Philosophical quotes that inspire...

[Arcturus Descending]

Picture quote.

Amen to that or you transplant the flower!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hi Artimas.

[promethean75]

“A revolutionary age is an age of action; ours is the age of advertisement and publicity. Nothing ever happens but there is immediate publicity everywhere. In the present age a rebellion is, of all things, the most unthinkable. Such an expression of strength would seem ridiculous to the calculating intelligence of our times. On the other hand a political virtuoso might bring off a feat almost as remarkable. He might write a manifesto suggesting a general assembly at which people should decide upon a rebellion, and it would be so carefully worded that even the censor would let it pass. At the meeting itself he would be able to create the impression that his audience had rebelled, after which they would all go quietly home--having spent a very pleasant evening.”- Kierkegaard, On The Nature Of The Philosophy Forum Renaissance

[promethean75]

"this sort of thing has got to be stopped. bad philosophers are like slum landlords. it's my job to put them out of business." - wittgenstein

dayum!

[Meno_]

"The Greater the difficulty the more glory in surmounting it"


Epicurus

[barbarianhorde]

"What is an ego but a bunch of dead ancestors broken dreams..."

["it is not exactly up to us what our ego is like you know
cause as nicely as you can fit it into a pattern where you call it oh this is the ego on top of this pyramid
what youre really referring to is thousands of years of nervous patterns
thats the ego
some people just dont really need one, some people are just too smooth with the ways of the world
they just dont have too many neurological reactions to these things
they can just be
without really having an idea of themselves
oh right I am this, oh no, so I shouldnt do that
haha
so yeah and then but the problem is with these people there would be problems with an egoic society where everybody is all nervy and thereby also like plastic coated in their wiredness so as to be able to be very close to each other and still be wired and not discharge… yeah thats ego
maybe
so like ego is a city thing
yeah
and concentration camps, also, or you know, schools… organizations…
where people are being inferiorized by being pressed together
as if they were itty bitty modules in a computer
anyway
so you have to have an ego in such a case
otherwise, you dont…. if youre free, you dont need to have an ego
and your ego would only like annoy the shit out of you
so there it is
there is how to lose your ego
get free
so your ego becomes so much of a nuisance in your life
that you just, you know, 'take care' of it."]

[Exuberant Teleportation]

"I am confident we will resolve these mysteries, and I think the years ahead will be a golden age of discovery."
- Stephen Hawking (in a cosmology documentary)

[promethean75]

"No: a poor man who is ungrateful, unthrifty, discontented, and rebellious, is probably a real personality, and has much in him. He is at any rate a healthy protest. As for the virtuous poor, one can pity them, of course, but one cannot possibly admire them. They have made private terms with the enemy, and sold their birthright for very bad pottage. They must also be extraordinarily stupid. I can quite understand a man accepting laws that protect private property, and admit of its accumulation, as long as he himself is able under those conditions to realise some form of beautiful and intellectual life. But it is almost incredible to me how a man whose life is marred and made hideous by such laws can possibly acquiesce in their continuance." - Oscar Wilde

[surreptitious75]

The past is a place of reference not a place of residence

[surreptitious75]

To really understand the rules you sometimes need to learn from the rule breakers

[MagsJ]

The past is a place of reference not a place of residence

To really understand the rules you sometimes need to learn from the rule breakers

[surreptitious75]

When you blame yourself you learn from it - when you blame someone else you learn nothing at all

[MagsJ]

When you blame yourself you learn from it - when you blame someone else you learn nothing at all

A place of epiphanies?

I blame the many, for fools foster others' malaise, ergo.. stay away from fools!

[surreptitious75]

Some of course do not suffer fools in any shape or form but what if you yourself are actually a fool
So how do you remove it from within you - through honest and maybe brutal self examination I say

[Exuberant Teleportation]

“I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who had practiced one kick 10,000 times.”
― Bruce Lee

[MagsJ]

Some of course do not suffer fools in any shape or form but what if you yourself are actually a fool
So how do you remove it from within you - through honest and maybe brutal self examination I say

I say likewise.. though a touch of fool.. or any characteristic, can be quite endearing, and also very entertaining.. to the self and to the other.

Can one be a serious fool?

