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Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
4 days ago
Our liberty depends on the freedom...

Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.

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Letter to Dr. James Currie (28 January 1786) Lipscomb & Bergh 18:ii
Philosophical Maxims
Arthur Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer
4 months 6 days ago
How every line is of such...

How every line is of such strong, determined, and consistent meaning! And on every page we encounter deep, original, lofty thoughts, while the whole world is suffused with a high and holy seriousness.

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About Indian sacred scriptures. quoted in Londhe, S. (2008).
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes
2 months 3 weeks ago
Give an inch, he'll take an...

Give an inch, he'll take an ell.

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Liberty and Necessity (no. 111)
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
1 month 1 week ago
Tis not sufficient....
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Main Content / General
Zeno of Citium
Zeno of Citium
3 months 2 weeks ago
That which exercises reason is more...

That which exercises reason is more excellent than that which does not exercise reason; there is nothing more excellent than the universe, therefore the universe exercises reason.

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As quoted in De Natura Deorum by Cicero, ii. 8.; iii. 9.
Philosophical Maxims
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
5 months 2 days ago
To succeed, planning alone is insufficient....

To succeed, planning alone is insufficient. One must improvise as well.

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Philosophical Maxims
Wendell Berry
Wendell Berry
4 days ago
A community is the mental and...

A community is the mental and spiritual condition of knowing that the place is shared, and that the people who share the place define and limit the possibilities of each other's lives. It is the knowledge that people have of each other, their concern for each other, their trust in each other, the freedom with which they come and go among themselves.

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The Loss of the Future
Philosophical Maxims
William James
William James
4 months 4 days ago
Every one is familiar with the...

Every one is familiar with the phenomenon of feeling more or less alive on different days. Every one knows on any given day that there are energies slumbering in him which the incitements of that day do not call forth, but which he might display if these were greater. Most of us feel as if we lived habitually with a sort of cloud weighing on us, below our highest notch of clearness in discernment, sureness in reasoning, or firmness in deciding. Compared with what we ought to be, we are only half-awake. Our fires are damped, our drafts are checked. We are making use of only a small part of our possible mental and physical resources.

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The Energies of Men
Philosophical Maxims
Confucius
Confucius
4 months 3 weeks ago
It is soft, smooth and shining

It is soft, smooth and shining like intelligence. Its edges seem sharp but do not cut like justice. It hangs down to the ground like humility. When struck, it gives a clear, ringing sound like music. The strains in it are not hidden and add to its beauty like truthfulness.' What imagination! Confucius extolled Jade's virtues this way.

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Philosophical Maxims
Karl Popper
Karl Popper
4 months 3 days ago
Ignorance is not a simple lack...

Ignorance is not a simple lack of knowledge but an active aversion to knowledge, the refusal to know, issuing from cowardice, pride or laziness of mind. 

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Principle attributed to Popper by Ryszard Kapiscinski in New York Times obituary, 1995.
Philosophical Maxims
Ian Hacking
Ian Hacking
2 months 1 week ago
Opinion is the companion of probability...

Opinion is the companion of probability within the medieval epistemology.

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Chapter 3, Opinion, p. 28.
Philosophical Maxims
Will Durant
Will Durant
3 weeks 3 days ago
The invention and spread of contraceptives...

The invention and spread of contraceptives is the proximate cause of our changing morals. The old moral code restricted sexual experience to marriage, because copulation could not be effectively separated from parentage, and parentage could be made responsible only through marriage. But to-day the dissociation of sex from reproduction has created a situation unforeseen by our fathers. All the relations of men and women are being changed by this one factor; and the moral code of the future will have to take account of these new facilities which invention has placed at the service of ancient desires.

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Our Changing Morals, in The Mansions of Philosophy: A Survey of Human Life and Destiny (1929), Ch. 5. p. 119
Philosophical Maxims
Simone Weil
Simone Weil
2 months 2 weeks ago
Imaginary evil is romantic and varied;...

Imaginary evil is romantic and varied; real evil is gloomy, monotonous, barren, boring. Imaginary good is boring; real good is always new, marvelous, intoxicating.

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p. 120
Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
4 months 5 days ago
The Austrians are a highly civilised...

The Austrians are a highly civilised race, half-surrounded by Slavs in a relatively backward state of culture. ... Servia, a country so barbaric that a man can secure the throne by instigating the assassination of his predecessor, is engaged constantly in fermenting the racial discontent of men of the same race who are Austrian subjects.

