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Novalis
Novalis
2 months 1 day ago
Someone arrived there - who lifted...

Someone arrived there - who lifted the veil of the goddess, at Sais. - But what did he see? He saw - wonder of wonders - himself. Novalis here alludes to Plutarch's account of the shrine of the goddess Minerva, identified with Isis, at Sais, which he reports had the inscription "I am all that hath been, and is, and shall be; and my veil no mortal has hitherto raised."

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Philosophical Maxims
José Ortega y Gasset
José Ortega y Gasset
1 month 3 weeks ago
The metaphor is perhaps one of...

The metaphor is perhaps one of man's most fruitful potentialities. Its efficacy verges on magic, and it seems a tool for creation which God forgot inside one of His creatures when He made him. All our other faculties keep us within the realm of the real, of what is already there. The most we can do is to combine things or to break them up. The metaphor alone furnishes an escape; between the real things, it lets emerge imaginary reefs, a crop of floating islands. A strange thing, indeed, the existence in man of this mental activity which substitutes one thing for another - from an urge not so much to get at the first as to get rid of the second.

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"Taboo and Metaphor"
Philosophical Maxims
George Santayana
George Santayana
1 month 3 weeks ago
Art like life should be free,...

Art like life should be free, since both are experimental.

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Ch. IX.: Justification of Art
Philosophical Maxims
David Hume
David Hume
3 months 1 week ago
Truth springs from argument amongst friends.

Truth springs from argument amongst friends.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Henry Huxley
Thomas Henry Huxley
2 weeks 6 days ago
The fact is he made a...

The fact is he made a prodigious blunder in commencing the attack, and now his only chance is to be silent and let people forget the exposure. I do not believe that in the whole history of science there is a case of any man of reputation getting himself into such a contemptible position.

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About Richard Owen's view on human and ape brains, in a letter to J.D. Hooker
Philosophical Maxims
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall McLuhan
1 month 2 days ago
Chinese script is not visual but...

Chinese script is not visual but iconic and tactile. It does not disturb the tribal bonds.

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(p. 72)
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
2 months ago
Always to have lived with the...

Always to have lived with the nostalgia to coincide with something, but not really knowing with what - it is easy to shift from unbelief to belief, or conversely. But what is there to convert to, and what is there to abjure, in a state of chronic lucidity?

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Philosophical Maxims
George Santayana
George Santayana
1 month 3 weeks ago
The Bible is literature, not dogma.

The Bible is literature, not dogma.

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Philosophical Maxims
Simone Weil
Simone Weil
1 month 2 weeks ago
We should desire neither the immortality...

We should desire neither the immortality nor the death of any human being, whoever he may be, with whom we have to do.

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p. 260
Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
1 month ago
Each generation is a filter, a...

Each generation is a filter, a sieve; good genes tend to fall through the sieve into the next generation; bad genes tend to end up in bodies that die young or without reproducing.

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Philosophical Maxims
Carl Jung
Carl Jung
2 months ago
For it all depends on how...

For it all depends on how we look at things, and not on how they are in themselves. The least of things with a meaning is worth more in life than the greatest of things without it.

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p. 67
Philosophical Maxims
Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
1 month 4 days ago
God is the infinite ALL. Man...

God is the infinite ALL. Man is only a finite manifestation of Him. Or better yet: God is that infinite All of which man knows himself to be a finite part. God alone exists truly. Man manifests Him in time, space and matter. The more God's manifestation in man (life) unites with the manifestations (lives) of other beings, the more man exists. This union with the lives of other beings is accomplished through love. God is not love, but the more there is of love, the more man manifests God, and the more he truly exists... We acknowledge God only when we are conscious of His manifestation in us. All conclusions and guidelines based on this consciousness should fully satisfy both our desire to know God as such as well as our desire to live a life based on this recognition.

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Entry in Tolstoy's Diary
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
2 months ago
Intelligence flourishes only in the ages...

Intelligence flourishes only in the ages when belief withers.

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Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
2 months 5 days ago
...if the Catholick religion is destroyd...

