philosophy

• Philosophy defines itself as 'love of wisdom' because it must in effect begin by loving before claiming to know. In order to comprehend, it is first necessary to desire to comprehend; put another way, one must be astonished at not comprehending (and this astonishment thus offers a beginning to wisdom); or one must suffer at not comprehending, indeed fear not comprehending (and this fear opens onto wisdom). [Jean-Luc Marion]
• “philosophy begins in disappointment…not in an experience of wonder at the fact that things are, but rather with an indeterminate but palpable sense that something desired has not been fulfilled, that a fantastic effort has failed. One feels that things are not, or at least not the way we expected or hoped they might be.”[Simon Critchley]
• "I now wish that I had spent somewhat more of my life with verse. This is not because I fear having missed out on truths that are incapable of statement in prose. There are no such truths; there is nothing about death that Swinburne and Landor knew but Epicurus and Heidegger failed to grasp. Rather, it is because I would have lived more fully if I had been able to rattle off more old chestnuts — just as I would have if I had made more close friends." -Richard Rorty

• "Zwei Dinge erfüllen das Gemüth mit immer neuer und zunehmender Bewunderung und Ehrfurcht, je öfter und anhaltender sich das Nachdenken damit beschäftigt: der bestirnte Himmel über mir und das moralische Gesetz in mir." -Kant [Kritik der praktischen Vernunft"
• "Das Denken des Seins hütet das Wort und erfüllt in solcher Behutsamkeit seine Bestimmung. Es ist die Sorge für den Sprach-gebrauch." -Heidegger
• "Philosophy is really homesickness, an urge to be at home everywhere" -Novalis
• “…in light of Socrates exemplification-a life spent showing-that one of the most important truths about us is that we have the capacity to be open minded: the capacity to live nondefensively with the question of how to live.” [Lear, Open Minded 8]
• “…the only hurdle I seemed to face was the fact of my own death. It didn’t seem to be all that far away. And I realized that before I died, I wanted to be in intimate touch with some of the world’s great thinkers, with some of the deepest thoughts which humans have encountered. I wanted to think thoughts-and also write something which mattered to me. “ [Lear, Open Minded, 7]
• “Psychoanalysis, Freud said, is an impossibleprofession. So is philosophy. This is not a metaphor or a poetically paradoxical turn of phrase. It is literally true. And the impossibility is a matter of logic. For the very idea of a profession is that of a defensive structure, and it is part of the very idea of philosophy and psychoanalysis to be activities which undo such defenses…The idea of a profession of psychoanalysis or a profession of philosophy is thus a contradiction of terms.” [Lear Open Minded 5]
o "...but the 'profession' itself is overcrowded with intruders, with interlopers, with exploiters of the increasingly hybrid trade, and it can be renewed and reinvested with meaning only by the quiet solitary individuals who do not consider themselves part of it and who accept none of the customs brought into circulation..." [Rilke]