Slavoj Žižek: "I'm generally opposed to wisdom"
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 18 พ.ค. 2014
- Slavoj Žižek tells Paul Holdengräber why he thinks wisdom is conformist.
Excerpt from a conversation on International Authors' Stage in The Black Diamond, Copenhagen - see the full conversation here • Slavoj Žižek + Paul Ho...
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May 18th 2014
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A wise man once said "a wise man once said"
~ A wise man
So wise
...once said
and so on and so on
Should've been:
A wise men once said "it's not wise to believe in wisdom"
- a wise man
@@missionpupa That is so wise. I can sell this.
To do is to be - Plato
To be is to do - Kant
Do be do be do - Sinatra
smoke a do be - some random stoner
Scooby doobe doo - scooby
Awop-bop-a-loo-mop alop bam boom - little Rich
Do be do be do bah do - perry perry the platypus
Smoke dat bitch - Snoop Doggy Dog.
That was pretty wise.
boom baby
Beat me to it.
WHATEVERRRD I SAY CAN BE ZOLD!
Indeed
Paradox
His thoughts remind me of what a wise man once said:
"Whatever I say you can sell it as wisdom"
Love this
a wise man once told me "never use me in an anecdote"
@@MysteryStew5977the consequences!
“I’m generally opposed to wisdom ... and so on and so forth.”
So on and so on... get it right
semp224 now who’s being a “wiseguy”?
and sho on and sho forthsh
No surprise, coming from this guy.
@@michaelplatts8052 What?
I get where he's coming from but I think he's more opposed to banal aphorisms than the concept of wisdom itself.
no he is precisely discarding wisdom as a concept. Because it's nothing more then a sense of awe an idiot has for something or someone. It's not a property of people and statements. The true philosophical term is knowledge, which can be prooven by experiment, and scrutinized. Wisdom is no no. Deal with it if you can't understand it logically, you lazy a-hole.
Piotr M. Salomon That's very aggressive. Besides, I doubt Zizek is presenting wisdom in opposition to a knowledge "which can be proven by experiment". This is what Foucault would call an "aristorelic" view of knowledge.
Wisdom is the reproduction of existing conditions, he knows what he's talking about. YOU DON'T.
@@HerrBaton seems like youre on a cult. Perhaps some wisdom would take you out of that, dumbfuck.
Lets define wisdom as the way you use your mind inteligence to produce optimal results. Like that comment that i just responded, or the other guy who just said "he knows what hes saying you dont" it would be more wise to prove your point rather than just show that you accept whatever zizek says. But who am i to say that? You guys are clearly full of shit after all. You can be high IQ person for example, but fail because you're not wise enough. Zizek rambles too much and dont prepare his thoughts before talking them over like mad, he made his point and it made sense in the context, but that doesn't justify discarding a word which is clearly useful to represent emotional intelligence.
It seems like what he means by "wisdom" here is the tendency to speak in cliches and truisms rather than engaging in rigorous thought. I think what most people mean by the word "wisdom" is sound judgement and the ability to apply intelligence in real world scenarios in order to achieve favorable outcomes. The entire discussion really hinges on the definition of wisdom and it would need to be defined first.
Applying intelligence in real world scenarios is ... just intelligence?
@@mylordandsaviour4786 no because...
@@mylordandsaviour4786 Here's Jordan Peterson's take on Wisdon and IQ not being the same thing: th-cam.com/video/HpsvuEvfs1g/w-d-xo.html
You're quite correct, but it's not necessary to clarify the definition of the word to understand what he meant. As someone said, you can not agree nor disagree with this guy.
1)Wisdom is mainly experience. 2)Intelligence is your ability to think, use the brain, IQ is quite close. 3) Knowledge is mainly education, what you learned. You can be wise, but not intelligent - like some old indian guru which has seen a lot in his life, but he cant calculate 8x9. Etc. For best life results combine these three attributes together. Intelligence is mainly born and inherited, but you can shape your wisdom by experince and knowledge by learning and education.
Zizek is against wisdom and he claims Jesus wasn't a wise guy. It means Zizek apreciate Jesus.
Yes he does, i mean, he has an entire book on that guy
that's not a logical proof.
Right, it's a mysterious thing called joke.