...if the Catholick religion is destroyd by the Infidels, it is a most contemptible and absurd Idea, that, this, or any Protestant Church, can survive that Event. ... in Ireland particularly, the R[oman] C[atholic] Religion should be upheld in high respect and veneration. ... I am more serious on the positive encouragement to be given to this religion...because the serious and earnest belief and practice of it by its professors forms, as things stand, the most effectual Barrier, if not the sole Barrier, against Jacobinism.

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Letter to William Smith, Member of the Irish Parliament (29 January 1795), quoted in R. B. McDowell (ed.)
Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche
4 months 6 days ago
Whoever has overthrown an existing law...
Whoever has overthrown an existing law of custom has hitherto always first been accounted a bad man: but when, as did happen, the law could not afterwards be reinstated and this fact was accepted, the predicate gradually changed: - history treats almost exclusively of these bad men who subsequently became good men!
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Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
1 month ago
With so many mind-bytes to be...

With so many mind-bytes to be downloaded, so many mental codons to be replicated, it is no wonder that child brains are gullible, open to almost any suggestion, vulnerable to subversion, easy prey to Moonies, Scientologists and nuns. Like immune-deficient patients, children are wide open to mental infections that adults might brush off without effort.

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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
3 months 5 days ago
The philosophy of Plotinus has the...

The philosophy of Plotinus has the defect of encouraging men to look within rather than to look without: when we look within we see nous, which is divine, while when we look without we see the imperfections of the sensible world. This kind of subjectivity was a gradual growth; it is to be found in the doctrines of Protagoras, Socrates, and Plato, as well as in the Stoics and Epicureans. But at first it was only doctrinal, not temperamental; for a long time it failed to kill scientific curiosity. [...] Plotinus is both an end and a beginning-an end as regards the Greeks, a beginning as regards Christendom.

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Russell, Bertrand (2008). History of Western Philosophy. Simon and Schuster. pp. 296-297. ISBN 978-1-4165-9915-9.
Philosophical Maxims
Simone Weil
Simone Weil
1 month 2 weeks ago
The eulogies of my intelligence are...

The eulogies of my intelligence are positively intended to evade the question "Is what she says true?"

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Letter to her parents (1943), as quoted in the Introduction by Siân Miles p. 2
Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels
1 month 4 weeks ago
Once the first radical attack on...

Once the first radical attack on private property has been launched, the proletariat will find itself forced to go ever further, to concentrate increasingly in the hands of the state all capital, all agriculture, all transport, all trade. All the foregoing measures are directed to this end; and they will become practicable and feasible, capable of producing their centralizing effects to precisely the degree that the proletariat, through its labor, multiplies the country's productive forces.

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Philosophical Maxims
Robert Nozick
Robert Nozick
1 week ago
You can't satisfy everybody; especially if...

You can't satisfy everybody; especially if there are those who will be dissatisfied unless not everybody is satisfied.

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Ch. 10 : A Framework for Utopia; The Framework as Utopian Common Ground, p. 320
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas
3 months 3 weeks ago
Charity, by which God and neighbor...

Charity, by which God and neighbor are loved, is the most perfect friendship.

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Disputed Questions: On Charity, c. 1270
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
2 months ago
The feeling of being ten thousand...

The feeling of being ten thousand years behind, or ahead, of the others, of belonging to the beginnings or to the end of humanity...

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Philosophical Maxims
Jean Jacques Rousseau
Jean Jacques Rousseau
3 months 1 week ago
I want you to read the...

I want you to read the true system of the heart, drafted by a decent man and published under another name. I do not want you to be biased against good and useful books merely because a man unworthy of reading them has the audacity to call himself the Author.

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First Dialogue; translated by Judith R. Bush, Christopher Kelly, Roger D. Masters
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Henry Huxley
Thomas Henry Huxley
2 weeks 6 days ago
Let us endeavour for a moment...

Let us endeavour for a moment to disconnect our thinking selves from the mask of humanity; let us imagine ourselves scientific Saturnians, if you will, fairly acquainted with such animals as now inhabit the Earth, and employed in discussing the relations they bear to a new and singular 'erect and featherless biped,' which some enterprising traveller, overcoming the difficulties of space and gravitation, has brought from that distant planet for our inspection, well preserved, may be, in a cask of rum.

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Ch.2, p. 85
Philosophical Maxims
Federico Fellini
Federico Fellini
1 week 6 days ago
A created thing is never invented...

