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73fe1e6 <> disse , guardandoci. <> donna-tartt greek human-nature philosophy philosophy-of-life philosophy-quotes the-secret-history tragedy Donna Tartt
8950121 "Bran said, "Why should some of the Riders of the Dark be dressed all in white and the rest all in black?" "Without colour...." Will said reflectively. "I don't know. Maybe because the Dark can only reach people at extremes-- blinded by their own shining ideas, or locked up in the darkness of their own heads." inspirational philosophy susan-cooper Susan Cooper
2e1859a But the ones who go posing as moralists are the worst. Cost-free morals. Full of great ways for others to improve without any expense to themselves. There's an ego thing in there, too. They use the morals to make someone else look inferior and that way look better themselves. It doesn't matter what the moral code is -- religious morals, political morals, racist morals, capitalist morals, feminist morals, hippie morals -- they're all the same. The moral codes change but the meanness and the egotism stay the same. philosophy psychology zen Robert M. Pirsig
2de9d74 If you have experienced recurring situations in your life that are unpleasant, know that there is something you are supposed to be getting from those situations that you have not been getting and that the moment you get it, those situations will pass out of your life, not to return. chris-prentiss life-improvement passages-malibu philosophy philosophy-of-life self-help self-improvement Chris Prentiss
e1aa8fd We thus have three levels of antagonism: the Two are never two, the One is never one, the Nothing is never nothing. Sinthome--the signifier of the barred Other--registers the antagonism of the Two, their non-relationship. The object a registers the antagonism of the One, its inability to be one. $ registers the antagonism of Nothing, its inability to be the Void at peace with itself, to annul all struggles. The position of Wisdom is that the Void brings ultimate peace, a state in which all differences are obliterated; the position of dialectical materialism is that there is no peace even in the Void. lacan philosophy struggle Slavoj Žižek
ade43df One contradiction of the human heart is this: God refuses to see any one person as unique in his or her relationship to Him, and yet we humans see each other as bottomless wells of creativity and uniqueness. god-s-love philosophy philosophy-of-life philosophy-of-religion religion Douglas Coupland
e24a95d Take this moment right here, and ask yourself, What is now lacking? philosophy Kim Stanley Robinson
96fc093 What early Christianity meant by 'faith' (pistis) was initially nothing other than running ahead and clinging to a model or idea whose attainability was still uncertain. Faith is purely anticipatory, in the sense that it already has an effect when it mobilizes the existence of the anticipatory towards the goal through anticipation. In analogy for the placebo effect, one would have to call this the movebo effect. anticipation faith philosophy theology Peter Sloterdijk
790b6d8 "Jack Reed, whom The New York Times had labeled "the Bolshevik agitator," hesitated and then equivocated on the stand. But by then the defense of The Masses was plain: criticism of the government didn't amount to a desire to overthrow it. If all hostile opinion were suppressed, how could Americans believe they lived in a free country? Dissent was a safeguard to freedom, not an impediment." -- independence liberty philosophy politics war Nancy Milford
26429f3 By changing how you perceive things and how you act upon those perceptions, you will change your life. chris-prentiss inspiration inspirational life non-12-step passages-malibu passages-ventura perception philosophy quotes Chris Prentiss
7bd0c43 Zsoronga, Sorweel was beginning to realize, possessed the enviable ability to yoke his conviction to his need -- to believe, absolutely, whatever his heart required. For Sorweel, belief and want always seemed like ropes too short to bind together, forcing him to play the knot as a result. philosophy R. Scott Bakker
231af36 "Despite my deep unease about animal advocates working for things we don't want and asking for changes we don't believe in, I am not an "abolitionist." First, the abolition of animal slavery will no more end speciesism by itself than the abolition of American slavery ended racism. To change the world, I think we should aim higher. Second, I'm increasingly convinced that no matter who uses the term, it hides a slur. When used to refer to others, it connotes zealotry and obstructionism, and when taken as self-definition, it is seen as an attack by anyone who does not apply it to herself. Yes, it's a highly defensible moral philosophy, right up there with Peter Singer's application of Utilitarianism to animal liberation, and Tom Regan's Theory of Rights, but like those other intellectual concepts, it's useful only so far as it engenders right action." advocacy animal-rights grassroots philosophy veganism Sarahjane Blum
a8cd439 Plato dramatically puts the detachment of the philosopher from his time this way: to philosophize is to prepare to die. perspective philosophy Rebecca Goldstein
