410 ideas
21875 | The wisdom of a free man is a meditation on life, not on death [Spinoza] |
17230 | If we are not wholly wise, we should live by good rules and maxims [Spinoza] |
21916 | Philosophers can't be religious, and don't need to be; philosophy is perilous but free [Schopenhauer] |
4171 | Philosophy considers only the universal, in nature as everywhere else [Schopenhauer] |
4186 | Everyone is conscious of all philosophical truths, but philosophers bring them to conceptual awareness [Schopenhauer] |
15209 | Like disastrous small errors in navigation, small misunderstandings can wreck intellectual life [Harré/Madden] |
12171 | Absurdity is incongruity between correct and false points of view [Schopenhauer] |
21366 | Metaphysics must understand the world thoroughly, as a principal source of knowledge [Schopenhauer] |
21474 | Metaphysics studies the inexplicable ends of explanation [Schopenhauer] |
15215 | Philosophy devises and assesses conceptual schemes in the service of worldviews [Harré/Madden] |
15212 | Analysis of concepts based neither on formalism nor psychology can arise from examining what we know [Harré/Madden] |
17200 | We must be careful to keep words distinct from ideas and images [Spinoza] |
15210 | Humeans see analysis in terms of formal logic, because necessities are fundamentally logical relations [Harré/Madden] |
15236 | Positivism says science only refers to immediate experiences [Harré/Madden] |
17194 | Reason only explains what is universal, so it is timeless, under a certain form of eternity [Spinoza] |
4840 | Reason perceives things under a certain form of eternity [Spinoza] |
17213 | In so far as men live according to reason, they will agree with one another [Spinoza] |
19917 | Without reason and human help, human life is misery [Spinoza] |
4819 | There is necessarily for each existent thing a cause why it should exist [Spinoza] |
21918 | Sufficient Reason can't be proved, because all proof presupposes it [Schopenhauer, by Lewis,PB] |
4187 | 'There is nothing without a reason why it should be rather than not be' (a generalisation of 'Why?') [Schopenhauer] |
15227 | Logically, definitions have a subject, and a set of necessary predicates [Harré/Madden] |
16541 | All the intrinsic properties of a thing should be deducible from its definition [Spinoza] |
21864 | Truth is its own standard [Spinoza] |
8018 | Spinoza's life shows that love of truth which he proclaims as the highest value [MacIntyre on Spinoza] |
5641 | For Spinoza, 'adequacy' is the intrinsic mark of truth [Spinoza, by Scruton] |
4816 | A true idea must correspond with its ideate or object [Spinoza] |
20309 | If our ideas are adequate, what follows from them is also adequate [Spinoza] |
17185 | Mathematics deals with the essences and properties of forms [Spinoza] |
17222 | The sum of its angles follows from a triangle's nature [Spinoza] |
17197 | The idea of a triangle involves truths about it, so those are part of its essence [Spinoza] |
15273 | Points can be 'dense' by unending division, but must meet a tougher criterion to be 'continuous' [Harré/Madden] |
15274 | Points are 'continuous' if any 'cut' point participates in both halves of the cut [Harré/Madden] |
15211 | There is not an exclusive dichotomy between the formal and the logical [Harré/Madden] |
17174 | Outside the mind, there are just things and their properties [Spinoza] |
17176 | The more reality a thing has, the more attributes it has [Spinoza] |
4168 | Matter and intellect are inseparable correlatives which only exist relatively, and for each other [Schopenhauer] |
17179 | There must always be a reason or cause why some triangle does or does not exist [Spinoza] |
15261 | Humeans can only explain change with continuity as successive replacement [Harré/Madden] |
15268 | Humeans construct their objects from events, but we construct events from objects [Harré/Madden] |
15257 | The induction problem fades if you work with things, rather than with events [Harré/Madden] |
17186 | Men say they prefer order, not realising that we imagine the order [Spinoza] |
15300 | Fundamental particulars can't change [Harré/Madden] |
15319 | Hard individual blocks don't fix what 'things' are; fluids are no less material things [Harré/Madden] |
15320 | Magnetic and gravity fields can occupy the same place without merging [Harré/Madden] |
21470 | For me the objective thing-in-itself is the will [Schopenhauer] |
21926 | Schopenhauer, unlike other idealists, says reality is irrational [Schopenhauer, by Lewis,PB] |
4167 | The knowing subject and the crude matter of the world are both in themselves unknowable [Schopenhauer] |
20127 | Laws of nature are universal, so everything must be understood through those laws [Spinoza] |
15318 | Gravitational and electrical fields are, for a materialist, distressingly empty of material [Harré/Madden] |
15267 | Events are changes in states of affairs (which consist of structured particulars, with powers and relations) [Harré/Madden] |