@@simonthebard9512 tbf, I wasn't really being serious myself. I don't know if a lot of people seriously go around and bash other people's logical consistency.
no, the syllogism says that zizek is not against jesus, which is not appreciation
What he is saying is that the idea of wisdom is purely situational. There is no general "wisdom"
Then why didn't he just say that.
@@stephanesauve8744 because it’s not as polemically tasty as “being opposed to wisdom”.
I read that as sitiational
There was a communication-translation misake here.
I guess Zizek wasn't criticising wisdom itself but this art of "wise-guy / smart-ass preacher" people who sells their commentary according to a situation.
Thats sophism (subjective truth). And it's not wisdom (objective truth).
No, what he is saying is that there is no way to differentiate between legitimate and illegitimate poetic impulse. Which is postmodern critique as far as I have understood????
I clicked on this thinking it was Mark Hamill
this is hamill overdose with green milk.
It is Hamill but in the dark side
Episode IV
A NEW HOPE
It is a period of civil war,
and so on and so forth.
He is so organic and wild... love how the people he talks with seemed puzzled and shock
This is honestly the best description I've seen of his manner of speaking.
@@jonathon_durno he is brilliant
When you’re entire argument is based on misrepresenting the definition of a commonly used word, being puzzled is an appropriate reaction
@@jonathon_durno yep lol his worldview is batshit insane and it’s really sad to see this worldview being adopted by otherwise intelligent people
@@kalgore4906 Jordan Peterson thinks he's cool.
"Never made it as a wise man,
I couldn't cut it as a poor man stealing" - Chad Robert Turton
🤢🤮
Love that song!
This is how you remind me of watyraillayam
i love this comment section you wise sarcastic sons of bitches
powerful.
Moral of the story: a wise guy will come with his wisdom, you cannot stop him
I agree with him here. Whatever you do, a wise man can make it into a wisdom.
If a man can turn anything into wisdom, then he must then be a very wise man.
Doesn't make him a wise man. That makes him good with words, probably a poet ;)
@@elnationalista A wise man knows which wisdom is the correct one
The wise man doesn’t make whatever you do into wisdom, the perceived wise man looks at your situation and extrapolates what went wrong. Depending on your natural inclinations, your mistakes will vary from others.
For example: if I shoot a basketball and it goes over the rim, I put too much force into it. If it shoot it and it lands in front of the basket, I didn’t put enough. Despite missing my goal in both situations, the advice for how to improve oppose one another. Meaningful wisdom to one person can be destructive to another if blindly followed. Wisdom can only flourish when perspective is bared in mind
Not just wise men but anyone with a facebook account and a tendency to post long qoutes. lol
"Whatever you say, you can sell it as a wisdom" is wisdom indeed.
I have a saying, that :
< whatever wisdom you give, Zizek will have an anecdote to call it bullshit. >
My wisdom: dont put your hand on the hot stove.
Zizek: thats BS. I put my hand on the hot stove all the time xD
Zizek is making a clear point. There is a significant difference in kind between claiming to have wisdom, and aspiring to have a love of wisdom.
No, I'm sorry that's not what he's saying. He has a disdain of wisdom.
The opening shot with the building, and then the sounds of Zizek's beautiful mouth music had me rolling. I like to imagine the entire town is being forced to listen to him talk
Imagine going to a lecture not knowing who Žižek is, first noticing his speech impairment and then you get shocked by things like these.
Only works if you're the kind of ass who thinks one's ability to speak in a normative fashion is indicative of how thoughtful or intelligent a person is
@@bookofkittehs You are projecting your own negativity onto others.
@@Valchee9192631770 No? Just saying that it's silly to think that such things about someone's speech are related to how they think. How he speaks doesn't make what he has to say any more impressive.
@@bookofkittehs The test came back negative again - you're still a grumpy negative person.
@@bookofkittehs It's a very common trait that negative people don't see how they are acting and they use lies to cover up their shortcomings. They love to attack others and love negativity. The only thing they don't like is not getting any...
He's saying:
I could be like:
"We live in the best time the world has had to offer. Technological advancements, medical advancements, Social enhancements and open voice movements"
"We live in the worst time the world has had to offer. Dishonest leaders, subliminal manipulation, ideological separation and spiritual segregation"
They would both could be taken as wisdom (Albeit weak) , but there's more to it than this and that. It's not so simple give someone wisdom, they have to seak it for themselves (Hence the word "wisdom" is Conformist). Everyone has a different way of hearing things. Someone might believe that wisdom agriculture is the most important, someone else might believe that corporate knowledge is best. There's practical wisdom, spiritual/religious/lifestyle wisdom, financial wisdom, artistic vision, political wisdom, historical wisdom etc.
