the concept to be at the heart of metaphysics. |
6269 | Only Tarski has found a way to define 'true' [Putnam] |
Full Idea: There is only one way anyone knows how to define 'true' and that is Tarski's way. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec II.5) | |
A reaction: However, Davidson wrote a paper called 'On the Folly of Trying to Define Truth', which seems to reject even Tarski. Also bear in mind Putnam's earlier remark (Idea 6265) that there is more to truth than Tarski's definition. Just take 'true' as primitive. |
19632 | An axiom has no more authority than a frenzy [Cioran] |
Full Idea: This earth is a place where can confirm anything with an equal likelihood: here axioms and frenzies are interchangeable. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 3) | |
A reaction: A perceptive and poetic expression of the modern anti-Euclidean and anti-Fregean view of axioms, as purely formal features of a model or system. |
6280 | Realism is a theory, which explains the convergence of science and the success of language [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Realism is an empirical theory; it explains the convergence of scientific theories, where earlier theories are often limiting cases of later theories (which is why theoretical terms preserve their reference); and it explains the success of language. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: I agree. Personally, I think of Plato's Theory of Forms and all religions as empirical theories. The response from anti-realists is generally to undermine confidence in the evidence which these 'empirical theories' are said to explain. |
6284 | If a tautology is immune from revision, why would that make it true? [Putnam] |
Full Idea: If we held, say, 'All unmarried men are unmarried' as absolutely immune from revision, why would this make it true? | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: A very nice question. Like most American philosophers, Putnam accepts Quine's attack on the unrevisability of analytic truths. His point here is that defenders of analytic truths are probably desperate to preserve basic truths, but it won't work. |
6273 | Knowledge depends on believing others, which must be innate, as inferences are not strong enough [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Our ability to picture how people are likely to respond may well be innate; indeed, our disposition to believe what other people tell us (which is fundamental to knowledge) could hardly be an inference, as that isn’t good enough for knowledge. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI) | |
A reaction: An interesting claim. There could be an intermediate situation, which is a hard-wired non-conscious inference. When dismantled, the 'innate' brain circuits for assessing testimony could turn out to work on logic and evidence. |
6274 | Empathy may not give knowledge, but it can give plausibility or right opinion [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Empathy with others may give less than 'Knowledge', but it gives more than mere logical or physical possibility; it gives plausibility, or (to revive Platonic terminology) it provides 'right opinion'. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI) | |
A reaction: See Ideas 174 and 2140 for Plato. Putnam is exploring areas of knowledge outside the limits of strict science. Behind this claim seems to lie the Principle of Charity (3971), but a gang of systematic liars (e.g. evil students) would be a problem case. |
17084 | You can't decide which explanations are good if you don't attend to the interest-relative aspects [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Explanation is an interest-relative notion …explanation has to be partly a pragmatic concept. To regard the 'pragmatics' of explanation as no part of the concept is to abdicate the job of figuring out what makes an explanation good. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], p. 41-2), quoted by David-Hillel Ruben - Explaining Explanation Ch 1 | |
A reaction: I suppose this is just obvious, depending on how far you want to take the 'interest-relative' bit. If a fool is fobbed off with a trivial explanation, there must be some non-relative criterion for assessing that. |
19626 | Our instincts had to be blunted and diminished, to make way for consciousness! [Cioran] |
Full Idea: How much our instincts must have had to be blunted and their functioning slackened before consciousness extended its control over the sum of our actions and our thoughts! | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'The Coming') | |
A reaction: Modern wisdom, founded in neuroscience, seems to tell us that the role of consciousness even now is far less than Cioran believed. Once you digest that wisdom, I believe introspection supports it. Still, instinct in animals is much stronger than ours. |
19633 | We use concepts to master our fears; saying 'death' releases us from confronting it [Cioran] |
Full Idea: It is the use of concepts which makes us master of our fears. We say: Death - and this abstraction releases us from experiencing its infinity, its horror. By baptising events and things, we elude the inexplicable. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 3) | |
A reaction: I like this idea. I'm struck by how weird our lives would become if people no longer had names. They are so deeply embedded in our experience that we don't notice them. Imagine if it were taboo to ever name death. |
6282 | Theory of meaning presupposes theory of understanding and reference [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Theory of meaning presupposes theory of understanding and reference. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: How can you have a theory of understanding without a meaning that requires to be understood? Personally I think about the minds of small animals when pondering this, and that seems to put reference and truth at the front of the queue. |
6281 | Truth conditions can't explain understanding a sentence, because that in turn needs explanation [Putnam] |
Full Idea: You can't treat understanding a sentence as knowing its truth conditions, because it then becomes unintelligible what that knowledge in turn consists in. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: The implication, I take it, is circularity; how can you specify truth conditions if you don't understand sentences? Putnam here agrees with Dummett that verification must be involved. Something has to be taken as axiomatic in all this. |
6278 | We should reject the view that truth is prior to meaning [Putnam] |
Full Idea: I am suggesting that we reject the view that truth (based on the semantic theory) is prior to meaning. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: It is a nice question which of truth or meaning has logical priority. One might start by speculating about how and why animals think. A moth attracted to flame is probably working on truth without much that could be called 'meaning'. |
6271 | How reference is specified is not what reference is [Putnam] |
Full Idea: A theory of how reference is specified isn't a theory of what reference is. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec V) | |
A reaction: A simple and important point. We may achieve reference by naming, describing, grunting or pointing, but the question is, what have we achieved when we get there? |
6268 | The claim that scientific terms are incommensurable can be blocked if scientific terms are not descriptions [Putnam] |
Full Idea: The line of reasoning of Kuhn and Feyerabend can be blocked by arguing (as I have in various places, and as Saul Kripke has) that scientific terms are not synonymous with descriptions. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec II.2) | |
A reaction: A nice clear statement of the motivation for creating the causal theory of reference. See Idea 6162. We could still go back and ask whether we could block scientific relativism by rethinking how descriptions work, instead of abandoning them. |
6279 | A private language could work with reference and beliefs, and wouldn't need meaning [Putnam] |
Full Idea: A language made up and used by a being who belonged to no community would have no need for such a concept as the 'meaning' of a term. To state the reference of each term and what the language speaker believes is to tell the whole story. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: A subtle response to Wittgenstein's claim (e.g. Ideas 4152,4158), but I am not sure what Putnam means. I would have thought that beliefs had to be embodied in propositions. They may not need 'meaning' quite as urgently as sentences, but still… |
6270 | The correct translation is the one that explains the speaker's behaviour [Putnam] |
Full Idea: What it is to be a correct translation is to be the translation that best explains the behaviour of the speaker. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec III) | |
A reaction: This seems fairly close to Quine, but rather puzzlingly uses the word 'correct'. If our criteria of translation are purely behavioural, there is no way we can be correct after one word ('gavagai'), so at what point does it become 'correct'? |
6283 | Language maps the world in many ways (because it maps onto other languages in many ways) [Putnam] |