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War: The Offspring of Fear (1914), quoted in Ray Monk, Bertrand Russell: The Spirit of Solitude, 1872-1921 (1996), p. 373
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Camus
Albert Camus
5 months 1 day ago
To two men living the same...

To two men living the same number of years, the world always provides the same sum of experiences. It is up to us to be conscious of them.

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Philosophical Maxims
Vandana Shiva
Vandana Shiva
1 month 2 weeks ago
Principles of Earth Democracy, #10: Earth...

Principles of Earth Democracy, #10: Earth Democracy connects people in circles of care, cooperation, and compassion instead of dividing them through competition and conflict, fear and hatred. In the face of a world of greed, inequality, and overconsumption, Earth Democracy globalizes compassion, justice, and sustainability.

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(p. 11)
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
3 months 5 days ago
Slavery they can have anywhere. It...

Slavery they can have anywhere. It is a weed that grows in every soil.

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Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
3 months 1 week ago
In no other country in the...

In no other country in the world is the love of property keener or more alert than in the United States, and nowhere else does the majority display less inclination toward doctrines which in any way threaten the way property is owned.

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Book Three, Chapter XXI.
Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
2 months 2 weeks ago
The salvation of reality is its...

The salvation of reality is its obstinate, irreducible, matter-of-fact entities, which are limited to be no other than themselves. Neither science, nor art, nor creative action can tear itself away from obstinate, irreducible, limited facts.

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Ch. 5: "The Romantic Reaction", p. 132
Philosophical Maxims
Auguste Comte
Auguste Comte
3 months 1 week ago
The first condition of unity is...

The first condition of unity is a subjective principle; and this principle in the Positive system is the subordination of the intellect to the heart: Without this the unity that we seek can never be placed on a permanent basis, whether individually or collectively. It is essential to have some influence sufficiently powerful to produce convergence amid the heterogeneous and often antagonistic tendencies of so complex an organism as ours.

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p. 24
Philosophical Maxims
Lin Yutang
Lin Yutang
1 week 6 days ago
True peace of mind comes from...

True peace of mind comes from accepting the worst.

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p. 158
Philosophical Maxims
John Dewey
John Dewey
2 months 3 weeks ago
The difference between the artificial and...

The difference between the artificial and the artful in the artistic lies on the surface in the former there is a split between what is overly done and what is intended. The appearance is one of cordiality; the intent is that of gaining favor. Whenever this split between what is done and its purpose exists, there is insincerity, a trick, a simulation of an act that intrinsically has another effect. When the natural and the cultivated blend into one, acts of social intercourse are works of art. The animating impulsion of genial friendship and the deed performed completely coincide without intrusion of ulterior motive. Awkwardness may prevent adequacy of expression.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
3 weeks 4 days ago
Originality is a thing we constantly...

Originality is a thing we constantly clamour for, and constantly quarrel with; as if, observes our author himself, any originality but our own could be expected to content us! In fact all strange thing are apt, without fault of theirs, to estrange us at first view, and unhappily scarcely anything is perfectly plain, but what is also perfectly common.

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Richter.
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
3 months ago
Though we may prefer ourselves to...

Though we may prefer ourselves to the universe, we nonetheless loathe ourselves much more than we suspect. If the wise man is so rare a phenomenon, it is because he seems unshaken by the aversion which, like all beings, he must feel for himself.

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Philosophical Maxims
Colin Wilson
Colin Wilson
2 months 2 weeks ago
It may seem to be a...

It may seem to be a long way from Blake's innocent talk of love and copulation to De Sade's need to inflict pain. And yet both are the outcome of a sexual mysticism that strives to transcend the everyday world. Simone de Beauvoir said penetratingly of De Sade's work that 'he is trying to communicate an experience whose distinguishing characteristic is, nevertheless its will to remain incommunicable'. De Sade's perversion may have sprung from his dislike of his mother or of other women, but its basis is a kind of distorted religious emotion.

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p. 90
Philosophical Maxims
Seneca the Younger
Seneca the Younger
2 weeks 5 days ago
Virtue alone…

Virtue alone affords everlasting and peace-giving joy; even if some obstacle arise, it is but like an intervening cloud, which floats beneath the sun but never prevails against it.

