pondering philosophy
Aug. 13th, 2024 05:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marycatelliWas pondering sagacity. I have recommended in the past that if you wish to have a wise old sage, you rip off wise things for him to say.
It is still a wise route. The problem is, as Machiavelli philosophically observed, that a prince who is not wise can not be wisely counseled, and likewise, a writer who is not wise can not recognize wise things to rip off.
It's not like you can count on things like their being a philosopher. I have recently read a philosopher who decried how Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas said that truth pursued for its own sake was superior to pursuing it for some end. And the more I read her essay the more clear it was that those two were simply right. She cited an example of a superheroine in a story whose knowledge let her set up amazing coincidences that did Good Things. But she missed that this character didn't have to. A character who pursues knowledge for its own sake is after the True. One who pursues it for its usefulness may be after the Good, the True, or the Beautiful -- but also could be after the Evil, the False, or the Ugly. The value of the pursuit would be determined by the end in question, not in itself.
It is still a wise route. The problem is, as Machiavelli philosophically observed, that a prince who is not wise can not be wisely counseled, and likewise, a writer who is not wise can not recognize wise things to rip off.
It's not like you can count on things like their being a philosopher. I have recently read a philosopher who decried how Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas said that truth pursued for its own sake was superior to pursuing it for some end. And the more I read her essay the more clear it was that those two were simply right. She cited an example of a superheroine in a story whose knowledge let her set up amazing coincidences that did Good Things. But she missed that this character didn't have to. A character who pursues knowledge for its own sake is after the True. One who pursues it for its usefulness may be after the Good, the True, or the Beautiful -- but also could be after the Evil, the False, or the Ugly. The value of the pursuit would be determined by the end in question, not in itself.