
“Those who can kill themselves do, and those who can’t, teach philosophy.”
Source: The Philosopher's Apprentice (2008), Chapter 13 (p. 295)
Source: A History of Western Philosophy
“Those who can kill themselves do, and those who can’t, teach philosophy.”
Source: The Philosopher's Apprentice (2008), Chapter 13 (p. 295)
“How can we live without our lives? How will we know it’s us without our past?”
Source: The Grapes of Wrath (1939)
Source: Philosophy and Real Politics (2008), p. 38.
Source: The Last Book (1999), Ch.20 (In Russian, Последняя книга,1999, ISBN 5-8246-0030-9
“Live for each second without hesitation”
Anarchism: Its Philosophy and Ideal (1896)
Context: It is not without a certain hesitation that I have decided to take the philosophy and ideal of Anarchy as the subject of this lecture.
Those who are persuaded that Anarchy is a collection of visions relating to the future, and an unconscious striving toward the destruction of all present civilization, are still very numerous; and to clear the ground of such prejudices of our education as maintain this view we should have, perhaps, to enter into many details which it would be difficult to embody in a single lecture. Did not the Parisian press, only two or three years ago, maintain that the whole philosophy of Anarchy consisted in destruction, and that its only argument was violence?
Nevertheless Anarchists have been spoken of so much lately, that part of the public has at last taken to reading and discussing our doctrines. Sometimes men have even given themselves trouble to reflect, and at the present moment we have at least gained a point: it is willingly admitted that Anarchists have an ideal. Their ideal is even found too beautiful, too lofty for a society not composed of superior beings.
“Happy are the beloved and the lovers and those who can live without love.”
It is not odd at all. You only think you know, as a matter of fact. And most of your actions are based on incomplete knowledge and you really don't know what it is all about, or what the purpose of the world is, or know a great deal of other things. It is possible to live and not know.
from lecture "What is and What Should be the Role of Scientific Culture in Modern Society", given at the Galileo Symposium in Italy (1964)
The Pleasure of Finding Things Out (1999)