113 ideas
| 23064 | So-called wisdom is just pondering things instead of acting [Cioran] |
| 19608 | Wisdom is just the last gasp of a dying civilization [Cioran] |
| 19631 | The history of ideas (and deeds) occurs in a meaningless environment [Cioran] |
| 19624 | Intelligence only fully flourishes at the end of a historical period [Cioran] |
| 19599 | Ideas are neutral, but people fill them with passion and weakness [Cioran] |
| 19629 | A nation gives expression to its sum of values, and is then exhausted [Cioran] |
| 19645 | Some thinkers would have been just as dynamic, no matter when they had lived [Cioran] |
| 21970 | Philosophy attains its goal if one person feels perfect accord between their system and experience [Fichte] |
| 19618 | I abandoned philosophy because it didn't acknowledge melancholy and human weakness [Cioran] |
| 19621 | Originality in philosophy is just the invention of terms [Cioran] |
| 19607 | The mind is superficial, only concerned with the arrangement of events, not their significance [Cioran] |
| 19638 | Metaphysics is a universalisation of physical anguish [Cioran] |
| 19620 | Great systems of philosophy are just brilliant tautologies [Cioran] |
| 23072 | Systems are the worst despotism, in philosophy and in life [Cioran] |
| 23075 | A text explained ceases to be a text [Cioran] |
| 22024 | Fichte's subjectivity struggles to then give any account of objectivity [Pinkard on Fichte] |
| 6912 | For Fichte there is no God outside the ego, and 'our religion is reason' [Fichte, by Feuerbach] |
| 23247 | The need to act produces consciousness, and practical reason is the root of all reason [Fichte] |
| 23232 | Sufficient reason makes the transition from the particular to the general [Fichte] |
| 19630 | No great idea ever emerged from a dialogue [Cioran] |
| 19636 | Truth is just an error insufficiently experienced [Cioran] |
| 19642 | Eventually every 'truth' is guaranteed by the police [Cioran] |
| 22017 | Normativity needs the possibility of negation, in affirmation and denial [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 23066 | Negation doesn't arise from reasoning, but from deep instincts [Cioran] |
| 19632 | An axiom has no more authority than a frenzy [Cioran] |
| 23077 | The word 'being' is very tempting, but in fact means nothing at all [Cioran] |
| 23068 | People who really believe anti-realism don't bother to prove it [Cioran] |
| 23227 | Each object has a precise number of properties, each to a precise degree [Fichte] |
| 23228 | The principle of activity and generation is found in a self-moving basic force [Fichte] |
| 22018 | Necessary truths derive from basic assertion and negation [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 23073 | Convictions are failures to study anything thoroughly [Cioran] |
| 23078 | Opinions are fine, but having convictions means something has gone wrong [Cioran] |
| 22062 | Mental presentation are not empirical, but concern the strivings of the self [Fichte] |
| 22015 | The thing-in-itself is an empty dream [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 22064 | Fichte's logic is much too narrow, and doesn't deduce ethics, art, society or life [Schlegel,F on Fichte] |
| 21973 | Fichte believed in things-in-themselves [Fichte, by Moore,AW] |
| 21914 | We can deduce experience from self-consciousness, without the thing-in-itself [Fichte] |
| 23241 | I am myself, but not the external object; so I only sense myself, and not the object [Fichte] |
| 21966 | Self-consciousness is the basis of knowledge, and knowing something is knowing myself [Fichte] |
| 21967 | There is nothing to say about anything which is outside my consciousness [Fichte] |
| 21969 | Awareness of reality comes from the free activity of consciousness [Fichte] |
| 22032 | Fichte's key claim was that the subjective-objective distinction must itself be subjective [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 20951 | The absolute I divides into consciousness, and a world which is not-I [Fichte, by Bowie] |
| 21964 | Reason arises from freedom, so philosophy starts from the self, and not from the laws of nature [Fichte] |
| 21968 | Abandon the thing-in-itself; things only exist in relation to our thinking [Fichte] |
| 23231 | I immediately know myself, and anything beyond that is an inference [Fichte] |
| 23246 | Faith is not knowledge; it is a decision of the will [Fichte] |
| 23245 | Knowledge can't be its own foundation; there has to be regress of higher and higher authorities [Fichte] |
| 20653 | Six reduction levels: groups, lives, cells, molecules, atoms, particles [Putnam/Oppenheim, by Watson] |
| 23242 | Consciousness has two parts, passively receiving sensation, and actively causing productions [Fichte] |
| 22020 | We only see ourselves as self-conscious and rational in relation to other rationalities [Fichte] |
| 19626 | Our instincts had to be blunted and diminished, to make way for consciousness! [Cioran] |
| 23240 | We can't know by sight or hearing without realising that we are doing so [Fichte] |
| 22060 | The Self is the spontaneity, self-relatedness and unity needed for knowledge [Fichte, by Siep] |
