142 ideas
19693 | There is practical wisdom (for action), and theoretical wisdom (for deep understanding) [Aristotle, by Whitcomb] |
2136 | Philosophers become as divine and orderly as possible, by studying divinity and order [Plato] |
23767 | The winds of the discussion should decide its destination [Plato] |
21761 | If we start with indeterminate being, we arrive at being and nothing as a united pair [Hegel, by Houlgate] |
21764 | Thought about being leads to a string of other concepts, like becoming, quantity, specificity, causality... [Hegel, by Houlgate] |
21769 | We must start with absolute abstraction, with no presuppositions, so we start with pure being [Hegel] |
23682 | It would be absurd to be precise about the small things, but only vague about the big things [Plato] |
1575 | For Aristotle logos is essentially the ability to talk rationally about questions of value [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
1589 | Aristotle is the supreme optimist about the ability of logos to explain nature [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
22037 | Objectivity is not by correspondence, but by the historical determined necessity of Geist [Hegel, by Pinkard] |
21983 | Being and nothing are the same and not the same, which is the identity of identity and non-identity [Hegel] |
21985 | The so-called world is filled with contradiction [Hegel] |
21978 | Hegel's dialectic is not thesis-antithesis-synthesis, but usually negation of negation of the negation [Hegel, by Moore,AW] |
2151 | Dialectic is the only method of inquiry which uproots the things which it takes for granted [Plato] |
2154 | The ability to take an overview is the distinguishing mark of a dialectician [Plato] |
4011 | For Plato, rationality is a vision of and love of a cosmic rational order [Plato, by Taylor,C] |
21766 | Dialectic is the instability of thoughts generating their opposite, and then new more complex thoughts [Hegel, by Houlgate] |
2093 | You must never go against what you actually believe [Plato] |
2130 | People often merely practice eristic instead of dialectic, because they don't analyse the subject-matter [Plato] |
8200 | Aristotelian definitions aim to give the essential properties of the thing defined [Aristotle, by Quine] |
4385 | Aristotelian definition involves first stating the genus, then the differentia of the thing [Aristotle, by Urmson] |
2145 | In mathematics certain things have to be accepted without further explanation [Plato] |
13282 | Aristotle relativises the notion of wholeness to different measures [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
4730 | For Aristotle, the subject-predicate structure of Greek reflected a substance-accident structure of reality [Aristotle, by O'Grady] |
8726 | Geometry can lead the mind upwards to truth and philosophy [Plato] |
9863 | We aim for elevated discussion of pure numbers, not attaching them to physical objects [Plato] |
9864 | In pure numbers, all ones are equal, with no internal parts [Plato] |
8727 | Geometry is not an activity, but the study of unchanging knowledge [Plato] |
9861 | The same thing is both one and an unlimited number at the same time [Plato] |
9862 | To become rational, philosophers must rise from becoming into being [Plato] |
21762 | To grasp an existence, we must consider its non-existence [Hegel, by Houlgate] |
21977 | Nothing exists, as thinkable and expressible [Hegel] |
21760 | Thinking of nothing is not the same as simply not thinking [Hegel, by Houlgate] |
21818 | Being depends on the Good, which is not itself being, but superior to being [Plato] |
2061 | The best things (gods, healthy bodies, good souls) are least liable to change [Plato] |
21765 | The ground of a thing is not another thing, but the first thing's substance or rational concept [Hegel, by Houlgate] |
22059 | Kant's thing-in-itself is just an abstraction from our knowledge; things only exist for us [Hegel, by Bowie] |
22083 | Hegel believe that the genuine categories reveal things in themselves [Hegel, by Houlgate] |
6562 | Plato's reality has unchanging Parmenidean forms, and Heraclitean flux [Plato, by Fogelin] |
22080 | The nature of each category relates itself to another [Hegel] |
2142 | The plurality of beautiful things must belong to a single class, because they have a single particular character [Plato] |
5094 | Plato's Forms are said to have no location in space [Plato, by Aristotle] |
12043 | Forms are not universals, as they don't cover every general term [Plato, by Annas] |
2159 | Craftsmen making furniture refer to the form, but no one manufactures the form of furniture [Plato] |
17 | A Form applies to a set of particular things with the same name [Plato] |
