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B. F. Skinner
B. F. Skinner
2 weeks 6 days ago
The strengthening of behavior which results...

The strengthening of behavior which results from reinforcement is appropriately called "conditioning". In operant conditioning we "strengthen" an operant in the sense of making a response more probable or, in actual fact, more frequent.

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Science and Human Behavior
Philosophical Maxims
Charles Fourier
Charles Fourier
2 weeks 6 days ago
The seeds of heavenly bodies are...

The seeds of heavenly bodies are deposited and cared for in the Milky Way, from which they emanate in swarms of comets that travel a ;long time and ordinarily gravitate towards various suns before becoming fixed in orbit.

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L'attraction passioneé
Philosophical Maxims
Simone Weil
Simone Weil
2 months 1 week ago
The full expression of personality depends...

The full expression of personality depends upon its being inflated by social prestige; it is a social privilege.

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p. 64
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
2 weeks 1 day ago
For love is ever the beginning...

For love is ever the beginning of Knowledge, as fire is of light.

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Carlyle, Essays, Death of Goethe. Quote reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 419-23.
Philosophical Maxims
Max Stirner
Max Stirner
1 week 2 days ago
I love men too, not merely...

I love men too, not merely individuals, but every one. But I love them with the consciousness of egoism; I love them because love makes me happy, I love because loving is natural to me, because it pleases me. I know no 'commandment of love'.

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Cambridge 1995, p. 258
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
3 months 3 weeks ago
Fear not, then, thou child infirm,...

Fear not, then, thou child infirm, There's no god dare wrong a worm.

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Compensation, st. 2
Philosophical Maxims
Max Scheler
Max Scheler
2 months 2 weeks ago
All the seemingly positive valuations and...

All the seemingly positive valuations and judgments of ressentiment are hidden devaluations and negations.

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L. Coser, trans. (1973), p. 67
Philosophical Maxims
Publilius Syrus
Publilius Syrus
1 month 3 weeks ago
He dies twice who perishes by...

He dies twice who perishes by his own hand.

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Maxim 97
Philosophical Maxims
John Gray
John Gray
1 month 1 day ago
It is because human needs are...

It is because human needs are contradictory that no human life can be perfect. That does not mean that human life is imperfect. It means that the idea of perfection has no meaning.

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'Modus Vivendi' (p.29)
Philosophical Maxims
John Dewey
John Dewey
2 months 2 weeks ago
Artist and perceiver alike begin with...

Artist and perceiver alike begin with what may be called a total seizure, an inclusive qualitative whole not yet articulated, not distinguished into members.

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p. 199
Philosophical Maxims
Confucius
Confucius
4 months 1 week ago
How great is the path proper...

How great is the path proper to the Sage! Like overflowing water, it sends forth and nourishes all things, and rises up to the height of heaven. All-complete is its greatness! It embraces the three hundred rules of ceremony, and the three thousand rules of demeanor. It waits for the proper man, and then it is trodden. Hence it is said, "Only by perfect virtue can the perfect path, in all its courses, be made a fact."

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Philosophical Maxims
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall McLuhan
1 month 3 weeks ago
New media are new archetypes, at...

New media are new archetypes, at first disguised as degradations of older media.

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Arts in society, Volume 3, 1964, p. 240
Philosophical Maxims
Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
1 month 3 weeks ago
The inherent contradiction of human life...

The inherent contradiction of human life has now reached an extreme degree of tension: on the one side there is the consciousness of the beneficence of the law of love, and on the other the existing order of life which has for centuries occasioned an empty, anxious, restless, and troubled mode of life, conflicting as it does with the law of love and built on the use of violence. This contradiction must be faced, and the solution will evidently not be favourable to the outlived law of violence, but to the truth which has dwelt in the hearts of men from remote antiquity: the truth that the law of love is in accord with the nature of man. But men can only recognize this truth to its full extent when they have completely freed themselves from all religious and scientific superstitions and from all the consequent misrepresentations and sophistical distortions by which its recognition has been hindered for centuries.