| 22066 | Novalis sought a much wider concept of the ego than Fichte's proposal [Novalis on Fichte] |
| 22016 | The self is not a 'thing', but what emerges from an assertion of normativity [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 23243 | Consciousness of external things is always accompanied by an unnoticed consciousness of self [Fichte] |
| 22019 | Consciousness of an object always entails awareness of the self [Fichte] |
| 22063 | Effective individuals must posit a specific material body for themselves [Fichte] |
| 23237 | The capacity for freedom is above the laws of nature, with its own power of purpose and will [Fichte] |
| 23244 | Forming purposes is absolutely free, and produces something from nothing [Fichte] |
| 23235 | I want independent control of the fundamental cause of my decisions [Fichte] |
| 21965 | Spinoza could not actually believe his determinism, because living requires free will [Fichte] |
| 23076 | If people always acted without words we would take them for robots [Cioran] |
| 23230 | Nature contains a fundamental force of thought [Fichte] |
| 22061 | Judgement is distinguishing concepts, and seeing their relations [Fichte, by Siep] |
| 19633 | We use concepts to master our fears; saying 'death' releases us from confronting it [Cioran] |
| 23065 | If only we could write like a reptile, of endless sensations and no concepts! [Cioran] |
| 23233 | The will is awareness of one of our inner natural forces [Fichte] |
| 19615 | I want to suppress in myself the normal reasons people have for action [Cioran] |
| 23071 | We could only be responsible if we had consented before birth to who we are [Cioran] |
| 23070 | We morally dissolve if we spend time with excessive beauty [Cioran] |
| 19628 | At a civilisation's peak values are all that matters, and people unconsciously live by them [Cioran] |
| 23234 | I cannot change the nature which has been determined for me [Fichte] |
| 23239 | The self is, apart from outward behaviour, a drive in your nature [Fichte] |
| 19646 | Values don't accumulate; they are ruthlessly replaced [Cioran] |
| 22023 | Fichte's idea of spontaneity implied that nothing counts unless we give it status [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 19614 | Lovers are hateful, apart from their hovering awareness of death [Cioran] |
| 23238 | If life lacks love it becomes destruction [Fichte] |
| 19619 | To live authentically, we must see that philosophy is totally useless [Cioran] |
| 19634 | Man is never himself; he always aims at less than life, or more than life [Cioran] |
| 19617 | Evidence suggests that humans do not have a purpose [Cioran] |
| 19622 | The pointlessness of our motives and irrelevance of our gestures reveals our vacuity [Cioran] |
| 19612 | The universe is dirty and fragile, as if a scandal in nothingness had produced its matter [Cioran] |
| 19604 | Unlike other creatures, mankind seems lost in nature [Cioran] |
| 19606 | We can only live because our imagination and memory are poor [Cioran] |
| 19601 | Life is now more dreaded than death [Cioran] |
| 23074 | In anxiety people cling to what reinforces it, because it is a deep need [Cioran] |
| 19640 | No one is brave enough to say they don't want to do anything; we despise such a view [Cioran] |
| 23069 | Fear cures boredom, because it is stronger [Cioran] |
| 23062 | It is better to watch the hours pass, than trying to fill them [Cioran] |
| 19602 | You are stuck in the past if you don't know boredom [Cioran] |
| 19641 | If you lack beliefs, boredom is your martyrdom [Cioran] |
| 19644 | History is the bloody rejection of boredom [Cioran] |
| 23236 | Freedom means making yourself become true to your essential nature [Fichte] |
| 19613 | It is pointless to refuse or accept the social order; we must endure it like the weather [Cioran] |
| 19627 | Opportunists can save a nation, and heroes can ruin it [Cioran] |
| 19625 | The ideal is to impose a religion by force, and then live in doubt about its beliefs [Cioran] |
| 19605 | Despite endless suggestions, no one has found a goal for history [Cioran] |
| 19637 | History is wonderfully devoid of meaning [Cioran] |
| 23067 | Suicide is pointless, because it always comes too late [Cioran] |
| 19611 | No one has ever found a good argument against suicide [Cioran] |
| 19610 | Religions see suicide as insubordination [Cioran] |
| 19609 | If you have not contemplated suicide, you are a miserable worm [Cioran] |
| 19639 | We all need sexual secrets! [Cioran] |
| 23229 | Nature is wholly interconnected, and the tiniest change affects everything [Fichte] |
| 22065 | Fichte reduces nature to a lifeless immobility [Schlegel,F on Fichte] |
| 19603 | Why is God so boring, and why does God resemble humanity so little? [Cioran] |
| 19616 | As the perfect wisdom of detachment, philosophy offers no rivals to Taoism [Cioran] |
| 19600 | When man abandons religion, he then follows new fake gods and mythologies [Cioran] |
| 19643 | A religion needs to motivate killings, and cannot tolerate rivals [Cioran] |
| 23063 | The first man obviously found paradise unendurable [Cioran] |
| 19623 | Circles of hell are ridiculous; all that matters is to be there [Cioran] |