52 ideas
| 20678 | The Scientific Revolution was the discovery of our own ignorance [Harari] |
| 20686 | For millenia people didn't know how to convert one type of energy into another [Harari] |
| 13795 | Properties only have identity in the context of their contraries [Elder] |
| 13798 | Maybe we should give up the statue [Elder] |
| 13797 | The loss of an essential property means the end of an existence [Elder] |
| 13794 | Essential properties by nature occur in clusters or packages [Elder] |
| 13796 | Essential properties are bound together, and would be lost together [Elder] |
| 23928 | Good art produces exaltation and detachment [Bell,C] |
| 23922 | The word 'beauty' leads to confusion, because it denotes distinct emotions [Bell,C] |
| 23929 | We only see landscapes as artistic if we ignore their instrumental value [Bell,C] |
| 23921 | Our feeling for natural beauty is different from the aesthetic emotion of art [Bell,C] |
| 23923 | Visual form can create a sublime mental state [Bell,C] |
| 23927 | Aestheticism invites artist to create beauty, but with no indication of how to do it [Bell,C] |
| 23932 | Art is the expression of an emotion for ultimate reality [Bell,C] |
| 8115 | Only artists can discern significant form; other people must look to art to find it [Bell,C, by Gardner] |
| 23924 | Maybe significant form gives us a feeling for ultimate reality [Bell,C] |
| 23931 | Significant form is the essence of art, which I believe expresses an emotion about reality [Bell,C] |
| 20434 | 'Form' is visual relations, and it is 'significant' if it moves us aesthetically; art needs both [Bell,C, by Feagin] |
| 23934 | The only expression art could have is the emotion resulting from pure form [Bell,C] |
| 23925 | Mere copies of pictures are not significant - unless the copies are very exact [Bell,C] |
| 23926 | Art is distinguished by its aesthetic emotion, which produces appropriate form [Bell,C] |
| 23935 | Aesthetic experience is an exaltation which increases the possibilities of life [Bell,C] |
| 23933 | Aesthetic contemplation is the best and most intense mental state [Bell,C] |
| 22691 | Only artistic qualities matter in art, because they also have the highest moral value [Bell,C] |
| 20692 | Money does produce happiness, but only up to a point [Harari] |
| 20663 | If a group is bound by gossip, the natural size is 150 people [Harari] |
| 20677 | Since 1500 human population has increased fourteenfold, and consumption far more [Harari] |
| 20688 | People 300m tons; domesticated animals 700m tons; larger wild animals 100m tons [Harari] |
| 20674 | The Nazi aim was to encourage progressive evolution, and avoid degeneration [Harari] |
| 20679 | We stabilise societies with dogmas, either of dubious science, or of non-scientific values [Harari] |
| 20690 | The state fostered individualism, to break the power of family and community [Harari] |
| 20689 | In 1750 losing your family and community meant death [Harari] |
| 20681 | The sacred command of capitalism is that profits must be used to increase production [Harari] |
| 20682 | The main rule of capitalism is that all other goods depend on economic growth [Harari] |
| 20683 | The progress of capitalism depends entirely on the new discoveries and gadgets of science [Harari] |
| 20687 | In capitalism the rich invest, and the rest of us go shopping [Harari] |
| 20685 | No market is free of political bias, and markets need protection of their freedoms [Harari] |
| 20693 | Freedom may work against us, as individuals can choose to leave, and make fewer commitments [Harari] |
| 20691 | Real peace is the implausibility of war (and not just its absence) [Harari] |
| 20684 | Financing is increasingly through credit rather than taxes; people prefer investing to taxation [Harari] |
| 20675 | The more you know about history, the harder it becomes to explain [Harari] |
| 20676 | History teaches us that the present was not inevitable, and shows us the possibilities [Harari] |
| 20671 | In order to explain both order and evil, a single evil creator is best, but no one favours that [Harari] |
| 20664 | Animism is belief that every part of nature is aware and feeling, and can communicate [Harari] |
| 20666 | Most polytheist recognise one supreme power or law, behind the various gods [Harari] |
| 20667 | Polytheism is open-minded, and rarely persecutes opponents [Harari] |
| 20665 | Mythologies are usual contracts with the gods, exchanging devotion for control of nature [Harari] |
| 20669 | Dualist religions see everything as a battleground of good and evil forces [Harari] |
| 20670 | Dualist religions say the cosmos is a battleground, so can’t explain its order [Harari] |
| 20673 | Manichaeans and Gnostics: good made spirit, evil made flesh [Harari] |
| 20668 | Monotheism appeared in Egypt in 1350 BCE, when the god Aten was declared supreme [Harari] |
| 23930 | Religion sees infinite value in some things, and irrelevance in the rest [Bell,C] |