Full Idea: We could say that the language has more than one correct way of being mapped onto the world (it must, since it has more than one way of being correctly mapped onto a language which is itself correctly mapped onto the world). | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: This spells out nicely the significance of Quine's 'indeterminacy of translation'. Others have pointed out that the fact that language maps onto world in many ways need not be anti-realist; the world is endless, and language is limited. |
6275 | You can't say 'most speaker's beliefs are true'; in some areas this is not so, and you can't count beliefs [Putnam] |
Full Idea: The maxim that 'most of a speaker's beliefs are true' as an a priori principle governing radical translation seems to me to go too far; first, I don't know how to count beliefs; second, most people's beliefs on some topics (philosophy) are probably false. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: Putnam prefers a pragmatic view, where charity is applicable if behaviour is involved. Philosophy is too purely theoretical. The extent to which Charity should apply in philosophy seminars is a nice question, which all students should test in practice. |
19615 | I want to suppress in myself the normal reasons people have for action [Cioran] |
Full Idea: I want to suppress in myself the reasons men invoke in order to exist, in order to act. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Gamut') | |
A reaction: So much of our inner and moral life concerns not what we think or feel, but what we want to think or feel. The theory of action (if there can be such a thing) must account for these metareasons, which hover over us while we act. |
19628 | At a civilisation's peak values are all that matters, and people unconsciously live by them [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Epochs of apogee cultivate values for their own sake: life is only a means of realising them; the individual is not aware of living - he lives. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 3) | |
A reaction: This is a very Nietzschean thought. Mind you, a crazed and dangerous crowd exhibits the same absorption in simple values. |
7235 | Without freedom of will actions lack moral significance [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: If you take away all freedom of the will, you strip a man's actions of all moral significance. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.4) | |
A reaction: Rousseau is (in the context) guilty of the basic error of confusing freedom of action with freedom of the will. If the will has scope to act, it has freedom of action; if the will is not contrained in its decision by prior causes, it has freedom of will. |
19646 | Values don't accumulate; they are ruthlessly replaced [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Values do not accumulate: a generation contributes something new only by trampling on what was unique in the preceding generation. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'We') | |
A reaction: That may seem true for a Frenchman or a Romanian, but it doesn't feel true of British culture, which seems to me to have accumulated values over the last five hundred years. Before 1500 it seems to me to be a foreign country. We may be near the end! |
19614 | Lovers are hateful, apart from their hovering awareness of death [Cioran] |
Full Idea: As for lovers, they would be hateful if among their grimaces the presentiment of death did not hover. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Gamut') | |
A reaction: A nice existential corrective, if you were planning to build an ethical system around a rather sentimental idea of love! If you are not gripped by a latent fear that your beloved may die, I doubt whether you are in love. |
19634 | Man is never himself; he always aims at less than life, or more than life [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Able to live only beyond and short of life, man is a prey to two temptation: imbecility and sanctity: sub-man and superman, never himself. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 4 'Threat') | |
A reaction: To me, Taoism embodies imbecility, and spiritual religions embody the superman idea. [This is not Nietzsche's übermensch]. |
19619 | To live authentically, we must see that philosophy is totally useless [Cioran] |
Full Idea: We begin to live authentically only where philosophy ends, at its wreck, when we have understood its terrible nullity, when we have understood that it was futile to resort to it, that it is no help. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Farewell') | |
A reaction: The existentialist dream of trying to find an 'authentic' way of life. That idea means nothing to me. You would need to be utterly immersed in the life of a community with which you identified to live authentically, and that life has almost vanished. |
19622 | The pointlessness of our motives and irrelevance of our gestures reveals our vacuity [Cioran] |
Full Idea: When we realise that no human motive is compatible with infinity, and that no gesture is worth the trouble of making it, our heart, by its very beating, can no longer conceal its vacuity. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Disintoxication') | |
A reaction: An interesting choice of reasons. Nihilism in comparison with infinity, and in comparison with the vastness of society? If you were immortal, and there were only fifty other humans, would that help? |
19612 | The universe is dirty and fragile, as if a scandal in nothingness had produced its matter [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Everything which is done and undone in the universe bears the stamp of a filthy fragility, as if matter were the fruit of a scandal at the core of nothingness. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'The Reactionary') | |
A reaction: A gloriously imagined idea, worthy of Shakespeare. By 'scandal' I suppose he implies that the universe is the bastard child of a horrible relationship. A prize exhibit for my 'Nihilism' collection. True nihilists, of course, don't write books. |
19617 | Evidence suggests that humans do not have a purpose [Cioran] |
Full Idea: By all evidence, we are in the world to do nothing. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Militant') | |
A reaction: I'm not clear what evidence there could be. Other animals are all enmeshed in a particular environment. As soon as homo sapiens left Africa, it became a baffling phenonomen. I'm not sure what an alligator is in the world for, either. |
19604 | Unlike other creatures, mankind seems lost in nature [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Whereas all beings have their place in nature, man remains a metaphysically straying creature, lost in Life, a stranger to the Creation. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'The Indirect5') | |
A reaction: Nice challenge to the Aristotelian idea that we can identify the nature and function of man, and derive an ethics from it. This idea seems to state the essence of existentialism, perhaps better than anything in Sartre. We should have stayed in Africa? |
19606 | We can only live because our imagination and memory are poor [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Life is possible only by the deficiencies of our imagination and our memory | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'The Key') | |
A reaction: Does this mean that we should actually aspire to limit our imaginations and memories? Or are we mercifully intrinsically limited, so that massive intellectual ambition will do no harm? We should be told these things, Cioran! |
19601 | Life is now more dreaded than death [Cioran] |
Full Idea: By dint of accumulating non-mysteries and monopolizing non-meanings, life inspires more dread than death; it is life which is the Great Unknown. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Variations') | |
A reaction: This is the sort of remark we pay continental philosophers to make. |
19602 | You are stuck in the past if you don't know boredom [Cioran] |
Full Idea: The man who knows nothing of ennui is still in the world's childhood. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Dislocation') | |
A reaction: Boredom well may be the central experience of existentialism, rather than angst, or nihilism, or the temptations of suicide. |
19641 | If you lack beliefs, boredom is your martyrdom [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Ennui is the martyrdom of those who live and die for no belief. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'Obsequies') |
19644 | History is the bloody rejection of boredom [Cioran] |
Full Idea: History is the bloody product of the rejection of boredom. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'Views') | |
A reaction: How many absurd and horrible things have been done by people who could not stand being bored? But also, almost everything wonderful has the same source. How did Bach and Shakespeare and Rembrandt feel about boredom? |
19640 | No one is brave enough to say they don't want to do anything; we despise such a view [Cioran] |
Full Idea: No one has the audacity to exclaim: 'I don't want to do anything!' - we are more indulgent with a murderer than with a mind emancipated from actions. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'The Architect') | |
A reaction: Perhaps this should be the anti-epigraph for this website. I've slogged away at this project for nineteen years, probably for no other reason than that inactivity appears to be wicked. If I abandoned it, I would invent another project. Sad. |
