109 ideas
| 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] |
| 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] |
| 21267 | Supposing many principles is superfluous if a few will do it [Aquinas] |
| 19630 | No great idea ever emerged from a dialogue [Cioran] |
| 23176 | Truth is universal, but knowledge of it is not [Aquinas] |
| 20621 | Types of lying: Speak lies, intend lies, intend deception, aim at deceptive goal? [Aquinas, by Tuckness/Wolf] |
| 19636 | Truth is just an error insufficiently experienced [Cioran] |
| 19642 | Eventually every 'truth' is guaranteed by the police [Cioran] |
| 21248 | If the existence of truth is denied, the 'Truth does not exist' must be true! [Aquinas] |
| 23173 | If a syllogism admits one absurdity, others must follow [Aquinas] |
| 19632 | An axiom has no more authority than a frenzy [Cioran] |
| 15812 | Being implies distinctness, which implies division, unity, and multitude [Aquinas] |
| 21268 | Non-human things are explicable naturally, and voluntary things by the will, so God is not needed [Aquinas] |
| 16765 | Humans only have a single substantial form, which contains the others and acts for them [Aquinas] |
| 23175 | The conclusions of speculative reason about necessities are certain [Aquinas] |
| 21337 | A knowing being possesses a further reality, the 'presence' of the thing known [Aquinas] |
| 21249 | Some things are self-evident to us; others are only self-evident in themselves [Aquinas] |
| 21250 | A proposition is self-evident if the predicate is included in the essence of the subject [Aquinas] |
| 20224 | Sensation prepares the way for intellectual knowledge, which needs the virtues of reason [Aquinas] |
| 19626 | Our instincts had to be blunted and diminished, to make way for consciousness! [Cioran] |
| 22107 | Sensations are transmitted to 'internal senses' in the brain, chiefly to 'phantasia' and 'imagination' [Aquinas, by Kretzmann/Stump] |
| 9098 | Mental activity combines what we sense with imagination of what is not present [Aquinas] |
| 9092 | Abstracting A from B generates truth, as long as the connection is not denied [Aquinas] |
| 9093 | We understand the general nature of things by ignoring individual peculiarities [Aquinas] |
| 9097 | The mind abstracts generalities from images, but also uses images for understanding [Aquinas] |
| 9095 | Very general ideas (being, oneness, potentiality) can be abstracted from thought matter in general [Aquinas] |
| 9099 | Particular instances come first, and (pace Plato) generalisations are abstracted from them [Aquinas] |
| 10508 | Species are abstracted from appearances by ignoring individual conditions [Aquinas] |
| 22111 | Aquinas attributes freedom to decisions and judgements, and not to the will alone [Aquinas, by Kretzmann/Stump] |
| 22105 | The human intellectual soul is an incorporeal, subsistent principle [Aquinas] |
| 22108 | First grasp what it is, then its essential features; judgement is their compounding and division [Aquinas] |
| 19633 | We use concepts to master our fears; saying 'death' releases us from confronting it [Cioran] |
| 10503 | We abstract forms from appearances, and acquire knowledge of immaterial things [Aquinas] |
| 10509 | Understanding consists entirely of grasping abstracted species [Aquinas] |
| 10506 | Mathematics can be abstracted from sensible matter, and from individual intelligible matter [Aquinas] |
| 9094 | Mathematical objects abstract both from perceived matter, and from particular substance [Aquinas] |
| 10505 | We can just think of an apple's colour, because the apple is not part of the colour's nature [Aquinas] |
| 10504 | Abstracting either treats something as separate, or thinks of it separately [Aquinas] |
| 10507 | Numbers and shapes are abstracted by ignoring their sensible qualities [Aquinas] |
| 9096 | The mind must produce by its own power an image of the individual species [Aquinas] |
| 23180 | The will is the rational appetite [Aquinas] |
| 19615 | I want to suppress in myself the normal reasons people have for action [Cioran] |
| 19628 | At a civilisation's peak values are all that matters, and people unconsciously live by them [Cioran] |
| 22112 | For humans good is accordance with reason, and bad is contrary to reason [Aquinas] |
| 19646 | Values don't accumulate; they are ruthlessly replaced [Cioran] |
| 22494 | We must know the end, know that it is the end, and know how to attain it [Aquinas] |
| 19614 | Lovers are hateful, apart from their hovering awareness of death [Cioran] |
| 467 | A virtue is a combination of intelligence, strength and luck [Ion] |
| 23181 | All acts of virtue relate to justice, which is directed towards the common good [Aquinas] |
| 8009 | Aquinas wanted, not to escape desire, but to transform it for moral ends [Aquinas, by MacIntyre] |
| 23182 | Legal justice is supreme, because it directs the other virtues to the common good [Aquinas] |
| 22399 | Temperance prevents our passions from acting against reason [Aquinas] |
| 23177 | Justice directs our relations with others, because it denotes a kind of equality [Aquinas] |
| 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] |
| 19640 | No one is brave enough to say they don't want to do anything; we despise such a view [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] |
| 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] |
| 23179 | People differ in their social degrees, and a particular type of right applies to each [Aquinas] |
| 22114 | Tyrannical laws are irrational, and so not really laws [Aquinas] |
| 23174 | Natural law is a rational creature's participation in eternal law [Aquinas] |
| 22113 | Right and wrong actions pertain to natural law, as perceived by practical reason [Aquinas] |
| 7291 | For Aquinas a war must be in a just cause, have proper authority, and aim at good [Aquinas, by Grayling] |
| 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] |
| 5508 | Aquinas says a fertilized egg is not human, and has no immortal soul [Aquinas, by Martin/Barresi] |
| 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] |
| 16687 | Bodies are three-dimensional substances [Aquinas] |
| 23178 | Divine law commands some things because they are good, while others are good because commanded [Aquinas] |
| 21251 | We can't know God's essence, so his existence can't be self-evident for us [Aquinas] |
| 5614 | If you assume that there must be a necessary being, you can't say which being has this quality [Kant on Aquinas] |
| 21269 | Way 1: the infinite chain of potential-to-actual movement has to have a first mover [Aquinas] |
| 21270 | Way 2: no effect without a cause, and this cannot go back to infinity, so there is First Cause [Aquinas] |
| 21271 | Way 3: contingent beings eventually vanish, so continuity needs a necessary being [Aquinas] |
| 21272 | Way 4: the source of all qualities is their maximum, so something (God) causes all perfections [Aquinas] |
| 21273 | Way 5: mindless things act towards an obvious end, so there is an intelligent director [Aquinas] |
| 19603 | Why is God so boring, and why does God resemble humanity so little? [Cioran] |
| 20211 | Life aims at the Beatific Vision - of perfect happiness, and revealed truth [Aquinas, by Zagzebski] |
| 22106 | Aquinas saw angels as separated forms, rather than as made of 'spiritual matter' [Aquinas, by Kretzmann/Stump] |
| 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] |
| 23306 | Humans have a non-physical faculty of reason, so they can be immortal [Aquinas, by Sorabji] |
| 4412 | Those in bliss have their happiness increased by seeing the damned punished [Aquinas] |
| 19623 | Circles of hell are ridiculous; all that matters is to be there [Cioran] |
| 21266 | God does not exist, because He is infinite and good, and so no evil should be discoverable [Aquinas] |
| 21274 | It is part of God's supreme goodness that He brings good even out of evil [Aquinas] |