12122 | Plato mistakenly thought forms were totally abstracted away from matter [Bacon on Plato] |
5574 | Plato's Forms not only do not come from the senses, but they are beyond possibility of sensing [Plato, by Kant] |
13276 | The unmoved mover and the soul show Aristotelian form as the ultimate mereological atom [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
13277 | The 'form' is the recipe for building wholes of a particular kind [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
2133 | Knowledge must be of the permanent unchanging nature of things [Plato] |
5991 | For Aristotle, knowledge is of causes, and is theoretical, practical or productive [Aristotle, by Code] |
21772 | In absolute knowing, the gap between object and oneself closes, producing certainty [Hegel] |
20954 | The 'absolute idea' is when all the contradictions are exhausted [Hegel, by Bowie] |
21972 | Hegel, unlike Kant, said how things appear is the same as how things are [Hegel, by Moore,AW] |
22038 | Hegel's non-subjective idealism is the unity of subjective and objective viewpoints [Hegel, by Pinkard] |
22044 | Hegel claimed his system was about the world, but it only mapped conceptual interdependence [Pinkard on Hegel] |
21464 | The Absolute is the primitive system of concepts which are actualised [Hegel, by Gardner] |
22084 | Authentic thinking and reality have the same content [Hegel] |
21975 | The absolute idea is being, imperishable life, self-knowing truth, and all truth [Hegel] |
21976 | The absolute idea is the great unity of the infinite system of concepts [Hegel, by Moore,AW] |
11239 | The notion of a priori truth is absent in Aristotle [Aristotle, by Politis] |
23312 | Aristotle is a rationalist, but reason is slowly acquired through perception and experience [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
2162 | If theory and practice conflict, the best part of the mind accepts theory, so the other part is of lower grade [Plato] |
16111 | Aristotle wants to fit common intuitions, and therefore uses language as a guide [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
2140 | True belief without knowledge is like blind people on the right road [Plato] |
22058 | Hegel's 'absolute idea' is the interdependence of all truths to justify any of them [Hegel, by Bowie] |
16971 | Plato says sciences are unified around Forms; Aristotle says they're unified around substance [Aristotle, by Moravcsik] |
11243 | Aristotelian explanations are facts, while modern explanations depend on human conceptions [Aristotle, by Politis] |
3320 | Aristotle's standard analysis of species and genus involves specifying things in terms of something more general [Aristotle, by Benardete,JA] |
12000 | Aristotle regularly says that essential properties explain other significant properties [Aristotle, by Kung] |
2096 | Is the function of the mind management, authority and planning - or is it one's whole way of life? [Plato] |
6009 | Psychic conflict is clear if appetite is close to the body and reason fairly separate [Plato, by Modrak] |
6041 | There is a third element to the mind - spirit - lying between reason and appetite [Plato] |
2127 | The mind has parts, because we have inner conflicts [Plato] |
1737 | The soul seems to have an infinity of parts [Aristotle on Plato] |
23300 | Aristotle and the Stoics denied rationality to animals, while Platonists affirmed it [Aristotle, by Sorabji] |
20953 | Every concept depends on the counter-concepts of what it is not [Hegel, by Bowie] |
11240 | The notion of analytic truth is absent in Aristotle [Aristotle, by Politis] |
21763 | When we explicate the category of being, we watch a new category emerge [Hegel, by Houlgate] |
5945 | The 'Republic' is a great work of rhetorical theory [Lawson-Tancred on Plato] |
23316 | For Plato and Aristotle there is no will; there is only rational desire for what is seen as good [Plato, by Frede,M] |
16 | We avoid evil either through a natural aversion, or because we have acquired knowledge [Plato] |
16565 | Without the surface decoration, poetry shows only appearances and nothing of what is real [Plato] |
2160 | Representation is two steps removed from the truth [Plato] |
2163 | Artists should be excluded from a law-abiding community, because they destroy the rational mind [Plato] |
2135 | Truth is closely related to proportion [Plato] |
2141 | I suggest that we forget about trying to define goodness itself for the time being [Plato] |
1869 | The good cannot be expressed in words, but imprints itself upon the soul [Plato, by Celsus] |
6559 | Aristotle never actually says that man is a rational animal [Aristotle, by Fogelin] |
