41 ideas
24146 | All the major problems were formulated before Socrates [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: All the major problems were formulated before Socrates. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[064]) | |
A reaction: So much for it all being 'footnotes to Plato'! Nietzsche's lectures on the pre-Socratics are in print. Given how little survives, this idea is surprising. Nietzsche knew enough to infer a lot of what is lost. |
24142 | What matters is how humans can be developed [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: What can be made out of humans: this is what matters to superior human beings. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[435]) | |
A reaction: That seems to sum up the main aim of Nietzsche's philosophy. What would we then do if the aim was somehow achieved? Does he seriously think that one magnificent ubermensch could achieve this aim? |
24143 | Thinkers might agree some provisional truths, as methodological assumptions [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: It is sufficient if we [thinkers] come to agree about a totality of methodological presuppositions - about 'provisional truths' that we want to use as a guideline for our work. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[449]) | |
A reaction: Descartes attempted this. Maybe Frege is another attempt. Husserl, perhaps? Parmenides? Hume? Lewis? It is hard to imagine Nietzsche joining in a professional consensus! He has just rejected systems. |
24125 | Aristotle enjoyed the sham generalities of a system, as the peak of happiness! [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Aristotle probably had his best moments when he coldly and clearly (and joyfully) enjoyed the sensual sham of the highest generalities. To perceive the world as a system, and as the pinnacle of human happiness: how the schematic mind betrays itself then! | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[017]) | |
A reaction: Painful, this. One of my heroes laughing at the other one. I love systems, and love John Richardson's suggestion that Nietzsche was very systematice, despite his protestations. |
24147 | Thoughts are uncertain, and are just occasions for interpretation [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: A thought is not taken to be immediately certain, but rather a sign, a question mark. That each thought is initially ambiguous and fluctuating, and is in itself only an occasion for multiple interpretations …is experienced by every deep observer. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[092]) | |
A reaction: This idea makes me a little more sympathetic to the hermeneutic view of philosophy, as endless interpretations. I assumed it only referred to texts. A thought is not a done deal, but an occasion for further thought. He says the same of feelings. |
21793 | Genuine truth is the resolution of the highest contradiction [Hegel] |
Full Idea: The highest truth, truth as such, is the resolution of the highest opposition and contradiction. | |
From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826], I: 99), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 09 'Art' | |
A reaction: Uneasy about the word 'highest', and the general Hegelian dream of 'resolving' contradictions, rather than just eliminating at least one component of them. No one else uses the word 'truth' like this. I suppose this Truth has a capital 'T'. |
21795 | What I hold true must also be part of my feelings and character [Hegel] |
Full Idea: Whatever I hold as true, whatever ought to be valid for me, must also be in my feeling, must belong to my being and character. | |
From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826], I: 97), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 09 'Philosophy' | |
A reaction: I can see that truths do tend to become part of our character, but not that they ought to do so. I suppose I try to live my life enmeshed in the many truths which I have personally selected from the maelstrom of possibilities that engulf us. |
24137 | Mathematics is just accurate inferences from definitions, and doesn't involve objects [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Mathematics contains axioms (definitions) and conclusions from definitions. Its objects do not exist. The truth of its conclusions rests on the accuracy of logical thought. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[307]) | |
A reaction: Not suprising to find Nietzsche defying platonism. This is evidence that he was a systematic philosopher, who knew mathematics could be a challenge to his naturalism. |
24131 | There is no 'being'; it is just the opposition to nothingness [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: 'Being' is unprovable, because there is no 'being'. The concept of being is formed out of the opposition to 'nothingness'. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[185]) | |
A reaction: Presumably a comment on Hegel's most basic idea. I find both thoughts bewildering. 'Being' is just a generalised (and unhelpful) way of referring to the self-evident existence of stuff. |
24151 | I only want thinking that is anchored in body, senses and earth [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: I am not interested …in ways of thinking that are not anchored in the body and the senses and in the earth. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[352]) | |
A reaction: Exhibit A for Nietzsche as Naturalist. Indeed, this could be a manifesto for the whole school. I totally and completely and utterly agree with Nietzsche's assertion!. I see the 'anchor' as two-way: thought connects to earth, and thought arises from it. |
