66 ideas
13310 | Wisdom does not lie in books, and unread people can also become wise [Seneca] |
13295 | Wise people escape necessity by willing it [Seneca] |
21887 | Derrida focuses on other philosophers, rather than on science [Derrida] |
21888 | Philosophy is just a linguistic display [Derrida] |
13317 | Philosophy aims at happiness [Seneca] |
13293 | What philosophy offers humanity is guidance [Seneca] |
21896 | Philosophy aims to build foundations for thought [Derrida, by May] |
21893 | Philosophy is necessarily metaphorical, and its writing is aesthetic [Derrida] |
13309 | That something is a necessary condition of something else doesn't mean it caused it [Seneca] |
13313 | Even philosophers have got bogged down in analysing tiny bits of language [Seneca] |
20925 | Hermeneutics blunts truth, by conforming it to the interpreter [Derrida, by Zimmermann,J] |
21892 | Interpretations can be interpreted, so there is no original 'meaning' available [Derrida] |
20934 | Hermeneutics is hostile, trying to overcome the other person's difference [Derrida, by Zimmermann,J] |
21895 | Structuralism destroys awareness of dynamic meaning [Derrida] |
21934 | The idea of being as persistent presence, and meaning as conscious intelligibility, are self-destructive [Derrida, by Glendinning] |
21881 | We aim to explore the limits of expression (as in Mallarmé's poetry) [Derrida] |
21883 | Sincerity can't be verified, so fiction infuses speech, and hence reality also [Derrida] |
21882 | Sentences are contradictory, as they have opposite meanings in some contexts [Derrida] |
4756 | Derrida says that all truth-talk is merely metaphor [Derrida, by Engel] |
21877 | True thoughts are inaccessible, in the subconscious, prior to speech or writing [Derrida] |
21878 | Names have a subjective aspect, especially the role of our own name [Derrida] |
21889 | 'I' is the perfect name, because it denotes without description [Derrida] |
21879 | Even Kripke can't explain names; the word is the thing, and the thing is the word [Derrida] |
13297 | To the four causes Plato adds a fifth, the idea which guided the event [Seneca] |
21890 | Heidegger showed that passing time is the key to consciousness [Derrida] |
3444 | If actions are not caused by other events, and are not causeless, they must be caused by the person [Chisholm] |
9268 | If free will miraculously interrupts causation, animals might do that; why would we want to do it? [Frankfurt on Chisholm] |
3446 | For Hobbes (but not for Kant) a person's actions can be deduced from their desires and beliefs [Chisholm] |
13307 | If everything can be measured, try measuring the size of a man's soul [Seneca] |
21880 | 'Tacit theory' controls our thinking (which is why Freud is important) [Derrida] |
21884 | Capacity for repetitions is the hallmark of language [Derrida] |
21935 | The sign is only conceivable as a movement between elusive presences [Derrida] |
21930 | For Aristotle all proper nouns must have a single sense, which is the purpose of language [Derrida] |
21933 | Writing functions even if the sender or the receiver are absent [Derrida, by Glendinning] |
21894 | Madness and instability ('the demonic hyperbole') lurks in all language [Derrida] |
21886 | Meanings depend on differences and contrasts [Derrida] |
21931 | 'Dissemination' is opposed to polysemia, since that is irreducible, because of multiple understandings [Derrida, by Glendinning] |
21885 | Words exist in 'spacing', so meanings are never synchronic except in writing [Derrida] |
21399 | Referring to a person, and speaking about him, are very different [Seneca] |
3443 | Desires may rule us, but are we responsible for our desires? [Chisholm] |
3442 | Responsibility seems to conflict with events being either caused or not caused [Chisholm] |
13325 | Trouble in life comes from copying other people, which is following convention instead of reason [Seneca] |
22239 | Humans acquired the concept of virtue from an analogy with bodily health and strength [Seneca, by Allen] |
13294 | We know death, which is like before birth; ceasing to be and never beginning are the same [Seneca] |
13299 | Living is nothing wonderful; what matters is to die well [Seneca] |
13300 | It is as silly to lament ceasing to be as to lament not having lived in the remote past [Seneca] |
13321 | Is anything sweeter than valuing yourself more when you find you are loved? [Seneca] |
13292 | Selfishness does not produce happiness; to live for yourself, live for others [Seneca] |
21891 | The good is implicitly violent (against evil), so there is no pure good [Derrida] |
13303 | A man is as unhappy as he has convinced himself he is [Seneca] |
13302 | Life is like a play - it is the quality that matters, not the length [Seneca] |
13301 | We are scared of death - except when we are immersed in pleasure! [Seneca] |
13323 | The whole point of pleasure-seeking is novelty, and abandoning established ways [Seneca] |
13318 | Nature doesn't give us virtue; we must unremittingly pursue it, as a training and an art [Seneca] |
13324 | Living contrary to nature is like rowing against the stream [Seneca] |
13305 | Character is ruined by not looking back over our pasts, since the future rests on the past [Seneca] |
13312 | Excessive curiosity is a form of intemperance [Seneca] |
13308 | It's no good winning lots of fights, if you are then conquered by your own temper [Seneca] |
13315 | To govern used to mean to serve, not to rule; rulers did not test their powers over those who bestowed it [Seneca] |
13290 | One joy of learning is making teaching possible [Seneca] |
13322 | Both teachers and pupils should aim at one thing - the improvement of the pupil [Seneca] |
13298 | Suicide may be appropriate even when it is not urgent, if there are few reasons against it [Seneca] |
13320 | Sometimes we have a duty not to commit suicide, for those we love [Seneca] |
13319 | If we control our own death, no one has power over us [Seneca] |
3445 | Causation among objects relates either events or states [Chisholm] |
13311 | Does time exist on its own? Did anything precede it? Did it pre-exist the cosmos? [Seneca] |