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Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
4 months ago
I am an investigator by inclination....

I am an investigator by inclination. I feel a great thirst for knowledge and an impatient eagerness to advance, also satisfaction at each progressive step. There was a time when I thought that all this could constitute the honor of humanity, and I despised the mob, which knows nothing about it. Rousseau set me straight. This dazzling excellence vanishes; I learn to honor men, and would consider myself much less useful than common laborers if I did not believe that this consideration could give all the others a value, to establish the rights of humanity.

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Part III : Selection on Education from Kant's other Writings, Ch. I Pedagogical Fragments, # 55
Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
1 month 3 weeks ago
Living organisms had existed on earth,...

Living organisms had existed on earth, without ever knowing why, for over three thousand million years before the truth finally dawned on one of them. His name was Charles Darwin. To be fair, others had had inklings of the truth, but it was Darwin who first put together a coherent and tenable account of why we exist.

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Ch. 1. Why Are People?
Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Schlegel
Friedrich Schlegel
2 months 3 weeks ago
To disrespec the masses…

To disrespect the masses is moral; to honor them, lawful.

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Lucinde and the Fragments, P. Firchow, trans. (1991), "Athenaeum Fragments" § 211
Philosophical Maxims
Charles Sanders Peirce
Charles Sanders Peirce
2 months 3 weeks ago
Few persons care to study logic,...

Few persons care to study logic, because everybody conceives himself to be proficient enough in the art of reasoning already. But I observe that this satisfaction is limited to one's own ratiocination and does not extend to that of other men. We come to the full possession of our power of drawing inferences the last of all our faculties, for it is not so much a natural gift as a long and difficult art.

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Illustrations of the Logic of Science First Paper - The Fixation of Belief", in Popular Science Monthly, Vol. 12
Philosophical Maxims
Arnold J. Toynbee
Arnold J. Toynbee
1 month 1 week ago
A city that outdistances Man's walking...

A city that outdistances Man's walking powers is a trap for Man. It threatens to become a prison from which he cannot escape unless he has mechanical means of transport, the thoroughfares for carrying these, and the purchasing power for commanding the use of artificial means of communication.

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"Has Man's Metropolitan Environment Any Precedents?", Ekistics, vol. 22, no. 133 (December 1966) pp. 385-7
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
3 months 3 weeks ago
Exchange value forms the substance of...

Exchange value forms the substance of money, and exchange value is wealth.

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Notebook II, The Chapter on Money, p. 141.
Philosophical Maxims
John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill
3 months 3 weeks ago
[M]y father's rejection of all that...

[M]y father's rejection of all that is called religious belief, was not, as many might suppose, primarily a matter of logic and evidence: the grounds of it were moral, still more than intellectual. He found it impossible to believe that a world so full of evil was the work of an Author combining infinite power with perfect goodness and righteousness.

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(pp. 39-40)
Philosophical Maxims
Adam Smith
Adam Smith
4 months 1 day ago
How selfish soever man may be...

How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it except the pleasure of seeing it.

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Section I, Chap. I
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Camus
Albert Camus
4 months 3 weeks ago
Man is the only creature who...

Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.

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Philosophical Maxims
Erich Fromm
Erich Fromm
2 months 1 week ago
The sadistic person is as dependent...

The sadistic person is as dependent on the submissive person as the latter is on the former; neither can live without the other. The difference is only that the sadistic person commands, exploits, hurts, humiliates, and that the masochistic person is commanded, exploited, hurt, humiliated. This is a considerable difference in a realistic sense; in a deeper emotional sense, the difference is not so great as that which they both have in common: fusion without integrity.

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Ch. 2
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
1 month 2 weeks ago
The measure of a man...

The measure of a man is a man. Justice, morality, ethics, fairness, goodness all based on the preservation of life. You can do other things, but you'd be Good by coincidence.

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Philosophical Maxims
John Locke
John Locke
3 months 4 weeks ago
Encourage therefore his inquisitiveness all you...