96cf23a Aristotle's account of the Katharsis of tragedy was a philosophic presentation of a truth that Homo religiosus had always understood intuitively: a symbolic, mythical or ritual presentation of events that would be unendurable in daily life can redeem and transform them into something pure and even pleasurable. literature philosophy plays Karen Armstrong
7be6a2d "...This singular reversal may perhaps proceed from the fact that for us the "subject" (since Christianity) is the one who suffers: where there is a wound, there is a subject: die Wunde! die Wunde! says Parsifal, thereby becoming "himself"; and the deeper the wound, at the body's center (at the "heart"), the more the subject becomes a subject: for the subject is intimacy ("The wound...is of a frightful intimacy"). Such is love's wound: a radical chasm (at the "roots" of being), which cannot be closed, and out of which the subject drains, constituting himself as a subject in this very draining." --from_A Lover's Discourse: Fragments_. Translated by Richard Howard, p. 189" -- philosophy Roland Barthes
1f602bf "No I do not like blaming. Because for me it's enough if someone is other than bad--not too much out of hand, conscious at least of the justice that helps the city, a healthy man. No I shall not lay blame. Because fools are a species that never ends. greek philosophy poetry translation Simonides of Ceos
7df9ae6 It is often said that we live in a youth culture. It's a lie. We live in an old culture. We idolize youth because we are old. We are tired and bored. Ancient cultures respected the old because those cultures were young. They were not bored. culture philosophy youth Peter Kreeft
1dcdd83 She wasn't sure what she wanted to do, except that she knew that if she fooled around for long enough, without fretting, or nagging herself, she'd find out. knowledge life-lessons mary-malone philosophy Philip Pullman
1cd2c88 Some ideas are dangerous. philosophy thinking women Donna Woolfolk Cross
1c6458d Who is happier, those who are aware, and doubt, or those who are sure of what they believe in, and have never doubted or questioned it? The answer, she had concluded, was that this had nothing to do with happiness, which came upon you like the weather, determined by your personlaity. deep-thoughts happiness personality philosophical-musings philosophy weather Alexander McCall Smith
edf6aeb Un genio conversa con otro genio cara a cara, lo que no solo supone una alegria reciproca, sino tambien una dicha para el universo entero. Esa alegria existe y el universo existe tambien. El dia que los genios no se reconozcan unos a otros, el mundo se oscurecera y la Tierra dejara de dar vueltas sobre su eje knolwedge philosophy Jun'ichirō Tanizaki
18e6373 A strong personal philosophy does more than sustain us through the tragedies of life. It also stains us daily in everything we think and do. It gives us optimism and hope. philosophy zen zen-and-the-art-of-happiness Chris Prentiss
18ba3be So when the ruling ideology enjoins us to enjoy sex, not to feel guilty about it, since we are not bound by any prohibitions whose violations should make us feel guilty, the price we pay for this absence of guilt is anxiety. nonfiction philosophy philosophy-of-life psychology theology Slavoj Žižek
1825384 Human beings, Lucretius thought, must not drink in the poisonous belief that their souls are only part of the world temporarily and they are heading somewhere else. That belief will only spawn in them a destructive relation to the environment in which they live the only lives they have. philosophy science Stephen Greenblatt
822c82b If I could, I would begin this book by telling you what Life is. But unfortunately I do not know what Life is. The only consolation I can find is in the fact that nobody else knows either. philosophy Upton Sinclair
a20e3dc The occurrence of a highly improbable event is the equivalent of the nonoccurrence of a highly probable one philosophy Nassim Nicholas Taleb
a0714ff While he joined eagerly in the contemporary intellectual battles, philosophy was, for Spinoza, not a weapon but a way of life, a sacred order whose servants were transported to a supreme and certain blessedness. philosophy Roger Scruton
02c2980 Jo knew nothing about philosophy or metaphysics of any sort, but a curious excitement, half pleasurable, half painful, came over her, as she listened with a sense of being turned adrift into time and space, like a young balloon out on a holiday. philosophy Louisa May Alcott
83f29e8 Nothing in the Grimmerie on how to depose a tyrant - nothing useful... Nothing there that described why men and women could turn out so horrible. Or so wonderful - if that ever happens anymore. philosophy Gregory Maguire
0f342d7 There is nothing noble about being superior to some other person. True nobility lies in being superior to your former self. philosophy Robin S. Sharma
9d85e1d "Well," Harry said, "look at it this way: Suppose you were an intelligent bacterium floating in space, and you came upon one of our communication satellites, in orbit around the Earth. You would think, What a strange, alien object this is, let's explore it. Suppose you opened it up and crawled inside. You would find it very interesting in there, with lots of huge things to puzzle over. But eventually you might climb into one of the fuel cells, and the hydrogen would kill you. intelligence life-lessons misapprehension philosophy Michael Crichton
