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John Rawls
John Rawls
3 months 6 days ago
The suppression of liberty is always...

The suppression of liberty is always likely to be irrational.

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Chapter IV, Section 33, p. 210
Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
3 months 1 week ago
To speak impartially, the best men...

To speak impartially, the best men that I know are not serene, a world in themselves. For the most part, they dwell in forms, and flatter and study effect only more finely than the rest. We select granite for the underpinning of our houses and barns; we build fences of stone; but we do not ourselves rest on an underpinning of granitic truth, the lowest primitive rock. Our sills are rotten.

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p. 490
Philosophical Maxims
Carl Jung
Carl Jung
2 months 4 days ago
Even if the whole world were...

Even if the whole world were to fall to pieces, the unity of the psyche would never be shattered. And the wider and more numerous the fissures on the surface, the more the unity is strengthened in the depths.

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Civilization in Transition
Philosophical Maxims
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
2 months 1 week ago
And what is it in us...

And what is it in us that is mellowed by civilization? All it does, I'd say, is to develop in man a capacity to feel a greater variety of sensations. And nothing, absolutely nothing else. And through this development, man will yet learn how to enjoy bloodshed. Why, it has already happened....Civilization has made man, if not always more bloodthirsty, at least more viciously, more horribly bloodthirsty.

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Part 1, Chapter 7
Philosophical Maxims
Miguel de Unamuno
Miguel de Unamuno
1 month 3 weeks ago
Shall we not perhaps be told,...

Shall we not perhaps be told, on the other hand, that if the sinner suffers an eternal punishment, it is because he does not cease to sin? - for the damned sin without ceasing. This however is no solution to the problem, which derives all its absurdity from the fact that punishment has been conceived as vindictiveness or vengeance, not as correction, and has been conceived after the fashion of barbarous peoples. And in the same way hell has been conceived as a sort of police institution, necessary in order to put fear into the world. And the worst of it is that it no longer intimidates, and therefore will have to be shut up.

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Philosophical Maxims
Voltaire
Voltaire
3 months 1 week ago
The husband who decides…

The husband who decides to surprise his wife is often very much surprised himself.

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La Femme Qui a Raison, Act 1, scene 2, 1759
Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
3 months 1 week ago
To choose one sock from each...

To choose one sock from each of infinitely many pairs of socks requires the Axiom of Choice, but for shoes the Axiom is not needed.

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As quoted in Williams' Weighing the Odds: A Course in Probability and Statistics (2001), p. 498
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
2 months 4 days ago
Boredom is a larval anxiety; depression,...

Boredom is a larval anxiety; depression, a dreamy hatred.

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Philosophical Maxims
Herbert Marcuse
Herbert Marcuse
2 months ago
Entertainment and learning are not opposites;...

Entertainment and learning are not opposites; entertainment may be the most effective mode of learning.

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pp. 66-67
Philosophical Maxims
Leszek Kołakowski
Leszek Kołakowski
Just now
A certain degree of blindness as...

A certain degree of blindness as to the absoluteness of one's own values may be indispensable to extract the valuable qualities from the world, the qualities whose value is believed to be the highest. It is possible that in order to realize one's values one must have faith in their exclusive character.

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Chapter Eight, Logical Empiricism, p. 202-203
Philosophical Maxims
Miguel de Unamuno
Miguel de Unamuno
1 month 3 weeks ago
May we not say, perhaps, that...

May we not say, perhaps, that the evil man is annihilated because he wished to be annihilated, or that he did not wish strongly enough to eternalize himself because he was evil? May we say that it is not believing in the other life which causes a man to be good, but rather that being good causes him believe in it? And what is being good and being evil? These states belong to the sphere of ethics, not of religion; or rather, does not the doing good though being evil pertain to ethics, and the being good [forgivable] though doing evil, to religion?

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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
3 months 1 week ago
All traditional logic habitually assumes that...

All traditional logic habitually assumes that precise symbols are being employed. It is therefore not applicable to this terrestial life but only to an imagined celestial existence... logic takes us nearer to heaven than other studies.

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Vagueness', first published in The Australasian Journal of Psychology and Philosophy, 1 June, 1923
Philosophical Maxims
Max Scheler
Max Scheler
1 month 4 weeks ago
Instead of defining the word, let...

Instead of defining the word, let us briefly characterize or describe the phenomenon. Ressentiment is a self-poisoning of the mind which has quite definite causes and consequences. It is a lasting mental attitude, caused by the systematic repression of certain emotions and affects which, as such, are normal components of human nature. Their repression leads to the constant tendency to indulge in certain kinds of value delusions and corresponding value judgments. The emotions and affects primarily concerned are revenge, hatred, malice, envy, the impulse to detract, and spite.

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Philosophical Maxims
Colin Wilson
Colin Wilson
1 month 3 weeks ago
A child might be overawed by...