19791 | Natural mankind is too fragmented for states of peace, or of war and enmity [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Men are not naturally enemies, for the simple reason that men living in their original state of independence do not have sufficiently constant relationships among themselves to bring about either a state of peace or a state of war. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.4) | |
A reaction: He sees people in a state of nature as more or less solitary, and certainly in groups any more organised than a small family. One might then be in a state of permanent feud, rather than war, but without settlements people can move away. |
20501 | Rousseau assumes that laws need a people united by custom and tradition [Rousseau, by Wolff,J] |
Full Idea: Rousseau assumes that there should already be bonds of custom and tradition uniting a people before it is fit to receive laws. | |
From: report of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762]) by Jonathan Wolff - An Introduction to Political Philosophy (Rev) 3 'Rousseau' | |
A reaction: In unusual circumstances, such as the arrival of a large population at a new colony, it might be that the laws would create the missing customs and traditions. |
7237 | The act of becoming 'a people' is the real foundation of society [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The act by which people become 'a people' is the real foundation of society. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.5) | |
A reaction: The difficulty with many older countries is that it is impossible to identify such an act. Mythologies are created to fictionalise such acts; in Britain we refer back to King Alfred, and to Magna Carta. I suspect 1660 is the key year. |
19792 | To overcome obstacles, people must unite their forces into a single unified power [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Men have no other means of maintaining themselves but to form by aggregation a sum of forces that could gain the upper hand over the resistance of obstacles, so that their forces are directed by means of a single moving power and made to act in concert. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.6) | |
A reaction: I prefer the Aristotelian view, that men are naturally gregarious and social (like bees and ants), so this act of solidarity in superfluous. A human people is only broken up by violence or disaster, like kicking over an ants' nest. |
19812 | Human nature changes among a people, into a moral and partial existence [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The establisher of a people is in a position to change human nature, to transform each individual into a part of a larger whole from which the individual receives his life and being, to substitute a partial and moral existence for natural independence. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.07) | |
A reaction: The 'partial' part is obvious, in the compromises of society, but he says we only become moral in a people, and even more so when that people constitute a state. In the state of nature, morality seems to be unneeded, rather than absent. |
19814 | A state must be big enough to preserve itself, but small enough to be governable [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Like a well-formed man, there are limits to the size a state can have, so as not to be too large to be capable of being well governed, nor too small to be capable of preserving itself on its own. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.09) | |
A reaction: Geneva was his model, and it is close to the size of a Greek polis. Presumably even Scotland would be thought ungovernable, never mind the United States. Luxembourg might be his ideal nowadays. Thousands of them! |
19815 | Too much land is a struggle, producing defensive war; too little makes dependence, and offensive war [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Too much land makes its defence is onerous, its cultivation inadequate, and its yield surplus, which causes defensive wars. If there is not enough land, the state is at the discretion of its neighbours for what it needs as surplus, causing offensive wars. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.10) | |
A reaction: This sounds much too simplistic, like the causes of squabbles in a kindergarten. Certainly inequalities between nations (such as the USA and Mexico) produces frictions. Advances in agriculture technology have transformed this problem. |
19822 | If the state enlarges, the creators of the general will become less individually powerful [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The ratio of the sovereign to the subject increases in proportion to the number of citizens. The larger the state becomes, the less liberty there is. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.01) | |
A reaction: This is because we remain equally subjected to the state whatever its size, but have less power to influence if there are more citizens. In modern states we all feel pathetically powerless, because of the numbers. |
19823 | If the population is larger, the government needs to be more powerful [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: In order to be good, the government must be relatively stronger in proportion as the populace is more numerous. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.01) | |
A reaction: This could either imply a larger government, or more powerful laws for a fairly small government. Rousseau implies an almost mathematical law (of ratios) which determines the size of the government. |
7232 | Man is born free, and he is everywhere in chains [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Man is born free, and he is everywhere in chains. Those who think themselves the masters of others are indeed greater slaves than they. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.1) | |
A reaction: I've always liked the second sentence, though it may be wishful thinking. It is probably rather fun owning slaves. The idea that man is 'born free' strikes me as nonsense. Man is a highly social animal, which only flourishes if enmeshed in a culture. |
7234 | No man has any natural authority over his fellows [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: No man has any natural authority over his fellows. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.4) | |
A reaction: This is, of course, specifically denying that superior strength is the same as a natural right. 'Right' might be a better word than 'authority'. If strength doesn't bestow a natural right, then presumably neither does weakness. |
19816 | A state's purpose is liberty and equality - liberty for strength, and equality for liberty [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The greatest good and purpose of every legislative system boils down to liberty and equality. Liberty because dependence takes force from the body of the state, and equality because liberty cannot subsist without it. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.11) | |
A reaction: The idea of 'taking force' seems to cover the modern welfare state. Rousseau likes robustly self-sufficient citizens. To ensure equality, however, it may be necessary to restrict liberty. |
7247 | The greatest social good comes down to freedom and equality [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The greatest good of all, which ought to be the goal of every system of law, comes down to two main objects, freedom and equality. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.11) | |
A reaction: He goes on the specify the nature of the equality (Idea 7248). A rival pair of goods might be security and opportunity. On balance, I think I prefer my pair to Rousseau's. |
19838 | The measure of a successful state is increase in its population [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The government under which, without external means, without naturalisations, without colonies, the citizens become populous and multiply the most, is infallibly the best government. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.09) | |
A reaction: I'm not sure if this was true in the eighteenth century. Birth control has entirely changed the picture, since affluent people seem less inclined to breed. Presumably poverty increased famine and infant mortality. |
19848 | The sovereignty does not appoint the leaders [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The election of leaders is a function of government and not of the sovereignty. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.3) | |
A reaction: The point is that the general will only establishes the form of government, and not its content. In Britain we accept leaders who are appointed by their own party, and not by the electorate. |
20567 | Rousseau insists that popular sovereignty needs a means of expressing consent [Rousseau, by Oksala] |
Full Idea: Rousseau's idea of popular sovereignty is a much more radical idea of self-government, because he insists that the consent of the people has to have a real means of expression. | |
From: report of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762]) by Johanna Oksala - Political Philosophy: all that matters Ch.5 | |
A reaction: Presumably Hobbes's 'contract' is forgotten in the mists of time, and ceases to be of any interest to a ruler (such as Charles I, who thought God must have appointed him). Perhaps Britain needs an annual ceremony reaffirming the monarch. |