Encourage therefore his inquisitiveness all you can, by satisfying his demands, and informing his judgement, as far as it is capable. When his reasons are any way tolerable, let him find the credit and commendation of it, without being laugh'd at for his mistake be gently put into the right; and if he shew a forwardness to be reasoning about things that come in his way, take care, as much as you can, that no body check this inclination in him, or mislead it by captious or fallacious ways of talking with him. For when all is done, this is the highest and most important faculty of our minds, deserves the greatest care and attention in cultivating it: the right improvement, and exercise of our reason being the highest perfection that a man can attain to in his life.

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Sec. 122
Philosophical Maxims
Byung-Chul Han
Byung-Chul Han
2 months 1 week ago
Architecture is a way for power...

Architecture is a way for power to achieve eloquence through form.

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Philosophical Maxims
David Hume
David Hume
4 months 1 day ago
Necessity may be defined in two...

Necessity may be defined in two ways, conformably to the two definitions of cause, of which it makes an essential part. It consists either in the constant conjunction of like objects, or in the inference of the understating from one object to another.

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§ 8.27
Philosophical Maxims
Walter Lippmann
Walter Lippmann
3 weeks 2 days ago
There is only one purpose to...

There is only one purpose to which a whole society can be directed by a deliberate plan. That purpose is war, and there is no other.

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Ch. V: "The Totalitarian Regimes", §7, p. 90
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
2 weeks 4 days ago
Democracy, which means despair of finding...

Democracy, which means despair of finding any Heroes to govern you, and contented putting up with the want of them,-alas, thou too, mein Lieber, seest well how close it is of kin to Atheism, and other sad Isms: he who discovers no God whatever, how shall he discover Heroes, the visible Temples of God?

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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
3 months 4 weeks ago
The question of "unreality," which confronts...

The question of "unreality," which confronts us at this point, is a very important one. Misled by grammar, the great majority of those logicians who have dealt with this question have dealt with it on mistaken lines. They have regarded grammatical form as a surer guide in analysis than, in fact, it is. And they have not known what differences in grammatical form are important.

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Ch. 16: Descriptions
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
3 months 3 weeks ago
... in such a matter he...

... in such a matter he would never have been guided by his first thoughts (which would probably have been right) nor even by his twenty-first (which would have at least been explicable). Beyond doubt he would have prolonged deliberation till his hundred-and-first; and they would be infallibly and invincibly wrong. This is what always happens to the deliberations of a simple man who thinks he is a subtle one.

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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
3 months 4 weeks ago
Competition for power is of two...

Competition for power is of two sorts: between organizations, and between individuals for leadership within an organization.

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p. 165
Philosophical Maxims
Cisero
Cisero
4 months 2 weeks ago
We should never take pleasure in...

We should never take pleasure in causing pain to others, even to those who have wronged us, but rather strive to do good to all.

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Philosophical Maxims
Carl Jung
Carl Jung
2 months 3 weeks ago
Our psychology is ... a science...

Our psychology is ... a science of mere phenomena without any metaphysical implications. [It] Treats all metaphysical claims and assertions as mental phenomena, and regards them as statements about the mind and its structure.

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Psychology and Religion: West and East (1958), p. 476, as cited in Psychotherapy East and West (1961), p. 14
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
3 months 3 weeks ago
There are always two parties, the...

There are always two parties, the party of the Past and the party of the Future: the Establishment and the Movement. At times the resistance is reanimated, the schism runs under the world and appears in Literature, Philosophy, Church, State and social customs.

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p. 529, col. 1
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
2 months 3 weeks ago
We are fulfilled only when we...

We are fulfilled only when we aspire to nothing, when we are impregnated by that nothing to the point of intoxication.

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Philosophical Maxims
Adam Smith
Adam Smith
4 months 1 day ago
The annual labour of every nation...

