To talk about a literary or scholarly canon is to talk about centrality in a network of works. This centrality is affected by (1) extent of connection / # of connections, (2) connection to other central works / centrality of connected works, (3) resource and infrastructure constraints, (4) asymmetries of influence.
network repair as a function of History of Philosophy as a field
"Who wills the end, wills the feasible necessary means to that end" as the analytic structure of skill (cp Kant on technical imperatives).
consistency with the maintenance of the species as an end, consistency with the advancement of the species as an end
The People qua populus vs The People qua plebs
lex as the criterion of ius and iniuria (Cicero) vs
lex as a species of jus (Isidore)
ius : justice :: lex : prudence (Aquinas ST 2-2.57.1)
"That surge of certainty you feel when you dismiss someone isn't a signal that you're right, it's the satisfaction of getting out of some work." Ian Leslie
You are not made to fit the world, and you cannot force yourself into a life so small as that. The human person is no more containable than an explosion.
The dispute over different interpretations of quantum mechanics is a dispute over the rule that QM plays in general causal reasoning; QM as such, being in form a generalization of probability theory to include complex numbers and in matter a set of measurements, does not itself establish what role it should play in causal reasoning.
Everything sensible is intelligible.
Seduction is always by way of a persona.
All technology in its actually developed form is an expression of values: ease of use, convenience, simplicity, pleasantness for display, accessibility, swiftness, etc.
If your interest is in increasing good behavior, you will need to coax people to it.
Prudence elevates and transfigures skills.
When we act well and rightly, we act in accordance with the providential hierarchy, cooperating with the angels above us and, ultimately, God.
deinotic vs phronetic practical intelligence
Genuine compassion is something that can only be learned through justice.
Part of good planning is knowing where and when you shouldn't be planning things.
the person as quasi-numinous, as sign of the numinous, as at home with the numinous, as the locus of the numinous
You can tell the sheer genius of design in the ordinary saw by the fact that you can give it to an orangutan and the orangutan will start sawing things with it.
divine freedom (will) as the necessary principle of necessary contingency disjunctions (X happens or X does not happen)
A postulate of (our) freedom leads to a higher-order postulate of a divine freedom giving a world within which to be free; a postulate of immortality leads to a higher-order postulate of an eternity (of world or moral order or God) with respect to which it can be); a postulate of messianic community or church leads to a higher-order postulate of divine government organizing it.
"It must never be forgotten that the same individuals constitute both the mob and the people." Nicholas Murray Butler
Possible thalers imply either actual thalers or causes capable of making actual thalers (or both).
Christ as Shepherd & divine forgiveness -- Micah 7:14-20
presence by sign: trace, emblem, gift, narrowcast, broadcast, theophany, real presence, transubstantiation
We often seek comfort when we should seek hope, and we often seek to give comfort when people need hope.
Kant's autonomy is generally misunderstood because it is interpreted as something purely individualistic. But Kant's autonomy is a co-autonomy, it is an autonomy we share with others.
There There are many correspondence relations.
contract powers as legislative self-governance powers of citizens
All critique is a posteriori.
the Logos as the point of convergence for the pursuits of the sublime, of the beautiful, and of the true
Good taste converges with good taste.
One must prepare for the Muse, not because it does not visit the unprepared, but because it is embarrassing to find oneself stumbling over how well one is doing.
music as something that incorporates human beings into itself
justified true surmise; evidential surmise-sifting
The account of 'gaslighting' in Ivy (2017) is very strange, in that it treats it as a road to credibility defeat rather than to deliberate action. (It is also strange in not allowing 'allies' any room to disagree with those to whom they are allied, which seems to be a recipe for purely superficial and merely symbolic deferences: people only have true and committed alliances with those with whom they are engaged in an actual *co*operation.)
All thoughts are merely beginnings; they reach toward their completion, which is the Beatific Vision.
the phenomenology of the brilliant
- the brilliant and the sense of design
- 'nothing in vain' 'all in moderation' 'unity with variety'
- the brilliant as so in manifestation of purpose
Standpoints are not received by being a victim but achieved by a victory.
conversation with friends as way to develop half-formed thoughts
museum-exhibit progressivism
hold, hit, scrape, reach as proto-tool functions
2 Chr 36:14-23 and the parable of the vineyard
Ephesians 2:4-10) and the Life of Christ as a picture of our salvation
Scripture in liturgy as a prayer-altar
Lk 2:19 -- the two tasks of theology, to keep and to connect
Deely (Augustine & Poinsot) gets Augustine in the De Genesis Adversus Manicheos wrong: Augustine is not here speaking of signs in general but Scriptural revelation.
Signs exist because God gives.
doubting : apparent absence :: wondering : apparent presence
(these would not be hard and fast connections, but seem relevant to typical ones)
Love is the most hierarchical thing in creation.
zombie ethical discourse & vocabularies
the connection of neisheng (inner sagehood) and waiwang (outer kingliness)
"By basing itself on its own churches, Christianity avoided becoming a wandering soul in its own domain. In stark contrast is Confucianism." Ming-huei Lee
Tian ren buei. (Heaven and humanity are not two.)
"The moral qualities of the mind of Heaven and Earth are four: origination (yuan), flourishing (heng), advantages (li), and firmness (zhen). Moreover, the principle of origination unites and controls them all." Zhu Xi
means-or-end as a disjunctive transcendental (associated with res)
and we will sing in the darkness
for a city we never knew
academia and the proliferation of relevance-narrative boilerplate
Law of Nature : Miracle :: End in Itself : mystery :: Kingdom of Ends : means of grace
The dignity of labor is linked to the dignity of leisure that labor makes possible.
To postulate x requires postulating conditions for the possibility of x.
"The cult of saints excludes the cult of success -- the veneration of those people who have got on well in this world, the snobbish admiration of wealth and fame." Sigrid Undset
Truth falls on us like rain and warms us like sunlight, upon the just and the unjust both; but not all who are drenced and irradiated are equally prepared for it.
The doctrine of the Trinity makes us to know something of the Father, the doctrine of the Incarnation of the Son, the doctrine of the Church of the Spirit; and through the Church we come to be drawn to the Incarnation and through them both are drawn back to the Trinity.
"Correct habituation distinguishes a good polity from a bad one." Aristotle 1103a34-36
"Because the Church has received the treasure of supernatural revelation in its entirety, it allows us to honor everywhere the various traces or marks or scattered fragments of that revelation." Maritain
