5 ideas
21982 | I only wish I had such eyes as to see Nobody! It's as much as I can do to see real people. [Carroll,L] |
Full Idea: "I see nobody on the road," said Alice. - "I only wish I had such eyes," the King remarked. ..."To be able to see Nobody! ...Why, it's as much as I can do to see real people." | |
From: Lewis Carroll (C.Dodgson) (Through the Looking Glass [1886], p.189), quoted by A.W. Moore - The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics 07.7 | |
A reaction: [Moore quotes this, inevitably, in a chapter on Hegel] This may be a better candidate for the birth of philosophy of language than Frege's Groundwork. |
6017 | Nomos is king [Pindar] |
Full Idea: Nomos is king. | |
From: Pindar (poems [c.478 BCE], S 169), quoted by Thomas Nagel - The Philosophical Culture | |
A reaction: This seems to be the earliest recorded shot in the nomos-physis wars (the debate among sophists about moral relativism). It sounds as if it carries the full relativist burden - that all that matters is what has been locally decreed. |
7598 | Zoroaster and the Hebrew prophets evolved different versions of monotheism [Zoroaster, by Armstrong,K] |
Full Idea: Zoroaster and the Hebrew prophets evolved different versions of monotheism. | |
From: report of Zoroaster (The Gathas (seventeen hymns) [c.900 BCE]) by Karen Armstrong - A History of God Ch.1 | |
A reaction: This seems to be the consensus on the origins of monotheism, which places the development much earlier than the appearance of the idea in Greek philosophy. |
7472 | Zarathustra was the first to present a god who is an abstract concept [Zoroaster] |
Full Idea: Zarathustra's achievement was for the first time to present a god who is an abstract concept - he broke with the tradition of a pantheon of gods. | |
From: Zoroaster (The Gathas (seventeen hymns) [c.900 BCE]), quoted by Peter Watson - Ideas Ch.05 | |
A reaction: The more abstract the gods become, the harder it is to challenge their existence. |
20672 | Zoroastrianism saw the world as a battle between good evil gods [Zoroaster, by Harari] |
Full Idea: Zoroastrianism saw the world as a cosmic battle between the good god Ahura Mazda and the evil god Angra Mainyu. | |
From: report of Zoroaster (The Gathas (seventeen hymns) [c.900 BCE]) by Yuval Noah Harari - Sapiens: brief history of humankind 12 'Battle' | |
A reaction: Hm. This contradicts the impression I had gained that it was monotheist. |