[Exuberant Teleportation]

"The meaning of life is achieving infinite mastery of creation following knowledge's liberating light divining free will, happiness, inner peace; reaching this ultimate evolutionary level is victory, becoming the Cosmic God unleashed. This is the way of awakening the Great Dragon Mind." - Exuberant Teleportation (back in 2011).

[promethean75]

"I have never been joyful, and yet it has always seemed as if joy were my constant companion, as if the buoyant jinn of joy danced around me, invisible to others but not to me, whose eyes shone with delight. Then when I walk past people, happy-go-lucky as a god, and they envy me because of my good fortune, I laugh, for I despise people, and I take my revenge. I have never wished to do anyone an injustice, but I have always made it appear as if anyone who came close to me would be wronged and injured. Then when I hear others praised for their faithfulness, their integrity, I laugh, for I despise people, and I take my revenge. My heart has never been hardened toward anyone, but I have always made it appear, especially when I was touched most deeply, as if my heart were closed and alien to every feeling. Then when I hear others lauded for their good hearts, see them loved for their deep, rich feelings, then I laugh, for I despise people and take my revenge. When I see myself cursed, abhorred, hated for my coldness and heartlessness, then I laugh, then my rage is satisfied. The point is that if the good people could make me be actually in the wrong, make me actually do an injustice - well, then I would have lost." - kierkegaard

[promethean75]

Everybody's staring blankly at the quote thinking 'wtf is he saying?' Oh it's a puzzle alright, but you can bet your ass that when K puts pen to paper, he's gonna put down some heavy shit. I'll not yet venture a couple of my own interpretations until others have given it a shot first.

Discuss.

[promethean75]

speaking of super-K, check this out. his old man was reported to be quite religious and as obstinate as they come. very strict and demanding of the young lad. well the story goes that one time, K was instructed by his father to place second in some kind of test that was given to his class in school. not first, which he could have easily done, having been the brightest in his class... and not last, which he could have easily done by making no effort at all. no. being the best or the worst was too easy for the young soren, and the old man knew this. the challenge soren faced was to gauge the intelligence of the second brightest and then purposely place himself below him. think about how difficult that must have been.

i think this experience had a lasting impact on K and would eventually become a kind of ingredient to his maieutic method of philosophy. socrates, similarly but perhaps not with the same genuine modesty, played the role of the ignorant in the company of his interlocutors in order to prevent their intimidation... which would make them less trustworthy and willing to be led. it must have dawned on K after discovering this talent - he was quite capable of pretending to be more ignorant than he was - that this deception could actually be very useful in philosophical discourse. thus began his career as a philosophical midwife of sorts who never really asserts anything... but rather assists you in giving birth to your own thoughts.

it is always much easier to simply state and declare what you believe than it is to merely suggest what you believe... because it takes great skill to conceal the fact that you mean it, and instead present it as if you've only just considered it without much conviction.

if aristotle never mentioned this insight in his Rhetoric, he shoulda.

so g'head, give it a try. make me believe something you believe without directly insuring me that you believe it. make me believe that we discovered it together... while in fact you were leading me there the whole time.

[MagsJ]

Everybody's staring blankly at the quote thinking 'wtf is he saying?' Oh it's a puzzle alright, but you can bet your ass that when K puts pen to paper, he's gonna put down some heavy shit. I'll not yet venture a couple of my own interpretations until others have given it a shot first.

Discuss.

Isn't that simply called 'a mood'?

That is why I don't read such books, for I have enough moods of my own to deal and contend with.

[Exuberant Teleportation]

Michio Kaku
Physicist

Kaku: "To become a theoretical physicist ... you need to have a passionate love affair with the universe."

[Arcturus Descending]

"The ultimate value of life depends upon awareness and the power of contemplation rather than upon mere survival."
Aristotle

[Meno_]

I'm all in favor of the democratic principle that one idiot is as good as one genius, but I draw the line when someone takes the next step and concludes that two idiots are better than one genius.” ...Leo Szilard

[promethean75]

"Always forgive your enemies - nothing annoys them so much." - Oscar Wilde

[Exuberant Teleportation]

Nietzsche: "I am utterly amazed, utterly enchanted! I have a precursor, and what a precursor! I hardly knew Spinoza."