19801 | Sovereignty is the exercise of the general will, which can never be delegated [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Since sovereignty is merely the exercise of the general will, it can never be alienated, and the sovereign which is only a collective being, cannot be represented by anything but itself. Power can perfectly well be transmitted, but not the will. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.01) | |
A reaction: Part of the post-Hobbesian revolution, which sees sovereignty as residing in the will or consensus of the people, rather than in a divine right, or a right of power. In 2016 this isn't going very well. A people choosing to obey is thereby dissolved. |
19805 | Just as people control their limbs, the general-will state has total control of its members [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Just as nature gives each man an absolute power over all of his members, the social compact gives the body politic an absolute over all its members, which is the power directed by the general will, and bearing the name sovereignty. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.04) | |
A reaction: A highly organic view of the state, and his favourite political metaphor. Does the metaphor include disease and madness? In the 1930s Germany went insane. The man may be happy, but are his limbs happy? If I burn my hand? Etc. |
19818 | Political laws are fundamental, as they firmly organise the state - but they could still be changed [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The laws regulating the relationship of the sovereign to the state are political laws, which are also fundamental. There is one way of organising a state, and people should stand by it. ...But a people is always in a position to change its laws. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.12) | |
A reaction: Constitutions take on a sacred and inviolable quality, but Rousseau clearly thinks 'the Sabbath is made for man'. I think the USA is crazy not to change its constitution on the subject of bearing arms. |
19790 | Force can only dominate if it is seen as a right, and obedience as a duty [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The strongest is never strong enough to be master all the time, unless he transforms force into right and obedience into duty. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.3) | |
A reaction: Presumably the people only accept force as a right and obedience as a duty if they appear to be in the people's interests - because the alternative looks worse. In other words, they are terrified. |
19613 | It is pointless to refuse or accept the social order; we must endure it like the weather [Cioran] |
Full Idea: It is equally futile to refuse or to accept the social order: we must endure its changes for the better or the worse with a despairing conformism, as we endure birth, love, the weather, and death. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'The Reactionary') |
7233 | The social order is a sacred right, but based on covenants, not nature [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The social order is a sacred right which serves as a basis for all other rights; and as it is not a natural right, it must be one founded on covenants. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.1) | |
A reaction: I think Rousseau is offering a contradiction here, when he suggests we have a 'sacred' right, which is nevertheless only based on 'covenants'. You can't have it both ways. This is an abuse of the word 'sacred'. |
19842 | The government is instituted by a law, not by a contract [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The act that institutes the government is not a contract but a law. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.18) | |
A reaction: This is a law which implements the general will. There is nothing for citizens to make a contract with, since the sovereign is an abstraction, whereas a social contract is made between actual people. I like Rousseau's big idea. |
7239 | The social pact is the total subjection of individuals to the general will [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The essence of the social pact is that 'each one of us puts into the community his person and all his powers under the supreme direction of the general will; and as a body, we incorporate every member as an indivisible part of the whole'. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.6) | |
A reaction: This is alarmingly like totally subjecting yourself to the 'Will of God', where the big problem is a bunch of priests (or worse) insisting that they know better than you do what that Will consists of. I have no idea what the current Will of Britain is. |
19793 | We need a protective association which unites forces, but retains individual freedom [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The problem is to find a form of association which protects with all common forces the person and goods of each associate, by means of which each one, while uniting with all, nevertheless obeys only himself and remains as free as before. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.6) | |
A reaction: This is the clear purpose of Rousseau's famous concept of the General Will. The idea is that you submit to the general will because you helped formulate it, so you remain free. It is a lovely idea, but notoriously difficult to implement. |
7240 | To foreign powers a state is seen as a simple individual [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: In relation to a foreign power, the body politic is a simple entity, an individual. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.7) | |
A reaction: This is strikingly contrary to the spirit of liberalism, in which I may be appalled by the foreign policy of my own government, and protest strongly against it. Rousseau might be considered as freedom's greatest champion, and greatest enemy! |
19795 | The act of association commits citizens to the state, and the state to its citizens [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The act of association is a reciprocal commitment of public and private individuals, and each individual, contracting with himself, is under a twofold commitment, as a member of the sovereign to individuals, and as a member of the state to the sovereign. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.7) | |
A reaction: This seems to be expressed in modern terms as a mutual entailment of rights and duties. Where the traditional social contract is just between individuals, this seems to be a contract with a unified abstraction, of state commitment to citizens. |
19797 | Citizens must ultimately for forced to accept the general will (so freedom is compulsory!) [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: To avoid the general compact being an empty formula, it tacitly entails the commitment that whoever refuses to obey the general will will be forced to do so by the entire body. This means merely that he will be forced to be free. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.7) | |
A reaction: Rousseau obviously enjoyed this paradox (which sounds like US foreign policy). Apart from anarchism, any political system will need a bit of force to back it up. Should democratic voting becoming compulsory, if the turnout declines too far? |
19796 | Individual citizens still retain a private will, which may be contrary to the general will [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Each individual can, as a man, have a private will contrary to or different from the general will that he has as a citizen. His private interest can speak to him in an entirely different manner than the common interest. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.7) | |
A reaction: So why I accept the general will when these two clash (apart from threat of punishment - which may be capital if I am recalcitrant!)? Usually the general will is also for my good - but not always. Idealist love of the people? |
7244 | The general will is common interest; the will of all is the sum of individual desires [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The general will studies only common interest, while the will of all studies private interest, and is indeed no more than the sum of individual desires. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.03) | |
A reaction: This invites the obvious liberal response (given later by utilitarians: Idea 3778) that there can be no more to any great 'will' than the sum of the individuals (which leads to Margaret Thatcher's famous 'there is no such thing as society'). |
19802 | The general will is always right, but the will of all can err, because it includes private interests [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The general will is always right. ....There is often a great deal of difference between the will of all and the general will. The latter considers only the general interest, but the former considers private interest and is merely the sum of private wills. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.03) | |
A reaction: Hence in order to get an expression of the general will, voters must exclusively focus on the general good. I do that in general elections, only to find that the people around me vote for their own interests. I wish we all did the same thing. |
19803 | If the state contains associations there are fewer opinions, undermining the general will [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: If there are partial association in the state ...there are no longer as many voters as there are men, but merely as many as there are associations. The differences become less numerous and yield a result that is less general. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.03) | |