A child might be overawed by a great city, but a civil engineer knows that he might demolish it and rebuild it himself. Husserl's philosophy has the same aim: to show us that, although we may have been thrust into this world without a 'by your leave,' we are mistaken to assume that it exists independently of us. It is true that reality exists apart from us; but what we mistake for the world is actually a world constituted by us, selected from an infinitely complex reality.

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p. 63
Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Wittgenstein
3 months 3 days ago
For remember that in general we...

For remember that in general we don't use language according to strict rules - it hasn't been taught us by means of strict rules, either.

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p. 25
Philosophical Maxims
Simone Weil
Simone Weil
1 month 3 weeks ago
The collective is the object of...

The collective is the object of all idolatry, this it is which chains us to the earth. In the case of avarice: gold is of the social order. In the case of ambition: power is of the social order. Science and art are full of the social element also. And love? Love is more or less of an exception: that is why we can go to God through love, not through avarice and ambition.

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p. 121
Philosophical Maxims
Niccolò Machiavelli
Niccolò Machiavelli
3 months 2 weeks ago
The demands of a free populace,...

The demands of a free populace, too, are very seldom harmful to liberty, for they are due either to the populace being oppressed or to the suspicious that it is going to be oppressed... and, should these impressions be false, a remedy is provided in the public platform on which some man of standing can get up, appeal to the crowd, and show that it is mistaken. And though, as Tully remarks, the populace may be ignorant, it is capable of grasping the truth and readily yields when a man, worthy of confidence, lays the truth before it.

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Book 1, Ch. 4 (as translated by LJ Walker and B Crick)
Philosophical Maxims
Ernest Renan
Ernest Renan
3 days ago
As a rule, all heroism is...

As a rule, all heroism is due to a lack of reflection, and thus it is necessary to maintain a mass of imbeciles. If they once understand themselves the ruling men will be lost.

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Orlando, in Caliban, act 2, sc. 1 (1878).
Philosophical Maxims
Florence Nightingale
Florence Nightingale
1 month 2 weeks ago
You ask me why I do...

You ask me why I do not write something... I think one's feelings waste themselves in words; they ought all to be distilled into actions and into actions which bring results.

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Letter to a friend, quoted in The Life of Florence Nightingale (1913) by Edward Tyas Cook, p. 94
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
3 months 2 weeks ago
Mother love is stronger than the...

Mother love is stronger than the filth and scabbiness on a child, and so the love of God toward us is stronger than the dirt that clings to us.

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94
Philosophical Maxims
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall McLuhan
1 month 5 days ago
Writing turned a spotlight on the...

Writing turned a spotlight on the high, dim Sierras of speech; writing was the visualization of acoustic space. It lit up the dark.

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(p. 14)
Philosophical Maxims
Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
1 month 1 week ago
Every one who has a heart...

Every one who has a heart and eyes sees that you, working men, are obliged to pass your lives in want and in hard labor, which is useless to you, while other men, who do not work, enjoy the fruits of your labor-that you are the slaves of these men, and that this ought not to exist.

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To the Working People, Complete Works, trans. Leo Wiener, Vol 24, p. 129
Philosophical Maxims
Charles Fourier
Charles Fourier
4 days ago
It is certain that nature inclines...

It is certain that nature inclines us toward the amorous orgy, just as much as toward the gastronomic orgy, and that while both are blameworthy in the excess, they would become praiseworthy in an order in which they could be equilibrated.

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Charles Fourier: The Visionary and His World, J. Beecher (1986), p. 310
Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
3 months 2 weeks ago
Don't discuss yourself, for you are...

Don't discuss yourself, for you are bound to lose; if you belittle yourself, you are believed; if you praise yourself, you are disbelieved.

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Book III, Ch. 8
Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels
2 months 3 days ago
History has proved us, and all...

History has proved us, and all who thought like us, wrong. It has made it clear that the state of economic development on the Continent at that time was not, by a long way, ripe for the removal of capitalist production.

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Introduction (1895) to Marx's The Class Struggles in France
Philosophical Maxims
Jesus
Jesus
2 months ago
Suffer little children, and forbid them...

Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.

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19:14 (KJV)
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Baudrillard
Jean Baudrillard
1 month 1 week ago
Challenge, and not desire, lies at...

Challenge, and not desire, lies at the heart of seduction.

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(p. 57)
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
2 months 1 week ago
The whole life of an American...

The whole life of an American is passed like a game of chance, a revolutionary crisis, or a battle.

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Chapter XVIII.
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
1 month 2 weeks ago
Basic justice

Basic justice is based on everything we as humans share that is the same. It extends to nature also, but, if we can't keep it straight amongst ourselves, of course we'll never have the traction to extend it to the larger context we are a part of.

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Philosophical Maxims
Byung-Chul Han
Byung-Chul Han
1 month 3 weeks ago
The inner music of things sounds...

The inner music of things sounds only when you close your eyes.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes
2 months ago
But Aversion wee have for things,...

But Aversion wee have for things, not only which we know have hurt us; but also that we do not know whether they will hurt us, or not.

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The First Part, Chapter 6, p. 24
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
3 months 1 week ago
There is but one good; that...