f3d5edd "We all live as if it is better to seek peace instead of war, to tell the truth instead of lying, to care and nurture rather than to destroy. We believe that these choices are not pointless, that it matters which way we choose to live. Yet if the Cosmic Bench is truly empty, then "who sez" that one choice is better than the others? We can argue about it, but it's just pointless arguing, endless litigation. If the Bench is truly empty, then the whole span of human civilization, even if it lasts a few million years, will be just an infinitesimally brief spark in relation to the oceans of dead time that preceded it and will follow it. There will be no one around to remember any of it. Whether we are loving or cruel in the end would make no difference at all. Once we realize this situation there are two options. One is that we can simply refuse to think out the implications of all this. We can hold on to our intellectual belief in an empty Bench and yet live as if our choices are meaningful and as if there is a difference between love and cruelty. Why would we do that? A cynic might say that this is a way of "having one's cake and eating it, too." That is, you can get the benefit of having a God without the cost of following him. But there is no integrity in that. The other option is to recognize that you do know there is a God. You could accept the fact that you live as if beauty and love have meaning, as if there is meaning in life, as if human beings have inherent dignity--all because you know God exists. It is dishonest to live as if he is there and yet fail to acknowledge the one who has given you all these gifts." philosophy religion Timothy J. Keller
9d63c2f In the end he wore me down. Always asking. And the answer I give him is still the only one I have. What do I want? Peace. And it actually shut him up. He didn't niggle me about it. It was like he got it straight off. I don't just want quiet, neither. I want peace. peace philosophy Tim Winton
8433a07 "You must convince your chiefs that what you're telling 'em is important, which ain't difficult, since they want to believe you, having chiefs of their own to satisfy; make as much mystery of your methods as you can; hint what a thoroughgoing ruffian you can be in a good cause, but never forget that innocence shines brighter than any virtue, "Flashman? Extraordinary fellow - kicks 'em in the crotch with the heart of a child"; remember that silence frequently passes for shrewdness, and that while suppressio veri is a damned good servant, suggestio falsi is a perilous master." experience hedonism human-nature knowledge-of-self philosophy the-way-the-world-works wisdom George MacDonald Fraser
8478231 We're living in topsy-turvy times, and I think that what causes the topsy-turvy feeling is inadequacy of old forms of thought to deal with new experiences. I've heard it said that the only real learning results from hang-ups, where instead of expanding the branches of what you already know, you have to stop and drift laterally for a while until you come across something that allows you to expand the roots of what you already know. Everyone's familiar with that. I think the same thing occurs with whole civilizations when expansion's needed at the roots. evolution expansion philosophy Robert M. Pirsig
0ae3623 "As I listened to him describing the scene of the procurer seducing the young girl, I found myself torn between two conflicting emotions, between a powerful desire to laugh and an overwhelming surge of indignation. I was in agony. Again and again a roar of laughter prevented my rage bursting forth; again and again the rage rising in my heart became a roar of laughter. I was dumbfounded by such shrewdness and such depravity; by such soundness of ideas alternating with such falseness; by so general a perversity of feeling, so total a corruption, and so exceptional a candour. He saw how agitated I was. 'What's the matter?' he asked. ME: Nothing. HIM: I think you're upset. ME: Indeed I am. HIM: So what do you think I should do? ME: Talk about something else. What a wretched fate, to have been born and to have fallen so low! HIM: I agree. But don't let my state affect you too much. In opening my heart to you, it was not my intention to upset you. I've managed to save a little, while I was with those people. Remember I wanted for nothing, nothing whatsoever, and they also made me a small allowance for incidentals. [Here he began to strike himself on the forehead with his fist, bite his lips, and roll his eyes like a lunatic, then he said:] What's done is done. I've put a bit aside. Time's passed, so I'm that much to the good. philosophy scoundrel Denis Diderot
0a641dc "Zabuna o odnosu izmedu poimanja osobe i covjeka moze uzrokovati golemu stetu. Americki Vrhovni sud dvaput je pokazao da mu je prijeko potrebna lekcija iz filozofije jer ne shvaca da ljudska bica spadaju pod osobe, a ne obrnuto, da su ljudska bica osobe te kao takve posjeduju temeljna ljudska prava. Dred Scott proglasio je crnce nepotpunim osobama opravdavsi tako ropstvo i provodeci povratak odbjeglih robova kao da se radi o vlasnistvu, a ne o osobama. Time im je oduzeo drugo temeljno ljudsko pravo, pravo na slobodu. Jedno stoljece kasnije slucaj oduzeo je nerodenoj djeci prvo osnovno pravo svake osobe, pravo na zivot. Ovo se temelji na filozofiji koja je zapravo identicna nacistickoj: drzava uzima sebi moc da proglasi jednu vrstu ljudskih bica ne-osobama [bilo crnce, bilo Zidove, bilo nerodene]. Osim sto je rijec o prestrasnu moralu, radi se i o jako losoj logici. Naime, smatra "osobe" uzom kategorijom od "ljudskih bica". Postojanje andela pokazuje da se zapravo radi o visoj kategoriji." christianity philosophy pro-life unborn-child Peter Kreeft