A reaction: This appears to entirely reject political parties, and similar groups, which he had seen forming in England. It goes with his interesting faith that the more separate views there are, the more the right choice will emerge. |
19804 | If a large knowledgeable population votes in isolation, their many choices will have good results [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: If, when a sufficiently informed populace deliberates, the citizens were to have no communication among themselves, the general will would always result from a large number of small differences, and the deliberations would always be good. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.03) | |
A reaction: An obvious weak point in the electorate being well informed, if someone controls the sources of information. All the optimism of the Enlightenment is in this idea - that rational beings converge of the truth. All pubs closed in the month of an election? |
19808 | The general will changes its nature when it focuses on particulars [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Just as a private will cannot represent the general will, the general will, for its part, alters its nature when it has a particular object. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.04) | |
A reaction: Is the general will, then, in danger of being much too general, because as soon as it gets close to anything practical it becomes distorted. It can design the constitution, but can it give a view on capital punishment, or is that too personal? |
7246 | The general will is always good, but sometimes misunderstood [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: By themselves the people always will what is good, but by themselves they do not always discern it. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.06) | |
A reaction: This sounds like a can of worms. It invites someone to step in as interpreter - a spin doctor, perhaps, or a newspaper proprietor. The first proposition strikes me as absurdly optimistic. Think of the people of Europe in August 1914. |
7250 | Laws are authentic acts of the general will [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The laws are nothing other than the authentic acts of the general will. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.12) | |
A reaction: I wonder how you tell whether an act of the general will is 'authentic'? Nevertheless, in a modern democracy there seems a lot of truth in it; when controversial legislation is in the offing, governments have to be very attentive to the people. |
19844 | Assemblies must always confirm the form of government, and the current administration [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The opening of assemblies, which solely aim to preserve the social treaty, should always start with two separate propositions: 1) does it please the sovereign to preserve the present form of government?, 2) ...and to preserve the present administration? | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.18) | |
A reaction: I would love it if the British people were allowed to discuss our form of government, but it now seems completely ossified. Being a monarchy, with the consequent patronage, almost guarantees this stasis. |
19846 | The more unanimous the assembly, the stronger the general will becomes [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The more harmony reigns in the assemblies, that is to say, the closer opinions come to unanimity, the more dominant too is the general will. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.2) | |
A reaction: This seems important, because the general will comes in degrees. A decision from the assembly would come with an index number indicating its strength. His dream is obviously to get close to unanimity on all decisions. Maybe! Brexit 52%! |
19817 | Citizens should be independent of each other, and very dependent on the state [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Each citizen should be perfectly independent of all the others and excessively dependent on the city. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.12) | |
A reaction: Unlike many other of his pronouncements, this sounds a bit like a welfare state, though I doubt if he means that. Rousseau's state, founded by the general will, seems to have a quasi-religious quality, like a devotee's love of God. |
19840 | A citizen is a subject who is also sovereign [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The words 'subject' and 'sovereign' are identical correlatives, whose meaning is combined in the single word 'citizen'. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.13) | |
A reaction: 'Citizen' was the favourite post-revolutionary label, probably based on this remark. I've heard foreigners tease Britons for being 'subjects' of the monarch, where they are pure citizens. But we are all subject to the law, made by others. |
19839 | The flourishing of arts and letters is too much admired [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Times in which letters and arts are known to have flourished have been admired too much. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.09 n9) | |
A reaction: I assume most marxists would agree with this thought. Eighteenth century France is a good candidate for this judgement. The arts always needed patronage. |
19627 | Opportunists can save a nation, and heroes can ruin it [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Opportunists have saved nations; heroes have ruined them. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Defense') | |
A reaction: Siegfried smashes the staff of Wotan. Napoleon looks like a hero, but he increasingly looks like the single most disastrous figure ever to have emerged in Europe. It took the Germans till 1940 to avenge what he did. |
19833 | Hereditary monarchy is easier, but can lead to dreadful monarchs [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Some crowns are hereditary. So by substituting the disadvantage of regencies for elections, an apparent tranquillity has been preferred to a wise election, the risk of having children, monsters or imbeciles for leaders is preferred to choosing good kings. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
A reaction: Henry VI is the prime English example. The regents feuded, and then when he grew up it became obvious that he was hopeless. How many English monarchs would have been elected? But we would have missed Good Queen Bess. |
19834 | Attempts to train future kings don't usually work, and the best have been unprepared [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: A great deal of effort is made to teach young princes the art of ruling. It does not appear that this education does them any good. It would be better to teach them the art of obeying. The most celebrated kings were not brought up to reign. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
A reaction: King Alfred is our prime example of a success, But if only we had had Charles I's late brother Henry, instead the untrained Charles. |
19798 | Ancient monarchs were kings of peoples; modern monarchs more cleverly rule a land [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Ancient monarchs called themselves King of the Persians or Scythians, regarding themselve merely as the leaders of men. Today's monarchs more shrewdly call themselves King of France or England. By holding the land, they are sure of the inhabitants. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.9) | |
A reaction: This matches the Germans being earlier defined by speaking the language, and now defined by a territory. It is more to do with the rise of the modern state than to do with the shrewdness of the monarchs. |
19831 | The highest officers under a monarchy are normally useless; the public could choose much better [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Those who attain the highest positions in monarchies are most often petty bunglers, swindlers and intriguers, whose talents serve only to display their incompetence to the public. The populace is much less often in error in its choice than the prince. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
A reaction: Many monarchs have had famously good advisers, such as Lord Burleigh. The worst thing about bad leaders, at any level, is the bad appointments they make. |
19829 | Natural aristocracy is primitive, and hereditary is dreadful, but elective aristocracy is best [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: There are three sorts of aristocracy: natural, elective, and hereditary. The first is suited only to simple people; the third is the worst of any government. The second is the best; it is aristocracy properly so-called. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.05) | |
A reaction: This seems like the modern idea of 'meritocracy'. The Chinese civil service exams, introduced into Europe in the nineteenth century. |
7249 | Natural aristocracy is primitive, hereditary is bad, and elective aristocracy is the best [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: There are three types of aristocracy, natural, elective and hereditary. The first is suited only to primitive peoples; the third is the worst of all governments; the second is the best, and this is aristocracy in the true sense of the word. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.05) | |