21920 | No need for a priori categories, since sufficient reason shows the interrelations [Schopenhauer, by Lewis,PB] |
17170 | An 'attribute' is what the intellect takes as constituting an essence [Spinoza] |
15281 | Humeans see predicates as independent, but science says they are connected [Harré/Madden] |
17171 | A 'mode' is an aspect of a substance, and conceived through that substance [Spinoza] |
15279 | Energy was introduced to physics to refer to the 'store of potency' of a moving ball [Harré/Madden] |
15276 | Some powers need a stimulus, but others are just released [Harré/Madden] |
15305 | Some powers are variable, others cannot change (without destroying an identity) [Harré/Madden] |
17195 | Things persevere through a force which derives from God [Spinoza] |
15218 | Scientists define copper almost entirely (bar atomic number) in terms of its dispositions [Harré/Madden] |
15302 | We explain powers by the natures of things, but explanations end in inexplicable powers [Harré/Madden] |
15303 | Maybe a physical field qualifies as ultimate, if its nature is identical with its powers [Harré/Madden] |
15258 | Powers are not qualities; they just point to directions of empirical investigation [Harré/Madden] |
17206 | The essence of a thing is its effort to persevere [Spinoza] |
15315 | What is a field of potentials, if it only consists of possible events? [Harré/Madden] |
17192 | The 'universal' term 'man' is just imagining whatever is the same in a multitude of men [Spinoza] |
15272 | The good criticism of substance by Humeans also loses them the vital concept of a thing [Harré/Madden] |
17188 | A thing is unified if its parts produce a single effect [Spinoza] |
5639 | Spinoza implies that thought is impossible without the notion of substance [Spinoza, by Scruton] |
21857 | Substance is the power of self-actualisation [Spinoza, by Lord] |
4813 | Substance is that of which an independent conception can be formed [Spinoza] |
15304 | We can escape substance and its properties, if we take fields of pure powers as ultimate [Harré/Madden] |
15309 | The assumption that shape and solidity are fundamental implies dubious 'substance' in bodies [Harré/Madden] |
15264 | The notorious substratum results from substance-with-qualities; individuals-with-powers solves this [Harré/Madden] |
4828 | The essence of a thing is what is required for it to exist or be conceived [Spinoza] |
17187 | Essence gives existence and conception to things, and is inseparable from them [Spinoza] |
15262 | In logic the nature of a kind, substance or individual is the essence which is inseparable from what it is [Harré/Madden] |
17191 | Nothing is essential if it is in every part, and is common to everything [Spinoza] |
17184 | All natures of things produce some effect [Spinoza] |
15297 | We can infer a new property of a thing from its other properties, via its essential nature [Harré/Madden] |
4869 | Experience does not teach us any essences of things [Spinoza] |
15266 | We say the essence of particles is energy, but only so we can tell a story about the nature of things [Harré/Madden] |
15220 | To say something remains the same but lacks its capacities and powers seems a contradiction [Harré/Madden] |
15222 | Some individuals can gain or lose capacities or powers, without losing their identity [Harré/Madden] |
15296 | A particular might change all of its characteristics, retaining mere numerical identity [Harré/Madden] |
15275 | 'Dense' time raises doubts about continuous objects, so they need 'continuous' time [Harré/Madden] |
15271 | If things are successive instantaneous events, nothing requires those events to resemble one another [Harré/Madden] |
15256 | Humeans cannot step in the same river twice, because they cannot strictly form the concept of 'river' [Harré/Madden] |
17205 | Only an external cause can destroy something [Spinoza] |
17175 | There cannot be two substances with the same attributes [Spinoza] |
17173 | Two substances can't be the same if they have different attributes [Spinoza] |
15290 | What reduces the field of the possible is a step towards necessity [Harré/Madden] |
21362 | Necessity is physical, logical, mathematical or moral [Schopenhauer, by Janaway] |
15291 | There is 'absolute' necessity (implied by all propositions) and 'relative' necessity (from what is given) [Harré/Madden] |
15230 | Logical necessity is grounded in the logical form of a statement [Harré/Madden] |
15214 | Natural necessity is not logical necessity or empirical contingency in disguise [Harré/Madden] |
15221 | The relation between what a thing is and what it can do or undergo relate by natural necessity [Harré/Madden] |
15224 | A necessity corresponds to the nature of the actual [Harré/Madden] |
15232 | Natural necessity is when powerful particulars must produce certain results in a situation [Harré/Madden] |
15288 | People doubt science because if it isn't logically necessary it seems to be absolutely contingent [Harré/Madden] |
15289 | Property or event relations are naturally necessary if generated by essential mechanisms [Harré/Madden] |