The annual labour of every nation is the fund which originally supplies it with all the necessaries and conveniences of life which it annually consumes.

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Introduction and Plan of the Work, p. 1.
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
3 months 6 days ago
Let's put a limit...
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Main Content / General
Plato
Plato
4 months 3 weeks ago
Neither perception nor true opinion, nor...

Neither perception nor true opinion, nor reason or explanation combined with true opinion could be knowledge. Then our art of midwifery declare to us that all the offspring that have been born are mere wind-eggs and not worth rearing and if you remain barren, you will be less harsh and gentler to your associates, for you will have the wisdom not to think you know that which you do not know.

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Philosophical Maxims
Erich Fromm
Erich Fromm
2 months 1 week ago
Human history began with an act...

Human history began with an act of disobedience, and it is not unlikely that it will be terminated by an act of obedience.

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Disobedience as a Psychological and Moral Problem in On Disobedience and Other Essays
Philosophical Maxims
Jesus
Jesus
2 months 2 weeks ago
It is written, My house shall...

It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.

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21:13 (KJV)
Philosophical Maxims
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
2 months 6 days ago
Affectation is a very good word...

Affectation is a very good word when someone does not wish to confess to what he would none the less like to believe of himself.

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F 149
Philosophical Maxims
Byung-Chul Han
Byung-Chul Han
2 months 1 week ago
At the deepest level, the desire...

At the deepest level, the desire for complete union with God exhibits a narcissistic structure.

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Philosophical Maxims
Ptahhotep
Ptahhotep
3 months 2 weeks ago
One who is serious all day...

One who is serious all day will never have a good time, while one who is frivolous all day will never establish a household.

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Maxim no. 25.
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Paul Sartre
Jean Paul Sartre
3 months 3 weeks ago
...in order to change poverty into...

...in order to change poverty into wealth, one must start by displaying it.

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p. 420
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
3 months 2 days ago
No natural boundary seems to be...

No natural boundary seems to be set to the efforts of man; and what is not yet done is only what he has not yet attempted to do. Variant: What is not yet done is only what we have not yet attempted to do.

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Chapter XVIII.
Philosophical Maxims
Desiderius Erasmus
Desiderius Erasmus
4 months 6 days ago
As Christ had recommended peace during...

As Christ had recommended peace during the whole of his life, mark with what anxiety he enforces it at the approach of his dissolution. Love one another, says he; as I have loved you, so love one another; and again, my peace I give unto you, my peace I leave you. Do you observe the legacy he leaves to those whom he loves? Is it a pompous retinue, a large estate, or empire? Nothing of this kind. What is it then? Peace he giveth, his peace he leaveth; peace, not only with our near connections, but with enemies and strangers!

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Philosophical Maxims
Henri Poincaré
Henri Poincaré
3 weeks ago
Mathematicians do not study…

Mathematicians do not study objects, but the relations between objects; to them it is a matter of indifference if these objects are replaced by others, provided that the relations do not change. Matter does not engage their attention, they are interested in form alone.

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Ch. II: Dover abridged edition (1952), p. 20
Philosophical Maxims
David Pearce
David Pearce
1 month 6 days ago
Much more seriously, in those traditional...

Much more seriously, in those traditional eco-systems that we chose to retain, millions of non-human animals will continue periodically to starve, die horribly of thirst and disease, or even get eaten alive. This is commonly viewed as "natural" and hence basically OK. It would indeed be comforting to think that in some sense this ongoing animal holocaust doesn't matter too much. We often find it convenient to act as though the capacity to suffer were somehow inseparably bound up with linguistic ability or ratiocinative prowess. Yet there is absolutely no evidence that this is the case, and a great deal that it isn't.

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1.9 The Taste of Depravity
Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Wittgenstein
3 months 3 weeks ago
You could attach prices to ideas....

You could attach prices to ideas. Some cost a lot some little. ... And how do you pay for ideas? I believe: with courage.