24150 | We can only understand through concepts, which subsume particulars in generalities [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: We have only one form of understanding - concept, the more general case that subsumes the particular case. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[156]) | |
A reaction: This is precisely Aristotle's problem with scientific explanation - that we aim to understand each particular, but accounts and definitions have to be expressed with universals. |
24138 | Strongly believed a priori is not certain; it may just be a feature of our existence [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: What we believe the most, everything a priori, is not for that reason more certain, just because it is so strongly believed. Rather, it is perhaps a consequence of the condition for the existence of our species. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[307]) | |
A reaction: This is in defiance of Leibniz and Kant. His proposed explanation is not very convincing. Russell agreed with Nietzsche. |
24130 | An affirmative belief is present in every basic sense impression [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Belief is already present in every sense impression going back to the very moment it begins: a kind of Yes-saying first intellectual activity! | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[168]) | |
A reaction: He seems right that there is an intrinsic commitment to believing sense impressions, even in animals. Presumably more of a default setting than an intellectual choice. |
24124 | We now have innumerable perspectives to draw on [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: We have been granted perspectives in all directions, broader than any humans have ever been granted, everywhere we look there is no end in sight. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[013]) | |
A reaction: Clearly perspectivism is not the simple relativism of being trapped in our own private perspective. What strikes me as missing from Nietzsche's brief thoughts is the question of consensus, and even rational and objective consensus. |
24145 | Mind is a mechanism of abstraction and simplification, aimed at control [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: The entire cognitive mechanism is a mechanism of abstraction and simplification - not aimed at knowing, but taking control of things. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[061]) | |
A reaction: It is my view that we can explain our metaphysics in this way, though I am more realist than Nietzsche, because I think the world has created these capacities within us, so they fit the world. To control, you must know. |
24144 | A cognitive mechanism wanting to know itself is absurd! [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: A cognitive mechanism that wants to know itself!! We definitely should have moved beyond this absurd goal! (The stomach that consumes itself! -) | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[018]) | |
A reaction: We see his point, but Nietzsche learns a huge amount about himself by introspection. To know the Self is a cat chasing its tail. I don't have to leave England to study England. |
24139 | A 'person' is just one possible abstraction from a bundle of qualities [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Individuals contain many more persons than they think. 'Person' is merely a point of emphasis, synopsis of characteristics and qualities | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[363]) | |
A reaction: He makes similar remarks abour character. For Locke 'person'' is a forensic and legal concept, and so must be enduring and unique. |
24133 | I have perfected fatalism, as recurrence and denial of the will [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: I have perfected fatalism, through eternal recurrence and preexistence, and through the elimination of the concept 'will'. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[214]) | |
A reaction: 'Amor fati' - love of fate - was his oft repeated slogan. We can all understand 'go with the flow', but I'm not sure about anything more universal than that. |
24152 | Fate is inspiring, if you understand you are part of it [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Fate is an inspiring thought for those who understand that they are part of it. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[442]) | |
A reaction: Sounds a bit like the Niagara Falls being inspiring if you are being swept over it. I find the possibility of fatalism neutral, rather than inspiring. |
24129 | We start with images, then words, and then concepts, to which emotions attach [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Images first, the words applied to images. Finally concepts, not possible until there are words a summary of many images. When see similar images for which there is one word - this weak emotion is the common element, the foundation of the concept. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[168]) | |
A reaction: Unusual to have an account of the origin of concepts in 1884. His theory entails that animals can't have concepts, but presumably they can combine images, and hence recognise things. I think he is wrong, but interestng. Mental files. |
24127 | Judging actions by intentions - like judging painters by their thoughts! [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: To judge people by intentions! That would be like classifying artists, not according to their paintings, but according to their visions! | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[119]) | |
