Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Toward a Philosophy of History' and 'Letters to Remond de Montmort'

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7 ideas

7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 3. Being / h. Dasein (being human)
20752 For man, being is not what he is, but what he is going to be [Ortega y Gassett]
     Full Idea: Being consists not in what it is already, but in what it is not yet, a being that consists in not-yet-being. Everything else in the world is what it is….Man is the entity that makes himself….He has to determine what he is going to be.
     From: José Ortega y Gassett (Toward a Philosophy of History [1941], p.112,201-2), quoted by Kevin Aho - Existentialism: an introduction 4 'Problem'
     A reaction: [p.112 and 201-2] This seems to be Ortega y Gasset's spin on Heidegger's concept, by adding a temporal dimension to it.
10. Modality / C. Sources of Modality / 2. Necessity as Primitive
12732 Some necessary truths are brute, and others derive from final causes [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: There is a difference between truths whose necessity is brute and geometric and those truths which have their source in fitness and final causes.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Remond de Montmort [1715], 1715.06.22/G III 645), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 6
     A reaction: The second one is a necessity deriving from God's wisdom. Strictly it could have been otherwise, unlike 'geometrical' necessity, which is utterly fixed.
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 1. Consciousness / c. Parts of consciousness
19438 Our large perceptions and appetites are made up tiny unconscious fragments [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: Our great perceptions and our great appetites of which we are conscious, are composed of innumerable little perceptions and little inclinations of which we cannot be conscious.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Remond de Montmort [1715], 1715 §2)
     A reaction: I think this is a wonderfully accurate report of how the mind is, in comparison with the much more simplistic views presented by most philosophers of that era. And so much understanding flows from Leibniz's account.
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 3. Emotions / c. Role of emotions
19415 Passions reside in confused perceptions [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: The passions of monads reside in their confused perceptions.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Remond de Montmort [1715], 1715)
     A reaction: He thinks perceptions come in degrees of confusion, all the way up to God, who alone has fully clear perceptions. He blames in on these confused perceptions.
21. Aesthetics / C. Artistic Issues / 7. Art and Morality
468 Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.]
     Full Idea: In singing and playing the lyre, a boy will be likely to reveal not only courage and moderation, but also justice.
     From: Damon (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B4), quoted by (who?) - where?
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / e. Human nature
20756 Instead of having a nature, man only has a history [Ortega y Gassett]
     Full Idea: Man lives in view of the past. Man, in a word, has no nature; what he has is history. Expressed differently: what nature is to things, history is to man.
     From: José Ortega y Gassett (Toward a Philosophy of History [1941], p.217), quoted by Kevin Aho - Existentialism: an introduction 5 'Situated'
     A reaction: Makes explicit the existentialist denial of human nature. The foundation of ethics can only be total freedom, to choose both yourself and your actions. What is inescapable is the social and culture contexts. What is the role of the 'history'?
28. God / A. Divine Nature / 2. Divine Nature
19439 God produces possibilities, and thus ideas [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: God is the source of possibilities and consequently of ideas.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Remond de Montmort [1715], 1715 §8)
     A reaction: A wonderfully individual conception of the nature of God. He produces the possibilities from which creation is chosen, and ideas and concepts are of everything which is non-contradictory, and thus possible. It all makes lovely sense!