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p. 60e
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
4 months 5 days ago
It is an article of faith...

It is an article of faith that Mary is Mother of the Lord and still a Virgin.

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Weimar edition of Martin Luther's Works, English translation edited by J. Pelikan [Concordia: St. Louis], Vol. 11, 319-320
Philosophical Maxims
Theodor Adorno
Theodor Adorno
2 months 1 week ago
In a world that has been...

In a world that has been thoroughly permeated by the structures of the social order, a world that so overpowers every individual that scarcely any option remains but to accept it on its own terms, such naiveté reproduces itself incessantly and disastrously. What people have forced upon them by a boundless apparatus, which they themselves constitute and which they are locked into, virtually eliminates all natural elements and becomes "nature" to them.

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p. 12
Philosophical Maxims
Roger Scruton
Roger Scruton
1 month 2 weeks ago
Faith exalts the human heart, by...

Faith exalts the human heart, by removing it from the market-place, making it sacred and unexchangeable. Under the jurisdiction of religion our deeper feelings are sacralized, so as to become raw material for the ethical life: the life lived in judgement.

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"Avant-garde and Kitsch" (p. 91)
Philosophical Maxims
Miguel de Unamuno
Miguel de Unamuno
2 months 2 weeks ago
The Catholic solution of our problem,...

The Catholic solution of our problem, of our unique vital problem, the problem of the immortality and eternal salvation of the soul, satisfies the will, and therefore satisfies life; but the attempt to rationalize it by means of a dogmatic theology fails to satisfy the reason. And reason has its exigencies as imperious as those of life. It is no use seeking to force ourselves to consider as super-rational what clearly appears to us to be contra-rational... Infallibility, a notion of Hellenic origin, is in its essence a rationalistic category.

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Philosophical Maxims
Desiderius Erasmus
Desiderius Erasmus
4 months 6 days ago
This type of man who is...

This type of man who is devoted to the study of wisdom is always most unlucky in everything, and particularly when it comes to procreating children; I imagine this is because Nature wants to ensure that the evils of wisdom shall not spread further throughout mankind.

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Philosophical Maxims
Charles Fourier
Charles Fourier
3 weeks 2 days ago
All repressed passion produces its counter-passion...

All repressed passion produces its counter-passion which is as malevolent as the natural passion would be beneficial.

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Le nouveau monde amoureux
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas
4 months 2 weeks ago
Truth is the ultimate end of...

Truth is the ultimate end of the whole universe.

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I, 1, 2
Philosophical Maxims
Iris Murdoch
Iris Murdoch
2 months 2 weeks ago
The role of philosophy might be...

The role of philosophy might be said to be to extend and deepen the self-awareness of mankind.

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Ch. 9, p. 137
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Jacques Rousseau
Jean Jacques Rousseau
4 months ago
Hatred, as well as love, renders...

Hatred, as well as love, renders its votaries credulous.

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V
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
3 months 3 weeks ago
But if the labourers could live...

But if the labourers could live on air they could not be bought at any price.

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Vol. I, Ch. 24, Section 4, pg. 657.
Philosophical Maxims
Colin Wilson
Colin Wilson
2 months 1 week ago
Crowley wanted to be a magician...

Crowley wanted to be a magician because he wanted power -- power over other people.

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p. 157
Philosophical Maxims
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
4 months 3 weeks ago
Outside intelligences, exploring the Solar System...

Outside intelligences, exploring the Solar System with true impartiality, would be quite likely to enter the Sun in their records thus: Star X, spectral class G0, 4 planets plus debris.

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Philosophical Maxims
Diogenes of Sinope
Diogenes of Sinope
3 months 2 weeks ago
When some one reminded him that...

When some one reminded him that the people of Sinope had sentenced him to exile, he said, "And I sentenced them to stay at home."

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Diogenes Laërtius, vi. 49
Philosophical Maxims
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