15231 | Transcendental necessity is conditions of a world required for a rational being to know its nature [Harré/Madden] |
15234 | There is a transcendental necessity for each logical necessity, but the transcendental extends further [Harré/Madden] |
17183 | Things are impossible if they imply contradiction, or their production lacks an external cause [Spinoza] |
4299 | Contingency is an illusion, resulting from our inadequate understanding [Spinoza, by Cottingham] |
4824 | We only call things 'contingent' in relation to the imperfection of our knowledge [Spinoza] |
4839 | Reason naturally regards things as necessary, and only imagination considers them contingent [Spinoza] |
15260 | Counterfactuals are just right for analysing statements about the powers which things have [Harré/Madden] |
4822 | Divine nature makes all existence and operations necessary, and nothing is contingent [Spinoza] |
4192 | All necessity arises from causation, which is conditioned; there is no absolute or unconditioned necessity [Schopenhauer] |
15233 | If natural necessity is used to include or exclude some predicate, the predicate is conceptually necessary [Harré/Madden] |
15242 | Having a child is contingent for a 'man', necessary for a 'father'; the latter reflects a necessity of nature [Harré/Madden] |
15216 | Is conceptual necessity just conventional, or does it mirror something about nature? [Harré/Madden] |
15235 | There is a conceptual necessity when properties become a standard part of a nominal essence [Harré/Madden] |
17182 | Necessity is in reference to essence or to cause [Spinoza] |
15228 | Necessity and contingency are separate from the a priori and the a posteriori [Harré/Madden] |
4818 | People who are ignorant of true causes imagine anything can change into anything else [Spinoza] |
20310 | Error does not result from imagining, but from lacking the evidence of impossibility [Spinoza] |
15252 | If Goldbach's Conjecture is true (and logically necessary), we may be able to conceive its opposite [Harré/Madden] |
17208 | A horse would be destroyed if it were changed into a man or an insect [Spinoza] |
17209 | A thing is contingent if nothing in its essence determines whether or not it exists [Spinoza] |
5640 | Spinoza's three levels of knowledge are perception/imagination, then principles, then intuitions [Spinoza, by Scruton] |
17211 | Understanding is the sole aim of reason, and the only profit for the mind [Spinoza] |
4190 | All understanding is an immediate apprehension of the causal relation [Schopenhauer] |
21479 | Knowledge is not power! Ignorant people possess supreme authority [Schopenhauer] |
21801 | Unlike Descartes' atomism, Spinoza held a holistic view of belief [Spinoza, by Schmid] |
17193 | True ideas intrinsically involve the highest degree of certainty [Spinoza] |
21863 | You only know you are certain of something when you actually are certain of it [Spinoza] |
17199 | A man who assents without doubt to a falsehood is not certain, but lacks a cause to make him waver [Spinoza] |
15245 | It is silly to say that direct experience must be justified, either by reason, or by more experience [Harré/Madden] |
4165 | Descartes found the true beginning of philosophy with the Cogito, in the consciousness of the individual [Schopenhauer] |
5638 | 'I think' is useless, because it is contingent, and limited to the first person [Spinoza, by Scruton] |
21361 | For Schopenhauer, material things would not exist without the mind [Schopenhauer, by Janaway] |
21923 | Schopenhauer can't use force/energy instead of 'will', because he is not a materialist [Lewis,PB on Schopenhauer] |
4162 | The world only exists in relation to something else, as an idea of the one who conceives it [Schopenhauer] |
21922 | We know reality because we know our own bodies and actions [Schopenhauer] |
21913 | Kant rightly separates appearance and thing-in-itself [Schopenhauer] |
21919 | Object for a subject and representation are the same thing [Schopenhauer] |
21476 | A priori propositions are those we could never be seriously motivated to challenge [Schopenhauer] |
4164 | Direct feeling of the senses are merely data; perception of the world comes with understanding causes [Schopenhauer] |
15244 | We experience qualities as of objects, not on their own [Harré/Madden] |
4831 | If the body is affected by an external object, the mind can't help believing that the object exists [Spinoza] |
4163 | All perception is intellectual [Schopenhauer] |
15248 | Inference in perception is unconvincingly defended as non-conscious and almost instantaneous [Harré/Madden] |
4865 | The eyes of the mind are proofs [Spinoza] |
20306 | Once we have experienced two feelings together, one will always give rise to the other [Spinoza] |
15269 | Humean impressions are too instantaneous and simple to have structure or relations [Harré/Madden] |
4835 | Anyone who knows, must know that they know, and even know that they know that they know.. [Spinoza] |
20308 | Encounters with things confuse the mind, and internal comparisons bring clarity [Spinoza] |