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VI
Philosophical Maxims
Slavoj Žižek
Slavoj Žižek
7 months 4 weeks ago
Canned laughter

Canned laughter: After some supposedly funny or witty remark you can hear the laughter and applause included in the soundtrack of the show itself - here we have the exact counterpart of the Chorus in classical tragedy; it is here that we have to look for 'living Antiquity.' That is to say, why this laughter? The first possible answer - that it serves to remind us when to laugh - is interesting enough, because it implies the paradox that laughter is a matter of duty and not of some spontaneous feeling; but this answer is not sufficient because we do not usually laugh. The only correct answer would be that the Other - embodied in the television set - is relieving us even of our duty to laugh - is instead laughing for us. So even if, tired from a hard days stupid work, all evening we did nothing but gaze drowsily into the television screen, we can say afterwards that objectively, through the medium of the other, we had a really good time.

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Philosophical Maxims
George Berkeley
George Berkeley
3 months ago
We indeed, who are beings of...

We indeed, who are beings of finite powers, are forced to make use of instruments. And the use of an instrument sheweth the agent to be limited by rules of another's prescription, and that he cannot obtain his end but in such a way, and by such conditions. Whence it seems a clear consequence, that the supreme unlimited agent useth no tool or instrument at all. The will of an Omnipotent Spirit is no sooner exerted than executed, without the application of means; which, if they are employed by inferior agents, it is not upon account of any real efficacy that is in them, or necessary aptitude to produce any effect, but merely in compliance with the laws of nature, or those conditions prescribed to them by the First Cause, who is Himself above all limitation or prescription whatsoever.

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Philonous to Hylas. The Second Dialogue
Philosophical Maxims
John Dewey
John Dewey
2 months 2 weeks ago
Freedom of thought and of expression...

Freedom of thought and of expression are not mere rights to be claimed. They have their roots deep in the existence of individuals as developing careers in time. Their denial and abrogation is an abdication of individuality and a virtual rejection of time as opportunity.

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Philosophical Maxims
Antisthenes
Antisthenes
3 months 2 weeks ago
Count all wickedness….

Count all wickedness foreign and alien.

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§ 5
Philosophical Maxims
Florence Nightingale
Florence Nightingale
2 months 6 days ago
The family uses people, not for...

The family uses people, not for what they are, nor for what they are intended to be, but for what it wants them for - its own uses. It thinks of them not as what God has made them, but as the something which it has arranged that they shall be.

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Philosophical Maxims
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault
3 months 2 weeks ago
If torture was so strongly embedded...

If torture was so strongly embedded in legal practice, it was because it revealed truth and showed the operation of power. It assured the articulation of the written on the oral, the secret on the public, the procedure of investigation on the operation of the confession; it made it possible to reproduce the crime on the visible body of the criminal.

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Chapter One, pp.55
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
2 months 4 weeks ago
You may set the Negro free,...

You may set the Negro free, but you cannot make him otherwise than an alien to the European. Nor is this all we scarcely acknowledge the common features of humanity in this stranger whom slavery has brought among us. His physiognomy is to our eyes hideous, his understanding weak, his tastes low; and we are almost inclined to look upon him as a being intermediate between man and the brutes.

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Chapter XVIII.
Philosophical Maxims
Montesquieu
Montesquieu
2 months 1 week ago
If one only wished to be...

If one only wished to be Sad, this could be horrible for the rest of civilisation; but we wish to be happier than other people, and this is always difficult, for we believe others to be happier than they are.

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As quoted in A Dictionary of Thoughts : Being a Cyclopedia of Laconic Quotations from the Best Authors, Both Ancient and Modern (1891) edited by Tryon Edwards.
Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
1 month 2 weeks ago
Ten years ago, you could have...