A reaction: What is wrong is to judge an action by any simple single principle. Our nuanced attitude to excuses shows the true complexity of it. 'I didn't mean to do that'. |
18549 | Nineteenth century aesthetics focused on art rather than nature (thanks to Hegel) [Hegel, by Scruton] |
Full Idea: Only In the course of the nineteenth century, and in the wake of Hegel's posthumously published lectures on aesthetics, did the topic of art come to replace that of natural beauty as the core subject-matter of aesthetics. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826], 5) by Roger Scruton - Beauty: a very short introduction |
22043 | Hegel largely ignores aesthetic pleasure, taste and beauty, and focuses on the meaning of artworks [Hegel, by Pinkard] |
Full Idea: Unlike his predecessors (including Kant), Hegel does not focus on aesthetic pleasure, nor on good taste, nor even on the nature and criteria for beauty. Instead he focuses on the meaning of artworks and their role in forming mankind's self-consciousness. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 11 | |
A reaction: Personally I dislike over-intellectualising art. The aim of a work of art is to give a certain experience, not to generate an ensuing sequence of theorising. I doubt whether Vermeer had any 'meaning' in mind in his obsessive work. |
22042 | Natural beauty is unimportant, because it doesn't show human freedom [Hegel, by Pinkard] |
Full Idea: Hegel thinks that natural beauty is of no real significance since it cannot display our freedom to us; nature per se is meaningless. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 11 | |
A reaction: Presumably freedom is in the creation, and so creativity is what matters in aesthetics. But what are the criteria of good creativity? |
20413 | For Hegel the importance of art concerns the culture, not the individual [Hegel, by Eldridge] |
Full Idea: Hegel locates the significance of art in its role in cultural life in general, not in relation to the psychological needs of individuals. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]) by Richard Eldridge - G.W.F. Hegel (aesthetics) 1 | |
A reaction: I'm beginning to see that art is a wonderful focus and test case for political attitudes. Roughly, liberalism focuses on individual responses, but more societal views (from right and left) see it in terms of role in the community. Which are you? |
20394 | The purpose of art is to reveal to Spirit its own nature [Hegel, by Davies,S] |
Full Idea: According to Hegel, the goal of art was to serve as a phase in a process by which Spirit would come to understand its own nature. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]) by Stephen Davies - The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) 2.7 | |
A reaction: I try very hard to understand ideas like this. Really really hard. However, since I see little sign of 'Spirit' really understanding its own nature, I'm guessing that the project is not going well. |
21794 | The main purpose of art is to express the unity of human life [Hegel] |
Full Idea: Art's primary function, for Hegel, is to give expression to the unity and wholeness of life - especially human life - that the contingencies of everyday existence frequently conceal. | |
From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 09 'Beauty' | |
A reaction: I don't find the view that human life is 'unified' and 'whole' vary illuminating, and I have no objection to art which reflects the fragmentary and unstable aspects of life. I suspect Hegel would just prefer it if life were a unity. |
20415 | Art forms a bridge between the sensuous world and the world of pure thought [Hegel] |
Full Idea: Spirit generates out of itself works of fine art as the first reconciling middle term between pure thought and what is merely external, sensuous and transient - between finite natural reality and the infinite freedom of conceptual thinking. | |
From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826], p.8), quoted by Richard Eldridge - G.W.F. Hegel (aesthetics) | |
A reaction: This apparently says that there is necessarily an intellectual and conceptual component in art. This means little to me. Does he include portraits? Dutch domestic scenes? Would photography qualify? |
24149 | Values need a perspective, of preserving some aspect of life [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: All value judgements involve a particular perspective: preservation of the individual, a community, a race, a state, a church, a belief, a culture. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[119]) | |
A reaction: This chimes in with my Aristotelian view of value, as arising out of the thing valued, rather than descending on it from outside. I think more than mere 'preservaation' is at stake. Fostering, cherishing. |
24148 | If you love something, it is connected with everything, so all must be affirmed as good [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: To appreciate and love anything, I must understand it as absolutely necessarily connected with everything that is - therefore I must affirm the goodness of all existence for its own sake. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 26[117]) | |
A reaction: For those of you out there imagining that Nietzsche was a nihilist…… It's a plausible idea. You could hardly love your dog, but hate the whole universe. A true misanthrope would struggle to love one exceptional person. |