There is but one good; that is God. Everything else is good when it looks to Him and bad when it turns from Him.

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Ch. 11
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Paine
Thomas Paine
3 months 1 week ago
It is the nature and intention...

It is the nature and intention of a constitution to prevent governing by party, by establishing a common principle that shall limit and control the power and impulse of party, and that says to all parties, thus far shalt thou go and no further. But in the absence of a constitution, men look entirely to party; and instead of principle governing party, party governs principle.

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Philosophical Maxims
Byung-Chul Han
Byung-Chul Han
1 month 2 weeks ago
The emptiness of Zen Buddhism... creates...

The emptiness of Zen Buddhism... creates a neighborly nearness between things.

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Philosophical Maxims
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall McLuhan
1 month 5 days ago
The magic of the cave image...

The magic of the cave image lies in its being, not in its being seen. The symbolic does not refer. It is.

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(p. 350)
Philosophical Maxims
Auguste Comte
Auguste Comte
2 months 1 week ago
And now I have explained the...

And now I have explained the series of social and intellectual conditions by which the discovery of sociological laws, and consequently the foundation of Positivism, was fixed for the precise date at which I began my philosophical career: that is to say, one generation after the progressive dictatorship of the Convention, and almost immediately after the fall of the retrograde tyranny of Bonaparte.

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p. 71
Philosophical Maxims
Pythagoras
Pythagoras
2 months 2 weeks ago
A solitary man is a God,...

A solitary man is a God, or a beast.

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Philosophical Maxims
Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt
3 months 1 week ago
The most radical revolutionary will become...

The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative the day after the revolution.

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The New Yorker
Philosophical Maxims
Confucius
Confucius
3 months 3 weeks ago
He that in his studies wholly...

He that in his studies wholly applies himself to labour and exercise, and neglects meditation, loses his time, and he that only applies himself to meditation, and neglects labour and exercise, only wanders and loses himself.

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Philosophical Maxims
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
3 months 1 week ago
All wars are accordingly so many...

All wars are accordingly so many attempts (not in the intention of man, but in the intention of Nature) to establish new relations among states, and through the destruction or at least the dismemberment of all of them to create new political bodies, which, again, either internally or externally, cannot maintain themselves and which must thus suffer like revolutions; until finally, through the best possible civic constitution and common agreement and legislation in external affairs, a state is created which, like a civic commonwealth, can maintain itself automatically.

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Seventh Thesis
Philosophical Maxims
John Locke
John Locke
3 months 1 week ago
Whensoever therefore the legislative shall transgress...

Whensoever therefore the legislative shall transgress this fundamental rule of society; and either by ambition, fear, folly or corruption, endeavour to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other, an absolute power over the lives, liberties, and estates of the people; by this breach of trust they forfeit the power the people had put into their hands for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the people, who have a right to resume their original liberty, and, by the establishment of a new legislative, (such as they shall think fit) provide for their own safety and security, which is the end for which they are in society.

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Second Treatise of Civil Government, Ch. XIX, sec. 222
Philosophical Maxims
Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman
1 month 2 weeks ago
What is patriotism? Is it love...

What is patriotism? Is it love of one's birthplace, the place of childhood's recollections and hopes, dreams and aspirations? Is it the place where, in childlike naïveté, we would watch the passing clouds, and wonder why we, too, could not float so swiftly? The place where we would count the milliard glittering stars, terror-stricken lest each one "an eye should be," piercing the very depths of our little souls?

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Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
3 months 1 week ago
God cannot give us a happiness...

God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.

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Book II, Chapter 3, "The Shocking Alternative"
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
2 months 4 days ago
Compared to the refined culture of...

Compared to the refined culture of sclerotic forms and frames, which mask everything, the lyrical mode is utterly barbarian in its expression. Its value resides precisely in its savage quality: it is only blood, sincerity, and fire.

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Philosophical Maxims
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft
2 months 5 days ago
The same energy of character which...

The same energy of character which renders a man a daring villain would have rendered him useful to society, had that society been well organized.

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Letter 19
Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
1 month 4 days 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
Florence Nightingale
Florence Nightingale
1 month 2 weeks ago
You must go to Mahometanism, to...

You must go to Mahometanism, to Buddhism, to the East, to the Sufis & Fakirs, to Pantheism, for the right growth of mysticism.

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Letter (2 March 1853), quoted in Suggestions for Thought : Selections and Commentaries (1994), edited by Michael D. Calabria and Janet A. MacRae, p. xiii
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
3 weeks 3 days ago
A man is a man...
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Main Content / General
Albert Camus
Albert Camus
4 months 4 days ago
Man is the only creature who...

Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.

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Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
3 months 1 week ago
Christian Apocalyptic offers us no such...

Christian Apocalyptic offers us no such hope. It does not even foretell, (which would be more tolerable to our habits of thought) a gradual decay. It foretells a sudden, violent end imposed from without; an extinguisher popped onto the candle, a brick flung at the gramophone, a curtain rung down on the play - "Halt!"

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Philosophical Maxims
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