Ten years ago, you could have traveled thousands of miles through the United States and never seen a baseball cap turned back to front. Today, the reverse baseball cap is ubiquitous. I do not know what the pattern of geographical spread of the reverse baseball cap precisely was, but epidemiology is certainly among the professions primarily qualified to study it.

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Philosophical Maxims
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon
4 months 3 days ago
There is another ground of hope...

There is another ground of hope that must not be omitted. Let men but think over their infinite expenditure of understanding, time, and means on matters and pursuits of far less use and value; whereof, if but a small part were directed to sound and solid studies, there is no difficulty that might not be overcome.

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Aphorism 111
Philosophical Maxims
Heraclitus
Heraclitus
4 months 1 week ago
Dogs, also, bark..

Dogs, also, bark at what they do not know.

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Philosophical Maxims
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson
1 month 2 weeks ago
The old land is still the...

The old land is still the true love, the others are but pleasant infidelities.

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Pt. I, ch. IV
Philosophical Maxims
St. Augustine of Hippo
St. Augustine of Hippo
4 months 1 week ago
We were ensnared by the wisdom...

We were ensnared by the wisdom of the serpent; we are set free by the foolishness of God.

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1:14 Latin: Serpentis sapientia decepti sumus, Dei stultitia liberamur.
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Browne
Thomas Browne
2 months 4 weeks ago
Obstinacy in a bad cause, is...

Obstinacy in a bad cause, is but constancy in a good.

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Section 25
Philosophical Maxims
Montesquieu
Montesquieu
2 months 1 week ago
There are only two cases in...

There are only two cases in which war is just: first, in order to resist the aggression of an enemy, and second, in order to help an ally who has been attacked.

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No. 95. (Usbek writing to Rhedi)
Philosophical Maxims
Saul Bellow
Saul Bellow
1 month 2 weeks ago
There is simply too much to...

There is simply too much to think about. It is hopeless - too many kinds of special preparation are required. In electronics, in economics, in social analysis, in history, in psychology, in international politics, most of us are, given the oceanic proliferating complexity of things, paralyzed by the very suggestion that we assume responsibility for so much. This is what makes packaged opinion so attractive.

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There Is Simply Too Much to Think About (1992), pp. 173-174
Philosophical Maxims
Jesus
Jesus
2 months 2 weeks ago
You have heard that it was...

You have heard that it was said, "Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth." But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.

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5:38-41 (NIV)
Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach
Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach
2 months 3 weeks ago
All presentation, all demonstration-and the presentation...

All presentation, all demonstration-and the presentation of thought is demonstration-has, according to its original determination-and this is all that matters to us-the cognitive activity of the other person as its ultimate aim.

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Z. Hanfi, trans., in The Fiery Brook (1972), p. 67
Philosophical Maxims
David Hume
David Hume
3 months 4 weeks ago
... no testimony is sufficient to...

... no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous, than the fact, which it endeavors to establish.

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Section 10 : Of Miracles Pt. 1
Philosophical Maxims
Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt
3 months 3 weeks ago
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule...

The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (i.e., the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (i.e., the standards of thought) no longer exist.

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Part 3, Ch. 13, § 3
Philosophical Maxims
Theodor Adorno
Theodor Adorno
2 months 1 week ago
By abstaining from all definite content,...

By abstaining from all definite content, whether as formal logic and theory of science or as the legend of Being beyond all beings, philosophy declared its bankruptcy regarding concrete social goals.

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p. 6
Philosophical Maxims
William James
William James
3 months 3 weeks ago
History is a bath of blood.

History is a bath of blood.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes
2 months 2 weeks ago
The Register of Knowledge of Fact...

The Register of Knowledge of Fact is called History.

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The First Part, Chapter 9, p. 40
Philosophical Maxims
Arnold J. Toynbee
Arnold J. Toynbee
1 month 6 days ago
The coming of Buddhism to the...

The coming of Buddhism to the West may well prove to be the most important event of the Twentieth Century.