A reaction: Presumably he means what we call 'meritocracy', and it seems a bit optimistic to hope that democracy will deliver that. I don't think Plato would expect a democracy to elect his Guardians. |
19830 | Large states need a nobility to fill the gap between a single prince and the people [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: With a large state in the hands of one man there is too great a distance between the prince and the people, and the state lacks cohesiveness. This requires intermediate orders of nobility to fill them. A small state is ruined by all these social levels. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
A reaction: [compressed] This seems to be a justification for the French ancien regime. Presumably this bit was not quoted much in 1789. Why must the gap be filled by 'nobility'? What about an elected house of lords? |
19820 | The state has a legislature and an executive, just like the will and physical power in a person [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Every free action has a moral cause, the will, and a physical cause, the power to act. ...The body politic has the same moving causes, namely the legislative power, and executive power. Nothing should be done without their concurrence. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.01) | |
A reaction: [compressed] This terminology is now standard in political philosophy. An absolute monarch like Edward III presumably embodies both branches. |
19827 | Law makers and law implementers should be separate [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: It is not good for the one who makes the laws to execute them. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.04) | |
A reaction: He doesn't give his reasons here, but this piece of wisdom is widely supported. There is a problem when the executive find themselves trying to enforce bad, discredited laws. Maybe the police know best what the law should say? Or not! |
19821 | I call the executive power the 'government', which is the 'prince' - a single person, or a group [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: I call 'government' or supreme administration the legitimate exercise of executive power; I call 'prince' or magistrate the man or body charged with that administration. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.01) | |
A reaction: Whether the prince is one person or many is left up to the legislative body, which is the general will. Rousseau has no view on the matter. |
19824 | Large populations needs stronger control, which means power should be concentrated [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The government becomes slack as the magistrates are multiplied, and the more numerous the people the greater should be the increase of repressive force - ...so the number of leaders should decrease in proportion to the increase of the number of people. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.02) | |
A reaction: This bit sounds Stalinist! A vast population seems to require a dictator. When his state is Geneva-sized Rousseau seems comfortable, but his plans for bigger states are a bit disturbing. |
19826 | Democracy for small states, aristocracy for intermediate, monarchy for large [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Democratic government is suited to small states, aristocratic government to states of intermediate size, and monarchical government to large ones. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.03) | |
A reaction: Is he thinking of France for the large state? What would he have made of 1789? Does this progression go on to increase the power of the monarch as the state gets even larger, into dictatorship? |
19837 | If inhabitants are widely dispersed, organising a revolt is much more difficult [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The greater the area occupied by the same number of inhabitants, the more difficult it becomes to revolt, since concerted action cannot be taken promptly and secretly. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.09) | |
A reaction: Revolutions since then have all occurred in large cities, which have become huge. The dispersal of the rest of the population (as in Russia) doesn't matter. |
19843 | The state is not bound to leave civil authority to its leaders [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The state is no more bound to leave civil authority to its leaders than it is to leave military authority to its generals. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.18) | |
A reaction: He assumes that a meeting of the citizens can articulate a new expression of the general will, but this idea also endorses revolution, if the prince or magistrates refuse to call this national AGM. |
19825 | If the sovereign entrusts government to at least half the citizens, that is 'democracy' [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The sovereign can entrust the government to the entire people or to the majority of them. This is given the name 'democracy'. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.03) | |
A reaction: Note that democracy is here a form for the executive, not for the legislature. I take it that the general will must come close to unanimity, and a mere 51% support for fundamental legislation would never do. Increase the percentage with the importance? |
19832 | Democratic elections are dangerous intervals in government [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Elections leave dangerous intervals and are stormy. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
A reaction: American presidential elections partially paralyse government for about nine months. In a settled democracy the process of election seems OK. The immediate aftermath can be worse. Losers may refuse to accept the result. |
7243 | Silence of the people implies their consent [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The silence of the people permits the assumption that the people consents. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.01) | |
A reaction: This seems to me a crucial principle for a democracy, because it says that the democratic way of life is much more than elections. Each citizen has a duty to bravely speak out; the more citizens willing to do this, the less bravery is required. |
7251 | The English are actually slaves in between elections [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The English people believes itself to be free; it is gravely mistaken; it is free only during the election of Members of Parliament; as soon as the Members are elected, the people is enslaved. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.15) | |
A reaction: Rousseau seems to be hoping for some sort of direct democracy. We could probably set up a direct democracy, by implementing regular voting over the internet, but I doubt if Rousseau would like that either. I certainly wouldn't. |
7238 | Minorities only accept majority-voting because of a prior unanimous agreement [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: If there were no earlier agreement, how could there be any obligation on the minority to accept the decision of the majority? The law of majority-voting rests on a covenant, implying at least one previous occasion of unanimity. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.5) | |
A reaction: In Britain this points to the Reform Acts of 1832 onwards as crucial. However, whenever democracy is newly introduced into a country (Iraq being a current spectacular case) there is usually a minority opposed to it, who are forcibly overruled. |
19828 | Democracy leads to internal strife, as people struggle to maintain or change ways of ruling [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: No government is so subject to civil wars and internal agitations as a democratic or popular one, since there is none that tends so forcefully and continuously to change its form, or that demands greater vigilance and courage to keep its form. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.05) | |
A reaction: We would like to think that a robust democracy, with a free press, can cope with all this strife and still survive. He may be thinking of the English Civil War. Democracies seem to be more conservative about the structure of government. |
19835 | When ministers change the state changes, because they always reverse policies [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Each revolution in the ministry produces a revolution in the state, since the maxim common to all ministers and nearly all kings is to do the reverse of their predecessor in everything. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
A reaction: Most parents bring up their children by trying to correct mistakes their own parents made. British democracy is rife with this desperate need for a new government to make its mark, because they want to win the next election. |
19849 | In early theocracies the god was the king, and there were as many gods as nations [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: At first men had no other kings but gods, and no other government than a theocratic one. ....By the mere fact that a god was placed at the head of every political society, it followed that there were as many gods as there were peoples. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
A reaction: He must be thinking of the Old Testament histories here. (see Spinoza on that!). He says that the modern idea that these were all really the same god is ridiculous. |