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Philosophical Maxims
Horace
Horace
3 months 3 weeks ago
Whoever cultivates the golden mean…

Whoever cultivates the golden mean avoids both the poverty of a hovel and the envy of a palace.

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Book II, ode x, line 5
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Paul Sartre
Jean Paul Sartre
4 months 3 days ago
Either the USSR was not the...

Either the USSR was not the country of socialism, in which case socialism didn't exist anywhere and doubtless, wasn't possible: or else, socialism was that, this abominable monster, this police state, the power of beasts of prey.

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p. 184
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
3 months 5 days ago
I am convinced that we have...

I am convinced that we have a degree of delight, and that no small one, in the real misfortunes and pains of others.

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Part I Section XIV
Philosophical Maxims
Jerry Fodor
Jerry Fodor
2 days ago
From the point of view of...

From the point of view of semantics, errors must be accidents: if in the extension of "horse" there are no cows, then it cannot be required for the meaning of "horse" that cows be called horses. On the other hand, if "horse" did not mean that which it means, and if it were an error for horses, it would never be possible for a cow to be called "horse." Putting the two things together, it can be seen that the possibility of falsely saying "this is a horse" presupposes the existence of a semantic basis for saying it truly, but not vice versa. If we put this in terms of the crude causal theory, the fact that cows cause one to say "horse" depends on the fact that horses cause one to say "horse"; but the fact that horses cause one to say "horse" does not depend on the fact that cows cause one to say "horse"...

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Fodor (1990). A Theory of Content and Other Essays. The MIT Press.
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Schweitzer
Albert Schweitzer
2 weeks 1 day ago
The great secret of success is...

The great secret of success is to go through life as a man who never gets used up. That is possible for him who never argues and strives with men and facts, but in all experience retires upon himself, and looks for the ultimate cause of things in himself.

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Philosophical Maxims
Georg Simmel
Georg Simmel
2 weeks 1 day ago
Cities are, first of all, seats...

Cities are, first of all, seats of the highest economic division of labor. They produce thereby such extreme phenomena as in Paris the remunerative occupation of the quatorzième. They are persons who identify themselves by signs on their residences and who are ready at the dinner hour in correct attire, so that they can be quickly called upon if a dinner party should consist of thirteen persons. In the measure of its expansion, the city offers more and more the decisive conditions of the division of labor. It offers a circle which through its size can absorb a highly diverse variety of services.

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p. 420
Philosophical Maxims
Henri Poincaré
Henri Poincaré
4 weeks ago
We can not... escape the conclusion...

We can not... escape the conclusion that the rule of reasoning by recurrence is irreducible to the principle of contradiction. ...Neither can this rule come to us from experience... This rule, inaccessible to analytic demonstration and to experience, is the veritable type of the synthetic a priori judgment. On the other hand, we can not think of seeing in it a convention, as in some of the postulates of geometry. ...it is only the affirmation of the power of the mind which knows itself capable of conceiving the indefinite repetition of the same act when once this act is possible. The mind has a direct intuition of this power, and experience can only give occasion for using it and thereby becoming conscious of it.

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Ch. I. (1905) Tr. George Bruce Halstead
Philosophical Maxims
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall McLuhan
2 months 2 days ago
Language does for intelligence what the...

Language does for intelligence what the wheel does for the feet and the body. It enables them to move from thing to thing with greater ease and speed and ever less involvement.

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(p. 113)
Philosophical Maxims
Pythagoras
Pythagoras
3 months 2 weeks ago
Order thyself so, that thy Soul...

Order thyself so, that thy Soul may always be in good estate; whatsoever become of thy body.

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Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche
5 months 1 week ago
He who is punished is never...
He who is punished is never he who performed the deed. He is always the scapegoat.
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Philosophical Maxims
Theodor Adorno
Theodor Adorno
2 months 2 weeks ago
When I speak of 'negative dialectics'...

When I speak of 'negative dialectics' not the least important reason for doing so is my desire to dissociate myself from this fetishization of the positive.

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p. 18
Philosophical Maxims
Nikos Kazantzakis
Nikos Kazantzakis
5 days ago
I am a mariner of Odysseus...

I am a mariner of Odysseus with heart of fire but with mind ruthless and clear.

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Toda Raba
Philosophical Maxims
Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius
1 day ago
All that happens is as usual...