15286 | Clavius's Paradox: purely syntactic entailment theories won't explain, because they are too profuse [Harré/Madden] |
15283 | Simplicity can sort theories out, but still leaves an infinity of possibilities [Harré/Madden] |
15316 | The powers/natures approach has been so successful (for electricity, magnetism, gravity) it may be universal [Harré/Madden] |
15298 | We prefer the theory which explains and predicts the powers and capacities of particulars [Harré/Madden] |
15225 | Science investigates the nature and constitution of things or substances [Harré/Madden] |
15255 | Conjunctions explain nothing, and so do not give a reason for confidence in inductions [Harré/Madden] |
15270 | Hume's atomic events makes properties independent, and leads to problems with induction [Harré/Madden] |
15284 | Contraposition may be equivalent in truth, but not true in nature, because of irrelevant predicates [Harré/Madden] |
15285 | The items put forward by the contraposition belong within different natural clusters [Harré/Madden] |
15287 | The possibility that all ravens are black is a law depends on a mechanism producing the blackness [Harré/Madden] |
21473 | All knowledge and explanation rests on the inexplicable [Schopenhauer] |
15306 | Only changes require explanation [Harré/Madden] |
15293 | If explanation is by entailment, that lacks a causal direction, unlike natural necessity [Harré/Madden] |
15294 | Powers can explain the direction of causality, and make it a natural necessity [Harré/Madden] |
21917 | The four explanations: objects by causes, concepts by ground, maths by spacetime, ethics by motive [Schopenhauer, by Lewis,PB] |
4312 | To understand a phenomenon, we must understand why it is necessary, not merely contingent [Spinoza, by Cottingham] |
15254 | If the nature of particulars explains their powers, it also explains their relations and behaviour [Harré/Madden] |
15317 | Powers and natures lead us to hypothesise underlying mechanisms, which may be real [Harré/Madden] |
15310 | Solidity comes from the power of repulsion, and shape from the power of attraction [Harré/Madden] |
13073 | To understand the properties we must know the essence, as with a circle [Spinoza] |
15219 | Essence explains passive capacities as well as active powers [Harré/Madden] |
4833 | The human mind is the very idea or knowledge of the human body [Spinoza] |
16198 | Knowledge is the essence of the mind [Spinoza] |
17198 | Will and intellect are the same thing [Spinoza] |
17201 | The will is finite, but the intellect is infinite [Spinoza] |
17196 | The will is not a desire, but the faculty of affirming what is true or false [Spinoza] |
21805 | Spinoza held that the mind is just a bundle of ideas [Spinoza, by Schmid] |
17204 | Animals are often observed to be wiser than people [Spinoza] |
4166 | A consciousness without an object is no consciousness [Schopenhauer] |
17212 | To understand is the absolute virtue of the mind [Spinoza] |
21369 | We have hidden and unadmitted desires and fears, suppressed because of vanity [Schopenhauer] |
21478 | Half our thinking is unconscious, and we reach conclusions while unaware of premises [Schopenhauer] |
21804 | Faculties are either fictions, or the abstract universals of ideas [Spinoza] |
15301 | The very concepts of a particular power or nature imply the possibility of being generalised [Harré/Madden] |
4832 | If the body is affected by two things together, the imagining of one will conjure up the other [Spinoza] |
21869 | Our own force of persevering is nothing in comparison with external forces [Spinoza] |
20307 | As far as possible, everything tries to persevere [Spinoza] |
21803 | The conatus (striving) of mind and body together is appetite, which is the essence of man [Spinoza] |
4836 | The mind only knows itself by means of ideas of the modification of the body [Spinoza] |
21861 | Self-knowledge needs perception of the affections of the body [Spinoza] |
4191 | What we know in ourselves is not a knower but a will [Schopenhauer] |
21367 | I know both aspects of my body, as representation, and as will [Schopenhauer] |
17216 | The poet who forgot his own tragedies was no longer the same man [Spinoza] |
21368 | The knot of the world is the use of 'I' to refer to both willing and knowing [Schopenhauer] |
4175 | It is as perverse to resent our individuality being replaced by others, as to resent the body renewing itself [Schopenhauer] |
4814 | A thing is free if it acts by necessity of its own nature, and the act is determined by itself alone [Spinoza] |
19922 | People are only free if they are guided entirely by reason [Spinoza] |
4871 | A thing is free if it acts only by the necessity of its own nature [Spinoza] |
21802 | An act of will can only occur if it has been caused, which implies a regress of causes [Spinoza] |
4837 | 'Free will' is a misunderstanding arising from awareness of our actions, but ignorance of their causes [Spinoza] |
4843 | Would we die if we lacked free will, and were poised between equal foods? Yes! [Spinoza] |