19847 | We can never assume that the son of a slave is a slave [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: To decide that the son of a slave is born a slave is to decide that he is not a man. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.2) | |
A reaction: Obviously this is because men are 'born free', though I am not clear how that maxim can be reached. I take it for granted that African slaves in the Americas found themselves born into slavery. No justification was required. |
19841 | Sometimes full liberty is only possible at the expense of some complete enslavement [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: There are some unfortunate circumstances where one's liberty can be preserved only at the expense of someone else's, and where the citizen can be perfectly free only if the slave is completely enslaved. Such was the situation in Sparta. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.15) | |
A reaction: Rousseau wrote just before the moment when it was seen that slavery in European empires might be abolished, but he was not in the forefront of thought on this one. Greek philosophy would probably never have happened without slavery. |
7242 | Appetite alone is slavery, and self-prescribed laws are freedom [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: To be governed by appetite alone is slavery, while obedience to a law one prescribes to oneself is freedom. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.8) | |
A reaction: An interesting formulation, sitting somewhere between Aristotle and Kant. The problem is to find a metaethic which will justify the prescription and nature of the self-imposed law. |
19800 | The social compact imposes conventional equality of rights on people who may start unequally [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Instead of destroying natural equality, the fundamental compact substitutes a moral and legitimate equality to any natural physical inequality. ...so that men all become equal by convention and by right. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.9) | |
A reaction: This does not pretend that equality is a natural right. The imposition of equality is virtually the main point of forming a state. Effectively, the state operates like an insurance company, treating all contributors as equal. |
7248 | No citizen should be rich enough to buy another, and none so poor as forced to sell himself [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Where wealth is concerned, no citizen should be rich enough to buy another, and none should be so poor as to be forced to sell himself. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.11) | |
A reaction: Rousseau is thinking of slavery, but this also points to prostitution as a key indicator of social equality. In Victorian Britain it seems that extensive prostituion was unavoidable; nowadays it looks more like a voluntary choice (for indigenous Britons). |
19794 | If we all give up all of our rights together to the community, we will always support one another [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The social compact reduces to a single clause, namely the total alienation of each associate, together with all of his rights, to the entire community. Since this condition is equal for everyone, no one has an interest in making it burdensome for others. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.6) | |
A reaction: He speaks elsewhere of basic natural rights which can never be alienated, such as self-defence. It is what small groups do all the time, if they start off as equals. Difficult to manage with large groups. Factions are the problem. |
7241 | In society man loses natural liberty, but gains a right to civil liberty and property [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: What man loses by the social contract is his natural liberty and the absolute right to anything that tempts him; what he gains is civil liberty and the legal rights of propery in what he possesses. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.8) | |
A reaction: It is an appealing idea that the purpose of society is to increase liberty, not to restrict it. That, on the whole, is my view. American libertarianism opens up the world to gun crime, vigilantes, pornographers and bounty-hunters. |
19806 | We alienate to society only what society needs - but society judges that, not us [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Each person alienates, by the social compact, only that portion of his power, his goods, and liberty whose use is of consequence to the community; but we must also grant that only the sovereign is the judge of what is of consequence. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.04) | |
A reaction: The weakness here is how society sees its needs. He seems to assume that two societies will arrive at almost identical general wills, but Spartans, Prussians and Serbs may require the lives of your children for the state. |
19799 | Private property must always be subordinate to ownership by the whole community [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Each private individual's right to his very own store is always subordinate to the community's right to all, without which there could be neither solidity in the social fabric nor real force in the exercise of sovereignty. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.9) | |
A reaction: This may sound a bit drastic, but every country practices this principle, seen in compulsory purchase orders (e.g. to build a railway line). In liberal democracies you expect good compensation. In communist Roumania you were just moved. Also taxation. |
19819 | The state ensures liberty, so civil law separates citizens, and binds them to the state [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The relationship of members to each other should be as small as possible, and as large as possible to the entire body. ...Only the force of the state brings about the liberty of its members. From this relationship civil laws arise. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.12) | |
A reaction: I'm guessing that these laws could be said mainly to prescribe both our rights and our duties. His four types of law are political, civil, criminal, and customary. |
7245 | Natural justice, without sanctions, benefits the wicked, who exploit it [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The laws of natural justice, lacking any natural sanctions, are unavailing among men. In fact, such laws merely benefit the wicked and injure the just, since the just respect them while others do not do so in return. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.06) | |
A reaction: This seems a very accurate observation, and points us towards either contracts, or a justification of the use of force by good people. |
19809 | We accept the death penalty to prevent assassinations, so we must submit to it if necessary [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Whoever wills the end also wills the means. ...The death penalty inflicted on criminals can be viewed from more or less this point of view. It is in order to avoid being the victim of an assassin that a person consents to die, were he to become one. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.05) | |
A reaction: This seems to be roughly the spirit in which Socrates submitted to his death. I doubt whether many criminals agree with harsh punishments dished out to other criminals who get caught. |
19810 | A trial proves that a criminal has broken the social treaty, and is no longer a member of the state [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The legal proceeding and judgement are the proofs and the declaration that a criminal has broken the social treaty, and consequently that he is no longer a member of the state. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.05) | |
A reaction: This seems to be a plausible rationalisation of capital punishment, but what about lesser crimes. Is the interior of a prison a sort of temporary exile from the state? Hence the significance of whether prisoners are allowed to vote. But 19811. |
19811 | Only people who are actually dangerous should be executed, even as an example [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: There is no wicked man who could not be made good for something. One has the right to put to death, even as an example, only someone who cannot be preserved without danger. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.05) | |
A reaction: This formulation implies that we could execute a dangerous person as a deterrent, even though they were not guilty of this particular crime. I suspect that Rousseau was too nice to go through with that. |
7236 | War gives no right to inflict more destruction than is necessary for victory [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: War gives no right to inflict any more destruction than is necessary for victory. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.4) | |
A reaction: This is the principle at stake in discussion of the bombing of Germany in 1942-5. We all seem to agree with this principle, and are shocked by breaches of it, but I am not sure why. Destruction must be a fundamentally bad thing - a basic value. |
23607 | Wars are between States, not people, and the individuals are enemies by accident [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: War is something that occurs not between man and man, but between States. The individuals who become involved in it are enemies only by accident. A State can have as its enemies only other States, not men at all. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], p.249), quoted by Jeff McMahan - Killing in War 2.5 | |
