Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Mahaprajnaparamitashastra', 'Giordano Bruno and Hermetic Tradition' and 'In Defense of a Dogma'

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4 ideas

1. Philosophy / B. History of Ideas / 4. Early European Thought

9288	The magic of Asclepius enters Renaissance thought mixed into Ficino's neo-platonism [Yates]
	Full Idea: The magic of Asclepius, reinterpreted through Plotinus, enters with Ficino's De Vita into the neo-platonic philosophy of the Renaissance, and, moreover, into Ficino's Christian Platonism.
	From: Frances A. Yates (Giordano Bruno and Hermetic Tradition [1964], Ch.4)
	A reaction: Asclepius is the source of 'Hermetic' philosophy. This move seems to be what gives the Renaissance period its rather quirky and distinctive character. Montaigne was not a typical figure. Most of them wanted to become gods and control the stars!

9291	The dating, in 1614, of the Hermetic writings as post-Christian is the end of the Renaissance [Yates]
	Full Idea: The dating by Isaac Casaubon in 1614 of the Hermetic writings as not the work of a very ancient Egyptian priest but written in post-Christian times, is a watershed separating the Renaissance world from the modern world.
	From: Frances A. Yates (Giordano Bruno and Hermetic Tradition [1964], Ch.21)
	A reaction: I tend to place the end of the Renaissance with the arrival of the telescope in 1610, so the two dates coincide. Simply, magic was replaced by science. Religion ran alongside, gasping for breath. Mathematics was freed from numerology.

19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 8. Synonymy

7319	If we give up synonymy, we have to give up significance, meaning and sense [Grice/Strawson]
	Full Idea: If we are to give up the notion of sentence-synonymy as senseless, we must give up the notion of sentence-significance (of a sentence having meaning) as senseless too. But then perhaps we might as well give up the notion of sense.
	From: P Grice / P Strawson (In Defense of a Dogma [1956]), quoted by Alexander Miller - Philosophy of Language 4.2
	A reaction: This is very prescient. Nearly all American philosophers seem to embrace Quine's view of analyticity (the philosophical equivalent of Americans putting a man on the moon?), but have they digested the implications (which Quine later largely admits)?

23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 3. Virtues / a. Virtues

7903	The six perfections are giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom [Nagarjuna]
	Full Idea: The six perfections are of giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom.
	From: Nagarjuna (Mahaprajnaparamitashastra [c.120], 88)
	A reaction: What is 'morality', if giving is not part of it? I like patience and vigour being two of the virtues, which immediately implies an Aristotelian mean (which is always what is 'appropriate').