4176 | We all regard ourselves a priori as free, but see from experience that character and motive compel us [Schopenhauer] |
4844 | The mind is not free to remember or forget anything [Spinoza] |
21477 | We don't control our own thinking [Schopenhauer] |
4311 | We think we are free because we don't know the causes of our desires and choices [Spinoza] |
7828 | The actual world is the only one God could have created [Spinoza] |
4170 | Man's actions are not free, because they follow strictly from impact of motive on character [Schopenhauer] |
21860 | Ideas and things have identical connections and order [Spinoza] |
4308 | Mind and body are one thing, seen sometimes as thought and sometimes as extension [Spinoza] |
4846 | We are incapable of formulating an idea which excludes the existence of our body [Spinoza] |
4834 | Mind and body are the same thing, sometimes seen as thought, and sometimes as extension [Spinoza] |
23951 | Emotion is a modification of bodily energy, controlling our actions [Spinoza] |
4849 | The three primary emotions are pleasure, pain and desire [Spinoza] |
23990 | The three primary emotions are pleasure, pain, and desire [Spinoza, by Goldie] |
17203 | Minds are subject to passions if they have inadequate ideas [Spinoza] |
4864 | An emotion is only bad if it hinders us from thinking [Spinoza] |
7832 | Stoics want to suppress emotions, but Spinoza overcomes them with higher emotions [Spinoza, by Stewart,M] |
4863 | An emotion comes more under our control in proportion to how well it is known to us [Spinoza] |
4841 | People make calculation mistakes by misjudging the figures, not calculating them wrongly [Spinoza] |
21807 | Ideas are powerful entities, which can produce further ideas [Spinoza, by Schmid] |
4830 | An 'idea' is a mental conception which is actively formed by the mind in thinking [Spinoza] |
4842 | Ideas are not images formed in the brain, but are the conceptions of thought [Spinoza] |
20311 | An idea involves affirmation or negation [Spinoza] |
15226 | What properties a thing must have to be a type of substance can be laid down a priori [Harré/Madden] |
21921 | Concepts are abstracted from perceptions [Schopenhauer, by Lewis,PB] |
21475 | All of our concepts are borrowed from perceptual knowledge [Schopenhauer] |
15229 | We say there is 'no alternative' in all sorts of contexts, and there are many different grounds for it [Harré/Madden] |
4169 | Every true act of will is also at once and without exception a movement of the body [Schopenhauer] |
7187 | Schopenhauer was caught in Christian ideals, because he didn't deify his 'will' [Nietzsche on Schopenhauer] |
21365 | Only the will is thing-in-itself, seen both in blind nature and in human action [Schopenhauer] |
21924 | As the subject of willing I am wretched, but absorption in knowledge is bliss [Schopenhauer] |
4838 | Claiming that actions depend on the will is meaningless; no one knows what the will is [Spinoza] |
4309 | Spinoza argues that in reality the will and the intellect are 'one and the same' [Spinoza, by Cottingham] |
20305 | Whenever we act, then desire is our very essence [Spinoza] |
4173 | If we were essentially intellect rather than will, our moral worth would depend on imagined motives [Schopenhauer] |
21363 | Motivation is causality seen from within [Schopenhauer] |
21868 | We love or hate people more strongly because we think they are free [Spinoza] |
17202 | We are the source of an action if only our nature can explain the action [Spinoza] |
21865 | We act when it follows from our nature, and is understood in that way [Spinoza] |
21372 | Aesthetics concerns how we can take pleasure in an object, with no reference to the will [Schopenhauer] |
21370 | Schopenhauer is a chief proponent of aesthetic experience as 'disinterested' [Schopenhauer, by Janaway] |
4182 | A principal pleasure of the beautiful is that it momentarily silences the will [Schopenhauer] |
21488 | The beautiful is a perception of Plato's Forms, which eliminates the will [Schopenhauer] |
4870 | The most beautiful hand seen through the microscope will appear horrible [Spinoza] |
21928 | The Sublime fights for will-less knowing, when faced with a beautiful threat to humanity [Schopenhauer, by Lewis,PB] |
21927 | Schopenhauer emphasises Ideas in art, unlike most romantics [Schopenhauer, by Lewis,PB] |
8116 | The will-less contemplation of art brings a liberation from selfhood [Schopenhauer, by Gardner] |
4174 | Man is more beautiful than anything else, and the loftiest purpose of art is to reveal his nature [Schopenhauer] |
21380 | The only aim of our existence is to grasp that non-existence would be better [Schopenhauer] |
21374 | We should no more expect ethical theory to produce good people than aesthetics to produce artists [Schopenhauer] |
4867 | Whether nature is beautiful or orderly is entirely in relation to human imagination [Spinoza] |
21378 | We clearly feel responsible for our deeds, because we are quite certain that we did them [Schopenhauer] |