A created thing is never invented and it is never true: it is always and ever itself.

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Creation
Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
3 months 5 days ago
Whatever my own practice may be,...

Whatever my own practice may be, I have no doubt that it is a part of the destiny of the human race, in its gradual improvement, to leave off eating animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating each other when they came in contact with the more civilized.

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p. 245
Philosophical Maxims
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
1 month 2 weeks ago
Man is a masterpiece of creation...

Man is a masterpiece of creation if for no other reason than that, all the weight of evidence for determinism notwithstanding, he believes he has free will.

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J 249
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Jaspers
Karl Jaspers
1 month 3 weeks ago
In old days the plastic arts,...

In old days the plastic arts, music, and poesy were so germane to man in his totality that his Transcendence plainly manifest in them. ... What is to-day obvious to all is a decay in the essence of art. ... the opposition to man's true nature as man.

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Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
3 months 4 days ago
The position of the revolutionary party...

The position of the revolutionary party in Germany is certainly difficult at the moment, but, with some critical analysis of the circumstances, clear nevertheless. As to the "governments," it is obvious from every point of view, if only for the sake of Germany's existence, that the demand must be put to them not to remain neutral, but, as you rightly say, to be patriotic. But the revolutionary point is to be given to the affair simply by emphasising the antagonism to Russia more strongly than the antagonism against Boustrapa.

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Letter to Friedrich Engels (18 May 1859), quoted in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Selected Correspondence, 1846-1895 (1943), p. 122
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
3 weeks ago
We do not....
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Main Content / General
Max Horkheimer
Max Horkheimer
1 month 3 weeks ago
In most cases, to be reasonable...

In most cases, to be reasonable means not to be obstinate, which in turn points to conformity with reality as it is. The principle of adjustment is taken for granted. When the idea of reason was conceived, it was intended to achieve more than the mere regulation of the relation between means and ends: it was regarded as the instrument for understanding the ends, for determining them.

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p. 10.
Philosophical Maxims
St. Augustine of Hippo
St. Augustine of Hippo
3 months 2 weeks ago
By faithfulness we are collected and...

By faithfulness we are collected and wound up into unity within ourselves, whereas we had been scattered abroad in multiplicity.

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As quoted in Footprints in Time : Fulfilling God's Destiny for Your Life (2007) by Jeff O'Leary, p. 223
Philosophical Maxims
Voltaire
Voltaire
3 months 6 days ago
Even in those cities which seem...

Even in those cities which seem to enjoy the blessings of peace, and where the arts florish, the inhabitants are devoured by envy, cares and anxieties, which are greater plagues than any experienced in a town when it is under siege.

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Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
1 month ago
Such delusions of grandeur to think...

Such delusions of grandeur to think that a God with a hundred billion galaxies on his mind would give a tuppenny damn who you sleep with, or indeed whether you believe in him.

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Richard Dawkins debates Rowan Williams
Philosophical Maxims
St. Augustine of Hippo
St. Augustine of Hippo
3 months 2 weeks ago
Let us rejoice and give thanks....

Let us rejoice and give thanks. Not only are we become Christians, but we are become Christ. My brothers, do you understand the grace of God that is given us? Wonder, rejoice, for we are made Christ! If He is the Head, and we the members, then together He and we are the whole man.... This would be foolish pride on our part, were it not a gift of his bounty. But this is what He promised by the mouth of the Apostle: You are the body of Christ, and severally His members.

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(1 Cor. 12:27). p. 415
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
3 months 4 days ago
The book written against fame and...

The book written against fame and learning has the author's name on the title-page.

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1857
Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
3 months 5 days ago
Sphere Music - Some sounds seem...

Sphere Music - Some sounds seem to reverberate along the plain, and then settle to earth again like dust; such are Noise, Discord, Jargon. But such only as spring heavenward, and I may catch from steeples and hilltops in their upward course, which are the more refined parts of the former, are the true sphere music - pure, unmixed music - in which no wail mingles.

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August 5, 1838
Philosophical Maxims
Mikhail Bakunin
Mikhail Bakunin
2 months 1 day ago
To revolt is a natural tendency...

To revolt is a natural tendency of life. Even a worm turns against the foot that crushes it. In general, the vitality and relative dignity of an animal can be measured by the intensity of its instinct to revolt.