A reaction: This is the classic statement of the collectivist view, which goes on to assert that the morality of warfare is quite different from ordinary morality. McMahan argues against this view, very persuasively. |
19850 | By separating theological and political systems, Jesus caused divisions in the state [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: In separating the theological system from the political system, Jesus made the state to cease being united and caused internal divisions. Since this new idea of an otherwordly kingdom had never entered the heads of pagans, they saw Christians as rebels. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
A reaction: This is the sort of stuff that made Rousseau a vast number of enemies, which embittered him. It is the sort of cool assessment which became commonplace in Germany sixty year later. |
19851 | Every society has a religion as its base [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: No state has ever been founded without religion serving as its base. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
A reaction: It is not clear to me that the ancient Greek cities had religion as a 'base', though they all had a religion, and expected conformity. Religion doesn't figure much in Thucydides. Communist Russia was the first explicitly atheist state, I think. |
19852 | Civil religion needs one supreme god, an afterlife, justice, and the sanctity of the social contract [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Dogmas of civil religion should be simple. The existence of a powerful, intelligent, beneficent divinity that foresees and provides; the life to come; the happiness of the just; the punishment of the wicked; the sanctity of the social contract and laws. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
A reaction: Notice that he gratuitously makes the social contract sacred (even though it can be voluntarily abandoned, and the general will can be changed). Presumably the foundation of any society, such as the ballot box, has to be sacred. |
19625 | The ideal is to impose a religion by force, and then live in doubt about its beliefs [Cioran] |
Full Idea: To belong to a church uncertain of its god - after once imposing that god by fire and sword - should be the ideal of every detached mind. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Felicity') | |
A reaction: I'm trying hard to think of an adequate response to this. I'll get back to you.... |
19853 | All religions should be tolerated, if they tolerate each other, and support citizenship [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: Tolerance should be shown to all religions which tolerate other religions, so long as their dogmas contain nothing contrary to the duties of a citizen. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
A reaction: Quite a good guideline for the attitude of western countries to middle eastern religious practices which arrive in their midst. Rousseau says the state has a minimal core religion (Idea 19852), which thus tolerates most other religions. |
19836 | The amount of taxation doesn't matter, if it quickly circulates back to the citizens [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: It is not on the basis of the amount of taxation that the burden is measured, but on the basis of the path they have to travel in order to return to the hands from which they came. If circulation is prompt and regular, the amount one pays is unimportant. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.08) | |
A reaction: So the problem is when the government wants to build up a surplus, or pay off debts (or is corrupt, or even if it is suspected of corruption). |
19637 | History is wonderfully devoid of meaning [Cioran] |
Full Idea: That History has no meaning is what should delight our hearts. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 5) | |
A reaction: I have just read a history of the Wars of the Roses, and I wholeheartedly endorse Cioran's view. |
19605 | Despite endless suggestions, no one has found a goal for history [Cioran] |
Full Idea: No one has found a valid goal for history; but everyone has proposed one. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'The Indirect') | |
A reaction: This seems to be an attack on the Hegelian idea of destiny that suffused both marxism and fascism in the 1930s. |
19610 | Religions see suicide as insubordination [Cioran] |
Full Idea: If the religions have forbidden us to die by our own hand, it is because they saw that such practices set an example of insubordination which humiliated temples and gods alike. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Resources') | |
A reaction: Has anyone ever committed suicide in a cathedral (even during a service)? How many bishops, cardinals, rabbis etc have committed suicide? It is not uncommon among priests in the lower echelons. |
19609 | If you have not contemplated suicide, you are a miserable worm [Cioran] |
Full Idea: The man who has never imagined his own annihilation, who has not anticipated recourse to the rope, the bullet, poison, or the sea, is a degraded galley slave or a worm crawling upon the cosmic carrion. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1'Resources') | |
A reaction: I guess by this date everyone in Paris had read Camus' 'The Myth of Sisyphus', so suicide was the main topic in the cafés. I sort of agree with it. The possibility of suicide is part of the examined life. |
19611 | No one has ever found a good argument against suicide [Cioran] |
Full Idea: No church, no civil institution has as yet invented a single argument valid against suicide. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Resources') | |
A reaction: Suicide in young people usually looks like an error of judgement (in quiet moments of history). You need more inductive evidence that life is going to be irremediably awful. But if life is fine but they choose suicide anyway, what can you say? |
19639 | We all need sexual secrets! [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Woe to those who have no sexual secrets! | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'Wonders') |
19603 | Why is God so boring, and why does God resemble humanity so little? [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Why is God so dull, so feeble, so inadequately picturesque? Why does He lack interest, vigor, actuality and resemble us so little? Is there any image less anthropomorphic and more gratuitously remote? | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'The Devil') | |
A reaction: This seems to be directed at those like Feuerbach who said that we had merely created God as a glorified image of humanity. |
7252 | A tyrant exploits Christians because they don't value this life, and are made to be slaves [Rousseau] |
Full Idea: The Christian spirit is too favourable to tyranny for tyranny not to take advantage of it. True Christians are made to be slaves; they know it and hardly care; this short life has too little value in their eyes. | |
From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
A reaction: This is strikingly close to Nietzsche's verdict on Christianity, that it is the essence of slave morality. It has certainly been my experience that Christians tend to be much more reluctant than other people to stand up to authority. |
19616 | As the perfect wisdom of detachment, philosophy offers no rivals to Taoism [Cioran] |
Full Idea: China alone long since arrived at a refined wisdom superior to philosophy: Taoism surpasses all the mind has conceived by way of detachment. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Militant') | |
A reaction: Personally I dislike Taoism, which seems to advocate a sort of suicide within life. But given Cioran's evident state of mind, I can see its attractions. If this country deteriorates any further [I write on 4th July 2016], I may turn to Taoism. |
19600 | When man abandons religion, he then follows new fake gods and mythologies [Cioran] |
Full Idea: Even when he turns from religion, man remains subject to it; depleting himself to create fake gods, he then feverishly adopts them: his need for fiction, for mythology triumphs over evidence and absurdity alike. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 1 'Genealogy') | |
A reaction: Cioran had just lived through the high water mark of communism and fascism. I don't think modern atheists fit this description very well. |
19643 | A religion needs to motivate killings, and cannot tolerate rivals [Cioran] |
Full Idea: A religion dies when it tolerates truths which exclude it; and the god in whose name one no longer kills is dead indeed. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], 6 'Views') | |
A reaction: I fear that in our time we have people who are killing in the name of their religion as a last resort to try to convince themselves that their religion is not dying. It is startlingly how religion can now be publicly mocked. Unthinkable 50 years ago. |
19623 | Circles of hell are ridiculous; all that matters is to be there [Cioran] |
Full Idea: What a preposterous notion, to draw circles in hell, to make the intensity of the flames vary in its compartments, to hierarchise its torments! The important thing is to be there. | |
From: E.M. Cioran (A Short History of Decay [1949], '1 'La Perduta') |