21873 | Men only agree in nature if they are guided by reason [Spinoza] |
21872 | We seek our own advantage, and virtue is doing this rationally [Spinoza] |
21375 | Reason can be vicious, and great crimes have to be rational [Schopenhauer] |
21915 | To deduce morality from reason is blasphemy, because it is holy, and far above reason [Schopenhauer] |
17189 | The essence of man is modifications of the nature of God [Spinoza] |
17207 | By 'good' I mean what brings us ever closer to our model of human nature [Spinoza] |
8019 | Along with his pantheism, Spinoza equates ethics with the study of human nature [Spinoza, by MacIntyre] |
17229 | If infancy in humans was very rare, we would consider it a pitiful natural defect [Spinoza] |
21483 | Man is essentially a dreadful wild animal [Schopenhauer] |
21379 | Man's three basic ethical incentives are egoism, malice and compassion [Schopenhauer] |
4845 | We don't want things because they are good; we judge things to be good because we want them [Spinoza] |
4181 | Every good is essentially relative, for it has its essential nature only in its relation to a desiring will [Schopenhauer] |
5649 | Will casts aside each of its temporary fulfilments, so human life has no ultimate aim [Schopenhauer, by Scruton] |
4177 | Most people would probably choose non-existence at the end of their life, rather than relive the whole thing [Schopenhauer] |
4185 | Altruistic people make less distinction than usual between themselves and others [Schopenhauer] |
17217 | Love is joy with an external cause [Spinoza] |
4848 | Love is nothing else but pleasure accompanied by the idea of an external cause [Spinoza] |
4183 | Only self-love can motivate morality, but that also makes it worthless [Schopenhauer] |
7833 | Spinoza names self-interest as the sole source of value [Spinoza, by Stewart,M] |
17224 | If our ideas were wholly adequate, we would have no concept of evil [Spinoza] |
21870 | Music is good for a melancholic, bad for a mourner, and indifferent to the deaf [Spinoza] |
4172 | Happiness is the swift movement from desire to satisfaction, and then again on to desire [Schopenhauer] |
4860 | Man's highest happiness consists of perfecting his understanding, or reason [Spinoza] |
21371 | We can never attain happiness while our will is pursuing desires [Schopenhauer] |
4847 | Pleasure is a passive state in which the mind increases in perfection [Spinoza] |
21466 | Pleasure is weaker, and pain stronger, than we expect [Schopenhauer] |
4859 | Pleasure is only bad in so far as it hinders a man's capability for action [Spinoza] |
4851 | Reason demands nothing contrary to nature, and so it demands self-love [Spinoza] |
17220 | Self-satisfaction is the highest thing for which we can hope [Spinoza] |
4852 | Both virtue and happiness are based on the preservation of one's own being [Spinoza] |
4184 | Virtue must spring from an intuitive recognition that other people are essentially like us [Schopenhauer] |
17214 | To act virtuously is to act rationally [Spinoza] |
21871 | The more we strive for our own advantage, the more virtuous we are [Spinoza] |
17210 | All virtue is founded on self-preservation [Spinoza] |
4856 | To live according to reason is to live according to the laws of human nature [Spinoza] |
21484 | A man's character can be learned from a single characteristic action [Schopenhauer] |
17221 | A man ignorant of himself is ignorant of all of the virtues [Spinoza] |
21482 | The five Chinese virtues: pity, justice, politeness, wisdom, honesty [Schopenhauer] |
21481 | Buddhists wisely start with the cardinal vices [Schopenhauer] |
17225 | In a free man, choosing flight can show as much strength of mind as fighting [Spinoza] |
17219 | A person unmoved by either reason or pity to help others is rightly called 'inhuman' [Spinoza] |
4857 | Pity is a bad and useless thing, as it is a pain, and rational people perform good deeds without it [Spinoza] |
17223 | Pity is not a virtue, but at least it shows a desire to live uprightly [Spinoza] |
17218 | People who live according to reason should avoid pity [Spinoza] |
17228 | Rational people judge money by needs, and live contented with very little [Spinoza] |
4853 | Rational people are self-interested, but also desire the same goods for other people [Spinoza] |
4858 | A rational person will want others to have the goods he seeks for himself [Spinoza] |
21480 | Boredom is only felt by those clever enough to need activity [Schopenhauer] |
21469 | Human life is a mistake, shown by boredom, which is direct awareness of the fact [Schopenhauer] |
4855 | If people are obedient to reason, they will live in harmony [Spinoza] |
19935 | Peoples are created by individuals, not by nature, and only distinguished by language and law [Spinoza] |
21874 | The ideal for human preservation is unanimity among people [Spinoza] |
8020 | Only self-knowledge can liberate us [Spinoza, by MacIntyre] |
19914 | In nature everything has an absolute right to do anything it is capable of doing [Spinoza] |