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"On the International Workingmen's Association and Karl Marx"
Philosophical Maxims
Henri Bergson
Henri Bergson
1 month 3 weeks ago
The remembrance of forbidden fruit is...

The remembrance of forbidden fruit is the earliest thing in the memory of each of us, as it is in that of mankind.

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Chapter I: Moral Obligation
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert Spencer
Herbert Spencer
2 months 4 days ago
Volumes might be written upon the...

Volumes might be written upon the impiety of the pious.

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Pt. I, The Unknowable; Ch. V, The Reconciliation
Philosophical Maxims
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley
3 months 4 days ago
Who is going to educate the...

Who is going to educate the human race in the principles and practice of conservation?

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Chapter 12 (p. 112)
Philosophical Maxims
Pythagoras
Pythagoras
2 months 2 weeks ago
Disbelieve nothing wonderful concerning the gods,...

Disbelieve nothing wonderful concerning the gods, nor concerning divine dogmas.

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Symbol 4
Philosophical Maxims
William James
William James
3 months 4 days ago
Pacifists ought to enter more deeply...

Pacifists ought to enter more deeply into the aesthetical and ethical point of view of their opponents. ... So long as antimilitarists propose no substitute for war's disciplinary function, no moral equivalent of war, analogous, as one might say, to the mechanical equivalent of heat, so long they fail to realize the full inwardness of the situation. And as a rule they do fail. The duties, penalties, and sanctions pictured in the utopias they paint are all too weak and tame to touch the military-minded.

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Philosophical Maxims
Ernst Mach
Ernst Mach
2 months ago
The aim of research is the...

The aim of research is the discovery of the equations which subsist between the elements of phenomena.

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p. 205; On aim of research.
Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels
1 month 4 weeks ago
By creating the world market, big...

By creating the world market, big industry has already brought all the peoples of the Earth, and especially the civilized peoples, into such close relation with one another that none is independent of what happens to the others. Further, it has co-ordinated the social development of the civilized countries to such an extent that, in all of them, bourgeoisie and proletariat have become the decisive classes, and the struggle between them the great struggle of the day. It follows that the communist revolution will not merely be a national phenomenon but must take place simultaneously in all civilized countries.

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Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
3 months 4 days ago
All the thoughts of a turtle...

All the thoughts of a turtle are turtle.

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1855
Philosophical Maxims
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
3 months 1 week ago
I freely admit that the remembrance...

I freely admit that the remembrance of David Hume was the very thing that many years ago first interrupted my dogmatic slumber and gave a completely different direction to my researches in the field of speculative philosophy.

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Philosophical Maxims
St. Augustine of Hippo
St. Augustine of Hippo
3 months 2 weeks ago
When I, who conduct this inquiry,...

When I, who conduct this inquiry, love something, then three things are found: I, what I love, and the love itself. There are, therefore three things: the lover, the beloved and the love.

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(Cambridge: 2002), Book 9, Chapter 2, Section 2, p. 26
Philosophical Maxims
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
4 months 2 days ago
Korell is that frequent phenomenon in...

Korell is that frequent phenomenon in history: the republic whose ruler has every attribute of the absolute monarch but the name. It therefore enjoyed the usual despotism unrestrained even by those two moderating influences in the legitimate monarchies: regal, honor and court etiquette.

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Philosophical Maxims
Herbert A. Simon
Herbert A. Simon
1 month 1 week ago
First, most producers are employees of...

First, most producers are employees of firms, not owners. Viewed from the vantage point of classical economic theory, they have no reason to maximize the profits of firms, except to the extent that they can be controlled by owners. Moreover, profit-making firms, nonprofit organizations, and bureaucratic organizations all have exactly the same problem of inducing their employees to work toward organizational goals. There is no reason, a priori, why it should be easier (or harder) to produce this motivation in organizations aimed at maximizing profits than in organizations with different goals. If it is true in an organizational economy that organizations motivated by profits will be more efficient than other organizations, additional postulates will have to be introduced to account for it.

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Simon (1991) "Organizations and Markets:" in: Journal of Economic Perspectives. 5 (2 Spring 1991): p. 28.
Philosophical Maxims
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