All that happens is as usual and familiar as the rose in spring and the crop in summer.

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IV, 44
Philosophical Maxims
William Whewell
William Whewell
4 days ago
The 'Diagnosis', or Scheme of the...

The 'Diagnosis', or Scheme of the Characters, comes, in the order of philosophy, after the Classification. The characters do not 'make' the classes, they only enable us to 'recognize' them. The Diagnosis is an Artificial Key to a Natural System.

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Philosophical Maxims
Erich Fromm
Erich Fromm
2 months 2 weeks ago
Fairness means not to use fraud...

Fairness means not to use fraud and trickery in the exchange of commodities and services and the exchange of feelings.

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Philosophical Maxims
Francis Fukuyama
Francis Fukuyama
4 weeks 1 day ago
The limits of this strategy were...

The limits of this strategy were evident as the century drew to a close.

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The Marxist left had to confront the fact that actual Communist societies in the Soviet Union and China had turned into grotesque and oppressive dictatorships. p. 112
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
4 months 4 days ago
All is riddle, and the key...

All is riddle, and the key to a riddle is another riddle.

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Illusions
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
4 days ago
Note that Unitarianism….

Note that Unitarianism rejects concepts such as Hell, the Trinity, Original Sin, the infallability of the Bible, as well as claims that any one religion has a monopoly on theological truth and the Holy Spirit. At the same time, it accepts the notion that reason, rational thought, science, and philosophy can coexist with faith in God.

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Thomas Jefferson, letter to Benjamin Waterhouse (26 June 1822), published in The Works of Thomas Jefferson in Twelve Volumes, Federal Edition, Paul Leicester Ford, ed., New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1904, Vol. 12, pp. 241-243.
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert A. Simon
Herbert A. Simon
2 months 1 week ago
We need to augment and amend...

We need to augment and amend the existing body of classical and neoclassical economic theory to achieve a more realistic picture of economic process.

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Herbert A. Simon (1986) in Preface to: Gilad & Kaish (eds.), Handbook of Behavioral Economics, p. xvi.
Philosophical Maxims
Gottlob frege
Gottlob frege
2 months 3 weeks ago
The ideal of strictly scientific method...

The ideal of strictly scientific method in mathematics which I have tried to realise here, and which perhaps might be named after Euclid I should like to describe in the following way... The novelty of this book does not lie in the content of the theorems but in the development of the proofs and the foundations on which they are based... With this book I accomplish an object which I had in view in my Begriffsschrift of 1879 and which I announced in my Grundlagen der Arithmetik. I am here trying to prove the opinion on the concept of number that I expressed in the book last mentioned.

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Vol. 1. pp. 137-140, as cited in: Ralph H. Johnson (2012), Manifest Rationality: A Pragmatic Theory of Argument, p. 87
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Mannheim
Karl Mannheim
2 days ago
Every bureaucracy, therefore, in accord with...

Every bureaucracy, therefore, in accord with the peculiar emphasis on its own position, tends to generalize its own experience and to overlook the fact that the realm of administration and of smoothly functioning order represents only a part of the total political reality. Bureaucratic thought does not deny the possibility of the science of politics, but regards it as identical with the science of administration. Thus irrational factors are overlooked, and when these nevertheless force themselves to the fore, they are treated as "routine matters of state."

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Philosophical Maxims
John Locke
John Locke
4 months 6 days ago
To teach him betimes to love...

To teach him betimes to love and be good-natur'd to others, is to lay early the true foundation of an honest man; all injustice generally springing from too great love of ourselves and too little of others.

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Sec. 139
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger
4 months ago
Agriculture is now a motorized food...

Agriculture is now a motorized food industry, the same thing in its essence as the production of corpses in the gas chambers and the extermination camps, the same thing as blockades and the reduction of countries to famine, the same thing as the manufacture of hydrogen bombs.

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Four Lectures on Technology
Philosophical Maxims
Confucius
Confucius
4 months 3 weeks ago
In all things success depends on...

In all things success depends on previous preparation, and without such previous preparation there is sure to be failure. If what is to be spoken be previously determined, there will be no stumbling. If affairs be previously determined, there will be no difficulty with them. If one's actions have been previously determined, there will be no sorrow in connection with them. If principles of conduct have been previously determined, the practice of them will be inexhaustible.

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Philosophical Maxims
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