848603c l 'ryd 'n 'fkr'w 'n 'sh`r 'w 'n 'tHrk, kl shy ytmzq wymwt, fkhTr ly `l~ sbyl l'ml 'nny s'jd ldhlk sbb `Dwy. novel philosophy Naguib Mahfouz
8e3c326 "Giddy with each other and the wine, they strolled outside through the Presidio, the old fort now housing restaurants and galleries. Jess explained that she wanted to devise a matrix for scarcity and abundance, frugality and profligacy. She thought that sweetness represented, and in some periods misrepresented, a sense of surplus and shared pleasure. "I don't think taste is purely biological," she said. "I think it's economically, historically, and culturally constructed as well. Sweetness means different things depending on availability, custom, farming, trade..." She was shivering, and George took off his jacket. "Here, sweetness." He helped her into it and laughed at the way her hands disappeared inside the sleeves. "Context is key- so the question is, What carries over? What can we still know about sweet and sour? Bitterness. What persists from generation to generation? Do we taste the same things?" He kissed her, sucking her lower lip and then her tongue. "I think so," he said. "Yes." philosophy sweetness tastes true-love Allegra Goodman
f711471 First mountains are mountains and rivers are rivers. Than mountains are no longer mountains and rivers are no longer rivers. Finally mountains are mountains and rivers are rivers. mountain philosophy river Dan Millman
0906c77 To explain our conventional ethical attitudes, is not to justify them. morality philosophy Peter Singer
9c7cb9f "The conventional term is "mystical experience," meaning something that by its very nature lies beyond the reach of language, except for some vague verbal hand-wavings about "mystery" and "transcendence." As far as I was concerned - as a rationalist, an atheist, a scientist by training - this was the realm of gods and fairies and of no use to the great human project of trying to retain a foothold on the planet for future generations." mysticism philosophy Barbara Ehrenreich
862f0a6 Life can be compared to a piece of embroidered material of which, every-one in the first half of his time, comes to see the top side, but in the second half, the reverse side. The latter is not so beautiful but it is more instructive because it enables one to see how the threads are connected together. philosophy Irvin D. Yalom
c8ab93f Sherrie described atheism as a positive system of belief--one based on data, exploration and observation rather than scripture, creed and prayer. Atheists believe that human life is a chemical phenomenon, that our first parents were super-novas that happened billions of years ago--that humans are inexplicable miracles in a universe of structured chaos. Atheists believe that when we die, we will turn into organic debris which will continue cycling for billions of years in various incarnations. Sherrie explained that atheists appreciate life unfathomably because it is going to end. No one who takes atheism seriously dies without hope. atheist caitlin-moran carl-sagan dying hope philosophy richard-dawkins science-and-religion science-vs-religion Israel Morrow
4c0c4e3 No da se unishchozhi edna fabrika ili da se v'stane sreshchu edno pravitelstvo, ili da ne se popravi edin mototsiklet, zashchoto e sistema, oznachava da se atakuvat sledstviiata, a ne prichinite; i dokato borbata e sreshchu sledstviiata, nikakva promiana ne e v'zmozhna. philosophy Robert M. Pirsig
47d87e9 In 1935, when there were no other programs, the founders of AA, Bill Wilson and Dr. Robert Smith, stepped up to the plate and took action to help a crippled population. All credit for the establishment of their wonderful, life-saving group goes to them and to those who came after them who have continued the tradition. However, there are not among the estimated two or three million who attend twelve-step meetings. 12-steps addiction-treatment addiction-treatment-center alcohol-abuse change change-the-world chris-prentiss drug-abuse passages-malibu philosophy tradition twelve-step Chris Prentiss
c80a4a3 There are so many shady things happening in this country, they're happening all around us all the time, and we just accept them. corruption country crime evil mystery philosophy truth united-states Rebecca McNutt
5039ad9 Where have i=I read that at the end, when life, surface upon surface, has become completely encrusted with experience, you know everything, the secret, the power, and the glory, why you were born, why you are dying, and how it all could have been different? You are wise. But the greatest wisdom, at that moment, is knowing that your wisdom is too late. You understand everything when there is no longer anything to understand. life philosophy wisdom Umberto Eco