24135 | Egoism should not assume that all egos are equal [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Egoism! But no one has ever asked: what kind of ego! Instead, every person automatically assumes that the ego of every ego is equal. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[287]) | |
A reaction: This is his first step in his defence of some form of egoism. Presumably 'higher' people should be egoists, and the rest should join the herd. |
24132 | After Socrates virtue is misunderstood, as good for all, not for individuals [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: From Socrates onwards arete [virtue] is misunderstood - first it had to reestablish itself over and over, and yet it did not want to do this on an individual basis! But rather tyrannically 'good for all!'. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[208]) | |
A reaction: Why not both? The virtues of a good citizen can't be private, but we are all allowed to develop virtues that concern us alone. |
24126 | We contain multitudes of characters, which can brought into the open [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: There is a multitude of characters hidden within each one of us: and attempts should be made to allow some of them to appear. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[021]) | |
A reaction: So character is not fate, contrary to Heraclitus (his hero). We are more inclined now to see varied characters as social roles (as in Irving Goffman). This idea challenges it, with our intrinsic nature containing variety. |
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'). |
24136 | Who can endure the thought of eternal recurrence? [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: I conduct the great test: who will endure the thought of eternal recurrence? | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[290]) | |
A reaction: He sometimes talks as if eternal recurrence were a cosmic fact, but we should definitely ignore that. This idea captures his idea best, I think - that we should try to live with the prospect of recurrence always in mind. A type of existentialism. |
24154 | If you want one experience repeated, you must want all of them [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Whoever wants to have a single experience again must want all of them again. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 29[054]) | |
A reaction: Nehemas says this is the main factual commitment of eternal recurrence (and certainly not that global recurrence actually occurs). It might be expressed in terms of possible worlds. We yearn for recurrence, then dread it? |
24153 | Humans are determined by community, so its preservation is their most valued drive [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: If a community is what absolutely determines the nature of humans, then the drive that allows the community to be preserved will be most forcefully developed in them. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 27[030]) | |
A reaction: Nietzsche was a loner, who despised 'the herd' and its dull 'good and evil', but humans are obviously social creatures, who need to raise families, so it seems perverse to despise the values this requires. Note the Marxist view of human nature. |
24134 | There is always slavery, whether we like it or not [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: In truth there is always slavery - whether you want it or not; e.g. Prussian officials. Scholars. Monks. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[225]) | |
A reaction: Not very persuasive examples. Monks are free to join and to leave. Maybe a lot of marriages are close to slavery for one side (usually the woman). Strict slavery has almost ceased in western civilisation (I think!). Nietzsche saw 'the herd' as slaves. |
24128 | After history following God, or a people, or an idea, we now see it in terms of animals [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Earlier we sought God's intentions in history: then an unconscious purposefulness, in a people or an idea. Only recently are we considering the history of animals, and the first insight is that no plan has so far existed. Coincidences have been dominant. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[127]) | |
A reaction: Not a Whig historian then! Presumably Hegel is his main target. In 2024 there is a definite feeling that western democracies are regressing. |
24140 | Cause and effect is a hypothesis, based on our supposed willing of actions [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Cause and effect is not a truth but rather a hypothesis - and indeed the one which we use to anthropomorphise the world for ourselves, bringing it in closer proximity to our feelings ('willing' is projected into it). | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[371]) | |
A reaction: That is (I think), we read the gap between thought and action onto natural external events, dividing them up. We treat the flow of events as if they were agent causation. Modern theories seem close to Nietzsche's unified view. |
24141 | Having a sense of time presupposes absolute time [Nietzsche] |
Full Idea: Our derivation of the sense of time etc. still presupposes time as absolute. | |
From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1884-85 [1884], 25[406]) | |
A reaction: 'Etc.'? I suppose this is meant to pre-empt whatever Bergson might have been planning to say. The idea that time actually is subjective strikes as very wrong. Whether physicists can reduce time to something else is above my pay scale. |