The most enlightened and knowledgeable philosopher could go up to a womanizer and try to offer wisdom, but how would that intuitive speech help in what he does with his life? That's why he's talking about marketing and advertising it. Whichever philosopher is the most popular gets to dictate what wisdom is. Celebrities, Celebrities, Celebrities is what philosophers in the past were. Except they didn't have cool instrumentals to work with and sing along to so they just gathered around crowds and raised their voice as much as they could or skribbled on their pads in the most attractive and mysterious language they could muster.
and that's where your thoughts are built from people, your core behavioural attitudes have all been birthed by someone else's pen or voice (Again it's not that simple, but you get the gist)
JustAgreekPassing He is underdetermining it -(or I am not understanding him properly) The problem of wisdom is all about the execution. Islamic theology is big on this as I have been reading into its philosophy lately.
Two people can take option a and option b
One uses wisdom during his decision I.e his procedure and is successful, the other doesn’t bother with the procedural measurements, and harms his society or causes a war
@@AN-it8dp It's not that simple. Ignorance will never threaten or cause harm to any society because there will always be someone less ignorant who will take it and make it to their advantage. Even something like War or the destruction of societal pillars requires someone who plans meticulously (procedural measurements). Someone who doesn't assess will not see results, whether it be destructive or successful.
so it's a matter of what the 'wise one' does with his wisdom. If he seeks to apply it selfishly, the world around him will crumble, if he applies it selflessly, he will crumble. If applied equally, he can hope to find some sort of societal balance.
Aleister Crowley once said "the righteous will remain righteous and the filthy will remain filthy"
Someone who doesn't assess/bother with procedural measurements will not be destructive on a large scale, what you should really fear is someone who envisions a twisted future. Beware of Ancient prophecies and research the modern "cult" mentality we've established. none of our complaining has made us more immune to the system, it has only grown a desire to elevate higher up. We will forget our lows and stay fixed on keeping our eyes raised beyond our individual capabilities like the good law-abiding citizens we are.
we're all monkeys, following the coolest philosopher
@@mmustap3 that sounds like Zizeks definition of wisdom as trivial saying.
We are all raindrops in the wind
We are all leaves during autumn
We are just products of our environment
Its better to be aristotle dissatisfied than a pig satisfied
Its flowery wording to seem insightful
They have to seek it, with facts, and that’s what makes it being knowledge
i love viking wisdom, because it's stuff like "get up early, carry a weapon, don't drink too much" stuff like that.
What wisdom is in that? Does it matter if you don't get up early? Carrying a weapon is horrible advice. Drinking too much is banal advice.
@@saintchristoffer Vikings were not living in 21st century for crying out loud
@@saintchristoffer try reading some Viking literature
Odin selling self helps books before capitalism. Still, not too compatible, so to take it as absolute wisdom is UNWISE
"Dragon's bleed a lot more than you seem to be planning for with those trenches, hoss. Also, you should probably not give the dragon's heart back to his own brother after you, ya know, murdered him. Bro's don't usually take that well. I mean... tweet tweet?"
banal platitudes =/= wisdom
Yeah, but those banal platitudes became a synonym for wisdom. The meaning of the word "wisdom" has changed over time, that's why it's good to be sceptic about modern-day wisdom
@@r.t.5767 home-spun wisdom =/= real wisdom
@jay yeah, he hates wisdom
But that’s not what he said. His point is wisdom is a meaningless distinction that can mean anything, an ideologic construct. It is wise to gamble if you win, it is wise to not gamble if you lose, it is wise to only gamble when you’re assured of the outcome, it is also wise to not gamble when you’re assured of the outcome. Wisdom means anything and as such has no meaning at all.
@@r.t.5767 If you have prefix wisdom with something, that isn't wisdom. Wisdom is wisdom. If modern day wisdom (whatever that means) isn't wise, then it isn't wisdom.
It is a really beautiful description he gives and you can say it on the guys face when he so suddenly gives the contrast between the first contemplation of eternity and the second. Wisdom is nothing but the framing of reality, it is poetic observation rather than useful codes for action. There may be truth hidden in such phrasing just as there could be in the phrasing of the unwise.