44744da At hun er i live er bra, men det er ikke det det handler om. philosophy suicide suicide-attempt Nick Hornby
c51f8e8 How they Agree; how temp'ratly they Feed; How curiously they Build; how chastly Breed; How seriously their Bus'ness they intend; How stoutly they their Common-good defend; How timely their Provisions are provided; How orderly their Labors are divided; What Vertues patterns, and what grounds of Art; What Pleasures, and what Profits they impart; When these, with all those other things I mind Which in this Book, concerning Bees, I finde: Me thinkes, there is not half that worth in Mee, Which I have apprehended in a Bee. And that the Pismere, and these Hony-flies, Instruct us better to Philosophize, Than all those tedious Volumes, which, as yet, Are least unto us by meere Humane-wit. For, whereas those but only Rules doe give; These by Examples teach how to live. nature philosophy Charles Butler
0865c94 The job of the terrorists was to penetrate into our subconscious. This had always been the aim of writers, but the terrorists took it a step further. They were the writers of our age. Don DeLillo said this many years before 9/11. The images they created spread around the globe, colonising our our subconscious minds. The tangible outcome of the attack, the numbers of dead and injured, the material destruction, meant nothing. It was the images that were important. The more iconic the images they managed to create, the more successful their actions. The attack on the World Trade Centre was the most successful of all time. There weren't that many dead, only a couple of thousand, as against the six hundred thousand who died in the first two days of the Battle Of Flanders in the autumn of 1914, yet the images were so iconic and powerful that the effect on us was just as devastating, perhaps more so, since we lived in a culture of images. Planes and skyscrapers. Icarus and Babel. They wanted into our dreams. Everyone did. Our inner beings were the final market. Once they were conquered, we would be sold. images philosophy subconcious terrorism world-war-one Karl Ove Knausgaard
50f8f3d "I asked, "You mean, you might as well spend your life going upward, through the happy places, since heaven and hell - the destinations - are the same thing anyway?" "Same - same," he said. "Same in end, so better to be happy on journey." I said, "So, if heaven is love, then hell is..." "Love, too," he said." hell life philosophy spirituality Elizabeth Gilbert
5750431 To argue against abortion on the grounds that it prevents beings of high intrinsic value coming into the world is implicitly to condemn practices that reduce the future human population: contraception, whether by 'artificial' means or by 'natural' means such as abstinence on days when the woman is likely to be fertile, and also celibacy. This argument does not provide any reason for thinking abortion worse than any other means of population control. If the world is already overpopulated, the argument provides no reason at all against abortion. ethics morality philosophy Peter Singer
c28af66 The Enlightenment, finally, invented progressive 'history' as an inner-worldly purgatory in order to develop the conditions of possibility of a perfected 'society'. This provided the required setting for the aggressive social theology of the Modern Age to drive out the political theology of the imperial eras. What was the Enlightenment in its deep structure if not an attempt to translate the ancient rhyme on learning and suffering - mathein pathein - into a collective and species-wide phenomenon? Was its aim not to persuade the many to expose themselves to transitional ordeals that would precede the great optimization of all things? enlightenment enlightenment-quotes optimization philosophy political-theology purgatory theology Peter Sloterdijk
d14d6d6 "There appears to be a fifth way, that of eminence. According to this I argue that it is incompatible with the idea of a most perfect being that anything should excel it in perfection (from the corollary to the fourth conclusion of the third chapter) . Now there is nothing incompatible about a finite thing being excelled in perfection; therefore, etc. The minor is proved from this, that to be infinite is not incompatible with being; but the infinite is greater than any finite being. Another formulation of the same is this. That to which intensive infinity is not repugnant is not all perfect unless it be infinite, for if it is finite, it can be surpassed, since infinity is not repugnant to it. But infinity is not repugnant to being, therefore the most perfect being is infinite. infinite infinity metaphysics ontology philosophy theology John Duns Scotus
c136d06 Why, then, does the man in love hang with complete abandon on the eyes of his chosen one, and is ready to make every sacrifice for her? Because it is his immortal part that longs for her; it is always the mortal part alone that longs for everything else. That eager and even ardent longing, directed to a particular woman, is therefore an immediate pledge of the indestructibility of the kernel of our true nature... philosophy Arthur Schopenhauer
82b6345 Ako s'dbata ne te razsmiva, ti prosto ne skhvashchash shegata. philosophy quotes Gregory David Roberts
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