19915 | Natural rights are determined by desire and power, not by reason [Spinoza] |
7412 | Spinoza extended Hobbes's natural rights to cover all possible desires and actions [Spinoza, by Tuck] |
7487 | Society exists to extend human awareness [Spinoza, by Watson] |
19943 | The state aims to allow personal development, so its main purpose is freedom [Spinoza] |
21485 | The state only exists to defend citizens, from exterior threats, and from one another [Schopenhauer] |
19930 | Sovereignty must include the power to make people submit to it [Spinoza] |
19936 | Kings tend to fight wars for glory, rather than for peace and liberty [Spinoza] |
19937 | Monarchs are always proud, and can't back down [Spinoza] |
19940 | Deposing a monarch is dangerous, because the people are used to royal authority [Spinoza] |
19931 | Every state is more frightened of its own citizens than of external enemies [Spinoza] |
19920 | Democracy is a legitimate gathering of people who do whatever they can do [Spinoza] |
19933 | If religion is law, then piety is justice, impiety is crime, and non-believers must leave [Spinoza] |
19938 | Allowing religious ministers any control of the state is bad for both parties [Spinoza] |
17227 | Slavery is a disgraceful crime [Spinoza] |
19923 | Slavery is not just obedience, but acting only in the interests of the master [Spinoza] |
21486 | Poverty and slavery are virtually two words for the same thing [Schopenhauer] |
19939 | Government is oppressive if opinions can be crimes, because people can't give them up [Spinoza] |
19944 | Without liberty of thought there is no trust in the state, and corruption follows [Spinoza] |
19942 | Treason may be committed as much by words as by deeds [Spinoza] |
21487 | The freedom of the press to sell poison outweighs its usefulness [Schopenhauer] |
19924 | The freest state is a rational one, where people can submit themselves to reason [Spinoza] |
7827 | Spinoza wanted democracy based on individual rights, and is thus the first modern political philosopher [Stewart,M on Spinoza] |
19926 | The sovereignty has absolute power over citizens [Spinoza] |
19918 | Forming a society meant following reason, and giving up dangerous appetites and mutual harm [Spinoza] |
19919 | People only give up their rights, and keep promises, if they hope for some greater good [Spinoza] |
19921 | Once you have given up your rights, there is no going back [Spinoza] |
19925 | In democracy we don't abandon our rights, but transfer them to the majority of us [Spinoza] |
19928 | No one, in giving up their power and right, ceases to be a human being [Spinoza] |
19929 | Everyone who gives up their rights must fear the recipients of them [Spinoza] |
19932 | The early Hebrews, following Moses, gave up their rights to God alone [Spinoza] |
19916 | The order of nature does not prohibit anything, and allows whatever appetite produces [Spinoza] |
19927 | State and religious law can clash, so the state must make decisions about religion [Spinoza] |
17226 | The best use of talent is to teach other people to live rationally [Spinoza] |
21471 | If suicide was quick and easy, most people would have done it by now [Schopenhauer] |
4854 | It is impossible that the necessity of a person's nature should produce a desire for non-existence [Spinoza] |
21467 | Would humanity still exist if sex wasn't both desired and pleasurable? [Schopenhauer] |
17215 | Animals feel, but that doesn't mean we can't use them for our pleasure and profit [Spinoza] |
21376 | Philosophy treats animals as exploitable things, ignoring the significance of their lives [Schopenhauer] |
17190 | We can easily think of nature as one individual [Spinoza] |
4179 | The essence of nature is the will to life itself [Schopenhauer] |
4826 | Nature has no particular goal in view, and final causes are mere human figments [Spinoza] |
1587 | Spinoza strongly attacked teleology, which is the lifeblood of classical logos [Roochnik on Spinoza] |
1588 | For Spinoza eyes don't act for purposes, but follow mechanical necessity [Roochnik on Spinoza] |
12731 | Final causes are figments of human imagination [Spinoza] |
4821 | An infinite line can be marked in feet or inches, so one infinity is twelve times the other [Spinoza] |
17177 | In nature there is just one infinite substance [Spinoza] |
15292 | We can base the idea of a natural kind on the mechanisms that produce natural necessity [Harré/Madden] |
15299 | Species do not have enough constancy to be natural kinds [Harré/Madden] |
15253 | If the concept of a cause includes its usual effects, we call it a 'power' [Harré/Madden] |
4850 | A final cause is simply a human desire [Spinoza] |
15278 | Humean accounts of causal direction by time fail, because cause and effect can occur together [Harré/Madden] |
15246 | Active causal power is just objects at work, not something existing in itself [Harré/Madden] |
15213 | Causation always involves particular productive things [Harré/Madden] |
15217 | Efficient causes combine stimulus to individuals, absence of contraints on activity [Harré/Madden] |