4115 | Plato found that he could only enforce rational moral justification by creating an authoritarian society [Williams,B on Plato] |
4547 | Plato measured the degree of reality by the degree of value [Nietzsche on Plato] |
2094 | A thing's function is what it alone can do, or what it does better than other things [Plato] |
2095 | If something has a function then it has a state of being good [Plato] |
2129 | Goodness is mental health, badness is mental sickness [Plato] |
12 | If we were invisible, would the just man become like the unjust? [Plato] |
2168 | Clever criminals do well at first, but not in the long run [Plato] |
2137 | The main aim is to understand goodness, which gives everything its value and advantage [Plato] |
2139 | Every person, and every activity, aims at the good [Plato] |
2143 | Good has the same role in the world of knowledge as the sun has in the physical world [Plato] |
2147 | The sight of goodness leads to all that is fine and true and right [Plato] |
4007 | For Plato we abandon honour and pleasure once we see the Good [Plato, by Taylor,C] |
2144 | Goodness makes truth and knowledge possible [Plato] |
2164 | Bad is always destructive, where good preserves and benefits [Plato] |
2138 | Pleasure is commonly thought to be the good, though the more ingenious prefer knowledge [Plato] |
2070 | Even people who think pleasure is the good admit that there are bad pleasures [Plato] |
2157 | Nice smells are intensive, have no preceding pain, and no bad after-effect [Plato] |
2134 | Philosophers are concerned with totally non-physical pleasures [Plato] |
2156 | There are three types of pleasure, for reason, for spirit and for appetite [Plato] |
2158 | Pleasure-seekers desperately seek illusory satisfaction, like filling a leaky vessel [Plato] |
2123 | Excessive pleasure deranges people, making the other virtues impossible [Plato] |
2166 | We should behave well even if invisible, for the health of the mind [Plato] |
2097 | Isn't it better to have a reputation for goodness than to actually be good? [Plato] |
19946 | Morality is a compromise, showing restraint, to avoid suffering wrong without compensation [Plato] |
5 | Justice is merely the interests of the stronger party [Plato] |
7 | Surely you don't return a borrowed weapon to a mad friend? [Plato] |
8 | Is right just the interests of the powerful? [Plato] |
15 | Sin first, then sacrifice to the gods from the proceeds [Plato] |
5944 | For Plato, virtue is its own reward [Lawson-Tancred on Plato] |
2155 | True goodness requires mental unity and harmony [Plato] |
2126 | A good community necessarily has wisdom, courage, self-discipline and morality [Plato] |
23562 | If the parts of our soul do their correct work, we will be just people, and will act justly [Plato] |
2092 | Simonides said morality is helping one's friends and harming one's enemies [Plato] |
19889 | People need society because the individual has too many needs [Plato] |
19890 | All exchanges in a community are for mutual benefit [Plato] |
10 | After a taste of mutual harm, men make a legal contract to avoid it [Plato] |
23561 | People doing their jobs properly is the fourth cardinal virtue for a city [Plato] |
2149 | Reluctant rulers make a better and more unified administration [Plato] |
2132 | Only rule by philosophers of integrity can keep a community healthy [Plato] |
2131 | Is there anything better for a community than to produce excellent people? [Plato] |
11150 | It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain an idea without accepting it [Aristotle] |
2148 | To gain knowledge, turn away from the world of change, and focus on true goodness [Plato] |
3037 | Aristotle said the educated were superior to the uneducated as the living are to the dead [Aristotle, by Diog. Laertius] |
2152 | Dialectic is the highest and most important part of the curriculum [Plato] |
2153 | Compulsory intellectual work never remains in the mind [Plato] |
8660 | There are potential infinities (never running out), but actual infinity is incoherent [Aristotle, by Friend] |
12058 | Aristotle's matter can become any other kind of matter [Aristotle, by Wiggins] |
2630 | If Plato's God is immaterial, he will lack consciousness, wisdom, pleasure and movement, which are essential to him [Cicero on Plato] |
14 | If the gods are non-existent or indifferent, why bother to deceive them? [Plato] |
22729 | The concepts of gods arose from observing the soul, and the cosmos [Aristotle, by Sext.Empiricus] |
2165 | Something is unlikely to be immortal if it is imperfectly made from diverse parts [Plato] |
13 | Is the supreme reward for virtue to be drunk for eternity? [Plato] |
2120 | God is responsible for the good things, but we must look elsewhere for the cause of the bad things [Plato] |