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In Lama Surya Das, Awakening the Buddha Within
Philosophical Maxims
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
2 months 3 weeks ago
No nation which has sunk into...

No nation which has sunk into this state of dependence can raise itself out of it by the means which have usually been adopted hitherto. Since resistance was useless to it when it was still in possession of all its powers, what can such resistance avail now that it has been deprived of the greater part of them?

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Introduction p. 9-10
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
3 months 3 weeks ago
The end of the human race...

The end of the human race will be that it will eventually die of civilization.

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Civilization
Philosophical Maxims
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft
2 months 3 weeks ago
I write in a hurry, because...

I write in a hurry, because the little one, who has been sleeping a long time, begins to call for me. Poor thing! when I am sad, I lament that all my affections grow on me, till they become too strong for my peace, though they all afford me snatches of exquisite enjoyment.

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Letter to Gilbert Imlay
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Jacques Rousseau
Jean Jacques Rousseau
3 months 3 weeks ago
The offender...

The offender never forgives.

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Émile et Sophie, ou Les Solitaires, "Lettre Première", 1781
Philosophical Maxims
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
3 months 3 weeks ago
Beneficence is a duty. He who...

Beneficence is a duty. He who often practices this, and sees his beneficent purpose succeed, comes at last really to love him whom he has benefited. When, therefore, it is said, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself," this does not mean, "Thou shalt first of all love, and by means of love (in the next place) do him good"; but: "Do good to thy neighbour, and this beneficence will produce in thee the love of men (as a settled habit of inclination to beneficence)."

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Metaphysical Elements of Ethics (1780). Translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbott, translation available at Philosophy.eserver.org. From section "Preliminary Notions of the Susceptibility of the Mind for Notions of Duty Generally", Part C ("Of love to men")
Philosophical Maxims
Charles Sanders Peirce
Charles Sanders Peirce
2 months 2 weeks ago
The word "God," so "capitalised" (as...

The word "God," so "capitalised" (as we Americans say), is the definable proper name, signifying Ens necessarium; in my belief Really creator of all three Universes of Experience. I, Ens necessarium is a latin expression which signifies "Necessary being, necessary entity"

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Philosophical Maxims
Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Kierkegaard
4 months 3 weeks ago
If someone were to expound that...

If someone were to expound that godliness is to belong to childhood in the temporal sense and thus dwindle and die with the years as childhood does, is to be a happy frame of mind that cannot be preserved but only recollected; if someone were to expound that repentance as a weakness of old age accompanies the decline of one's powers, when the senses are dulled, when sleep no longer strengthens but increases lethargy-this would be ungodliness and foolishness.

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Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
3 months 3 days ago
His capital is...
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Main Content / General
John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill
3 months 3 weeks ago
All those to whom I looked...

All those to whom I looked up, were of opinion that the pleasure of sympathy with human beings, and the feelings which made the good of others, and especially of mankind on a large scale, the object of existence, were the greatest and surest sources of happiness. Of the truth of this I was convinced, but to know that a feeling would make me happy if I had it, did not give me the feeling.

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(p. 138)
Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Wittgenstein
3 months 2 weeks ago
The thought is the significant proposition....

The thought is the significant proposition.

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(4) Original German: Der Gedanke ist der sinnvolle Satz.
Philosophical Maxims
Seneca the Younger
Seneca the Younger
1 week 2 days ago
The much occupied…

The much occupied man has no time for wantonness, and it is an obvious commonplace that the evils of leisure can be shaken off by hard work.

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Line 9
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
3 months 3 weeks ago
An increase in the productivity of...

An increase in the productivity of labour means nothing more than that the same capital creates the same value with less labour, or that less labour creates the same product with more capital.

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Notebook IV, The Chapter on Capital, p. 308.
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
2 months 2 weeks ago
I have never taken myself for...

I have never taken myself for a being. A non-citizen, a marginal type, a nothing who exists only by the excess, by the superabundance of his nothingness.

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Philosophical Maxims
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