15277 | The cause (or part of it) is what stimulates or releases the powerful particular thing involved [Harré/Madden] |
4815 | From a definite cause an effect necessarily follows [Spinoza] |
15237 | Originally Humeans based lawlike statements on pure qualities, without particulars [Harré/Madden] |
15238 | Being lawlike seems to resist formal analysis, because there are always counter-examples [Harré/Madden] |
15223 | Necessary effects will follow from some general theory specifying powers and structure of a world [Harré/Madden] |
15241 | Humeans say there is no necessity in causation, because denying an effect is never self-contradictory [Harré/Madden] |
15240 | In lawful universal statements (unlike accidental ones) we see why the regularity holds [Harré/Madden] |
15239 | We could call any generalisation a law, if it had reasonable support and no counter-evidence [Harré/Madden] |
15243 | We perceive motion, and not just successive occupations of different positions [Harré/Madden] |
15265 | 'Energy' is a quasi-substance invented as the bearer of change during interactions [Harré/Madden] |
15280 | 'Kinetic energy' is used to explain the effects of moving things when they are stopped [Harré/Madden] |
15321 | Space can't be an individual (in space), but it is present in all places [Harré/Madden] |
4189 | Time may be defined as the possibility of mutually exclusive conditions of the same thing [Schopenhauer] |
15259 | Chemical atoms have two powers: to enter certain combinations, and to emit a particular spectrum [Harré/Madden] |
15263 | Chemistry is not purely structural; CO2 is not the same as SO2 [Harré/Madden] |
7835 | The key question for Spinoza is: is his God really a God? [Stewart,M on Spinoza] |
17231 | God feels no emotions, of joy or sorrow [Spinoza] |
21859 | God has no purpose, because God lacks nothing [Spinoza] |
4823 | God does not act according to the freedom of the will [Spinoza] |
12928 | Spinoza's God is just power and necessity, without perfection or wisdom [Leibniz on Spinoza] |
7571 | Spinoza's God is not a person [Spinoza, by Jolley] |
4314 | God is wholly without passions, and strictly speaking does not love anyone [Spinoza, by Cottingham] |
7609 | God is the sum and principle of all eternal laws [Spinoza, by Armstrong,K] |
19435 | God is not loveable for producing without choice and by necessity; God is loveable for his goodness [Leibniz on Spinoza] |
17172 | God is a substance with infinite attributes [Spinoza] |
4866 | God is a being with infinite attributes, each of them infinite or perfect [Spinoza] |
7829 | God no more has human perfections than we have animal perfections [Spinoza] |
4825 | To say that God promotes what is good is false, as it sets up a goal beyond God [Spinoza] |
21856 | Spinoza says a substance of infinite attributes cannot fail to exist [Spinoza, by Lord] |
17178 | Denial of God is denial that his essence involves existence, which is absurd [Spinoza] |
21858 | God is being as such, and you cannot conceive of the non-existence of being [Spinoza, by Lord] |
4820 | God must necessarily exist, because no reason can be given for his non-existence [Spinoza] |
17169 | Some things makes me conceive of it as a thing whose essence requires its existence [Spinoza] |
4817 | If a thing can be conceived as non-existing, its essence does not involve existence [Spinoza] |
4868 | Trying to prove God's existence through miracles is proving the obscure by the more obscure [Spinoza] |
4827 | Priests reject as heretics anyone who tries to understand miracles in a natural way [Spinoza] |
12757 | That God is the substance of all things is an ill-reputed doctrine [Leibniz on Spinoza] |
17181 | God is the efficient cause of essences, as well as of existences [Spinoza] |
4829 | The human mind is part of the infinite intellect of God [Spinoza] |
17180 | Everything is in God, and nothing exists or is thinkable without God [Spinoza] |
7830 | A talking triangle would say God is triangular [Spinoza] |
15295 | Theism is supposed to make the world more intelligible - and should offer results [Harré/Madden] |
7836 | In Spinoza, one could substitute 'nature' or 'substance' for the word 'God' throughout [Spinoza, by Stewart,M] |
19934 | Hebrews were very hostile to other states, who had not given up their rights to God [Spinoza] |
4178 | Christianity is a pessimistic religion, in which the world is equated with evil [Schopenhauer] |
4300 | The Bible has nothing in common with reasoning and philosophy [Spinoza] |
4180 | Religion is the mythical clothing of the truth which is inaccessible to the crude human intellect [Schopenhauer] |
21472 | Only religion introduces serious issues to uneducated people [Schopenhauer] |
7831 | Spinoza's theory of mind implies that there is no immortality [Spinoza, by Stewart,M] |
21876 | After death, something eternal remains of the mind [Spinoza] |
21468 | The Creator created the possibilities for worlds, so should have made a better one than this possible [Schopenhauer] |