"What I'm not generally opposed to is flaunting cool-sounding, irresponsible paradoxes in order to attract attention to myself."
I was once in a talk with a "person of wisdom", explaining how life was tough for me. Civil war in Ex-Yu, domestic violence for decades, this and that and the "wisdom enriched" person told me:
"If life gives you a lemon, make a lemonade".
I replied. "What i life gives my a nice piece of shit, what do i then do, make a chocolate cake? ..you wan't us to split it and try some". Instant headshot!
Žižek is saying that true knowledge has value, abstract and new-age para-intellectual bullshit not so much. But people love it, because "nice-to-the-ear bullshitery" is much easier on the brain than true thinking, eventually leading to knowledge which does have value and is applicable in practice.
So, why do the brain work (by yourself) which is a tragedy in modern societies considering you can just buy "wisdom" for 10.99$ in form of a book that surely can be applied to everything.
good shit
you seem like part of the problem with that reply
I am going to make a fruit salad using only knowledge (no wisdom). I put in some banana, strawberry, pineapple, tomato, avocado, eggplant and to top it all off, olives. This is my analogy of the "knowledge salad" it's all technically fruit, its all "true", but it is the shittiest fucking fruit salad you'll ever eat
that's an interesting point, and to answer your question is to look at what we, humans, have chose to do with "a nice piece of shit." We used it as fertilizer to grow food. We used it to mask our presence around the habitats of big scary predators. We used it to build our houses instead of cement and whatever else. We used it to throw it at people too, for that matter. Modernly, we may use it to generate energy too.
If life gives you poo use the poo to fertilized the ground in order to grow a apple tree... Have you heard of "black Earth soil"? You need poo and char
"Zizek what is your wisdom?"
"Wisdom is as wisdom does, and so on."
"That is a good wisdom."
I have found that you really need a synthesis of wisdom and intelligence to get anywhere. If you're just strictly analytical and technical you often miss the bigger picture, but if your wisdom isn't informed by a certain focused shrewdness you can easily fall into just repeating cliches and hollow platitudes. And every virtue has a false counterpart -- what Zizek is talking about here could be called false wisdom, offering the pretense of insight without really stopping to consider the usefulness or applicability of your claims. The desire to emulate wisdom is one thing, it's quite another to actually offer ideas that are generally respected and thought-provoking.
I'd also offer that Nietzche said very similar things about wisdom -- or at least the concept of the 'wise man', whose facade he could see right through.
Like others have said before me, wisdom on its own is cheap. Knowledge has a role in wise actions and sayings, especially regarding self-preservation and happiness.
You summed this up very well. Thank you!
Yeah. That is why many engineering ideas sound cool and sensible until they meet the real world.
I recommend "Meaning in technology" by Arnold Pacey.
Sexual bummiation
well, he's sort of specifically making reference to the stoics and carpe diem and such, eternity vs ephemeral living, which is to say Kirkegaard or Socrates or Plato or whomever gets branded for being for X and that their work can be pulverized down into simple phrases like "everything changes" which might be little tidbits of knowledge that are useful in the right contexts... but you can always spin them the other way "everything stays the same" and you can argue from that position successfully. The Dao De Jing even addresses this by synthesizing concepts like this, "everything changes, everything stays the same" is largely a true wisdom in that a river flows in much the same way it will 500 years from now, however, a river is constantly and subtly changing shape and direction.
And yet these wisdoms tell us nothing, but it is all context-based wisdom that people apply at a macro scale. Idiots might use "everything stays the same" to give up on life. Other idiots might use "everything changes" to start a bloody revolution that is a negative sum game for society. Enshrining understanding as wisdom erodes the value of wisdom. Wisdom is contextual. Wisdom as a heuristic breaks down. You have to be able to discern. Would Zizek agree with the statement, "the time for having philosophers as a class has passed"? Shouldn't everyone be a philosopher, so that they can properly live their lives? I think he'd agree with that, though practically speaking it can be hard to motivate people to care about the meaning of their own lives once they have tasted immediate pleasure or were conditioned by religion to only care about eternity.
He just explained the problem with Cococola commercials
He: I'm opposed to wisdom.
Also he, explaining it through Wisdom.
I wouldn't agree with his take:
He assumes that wisdom necessarily is either 'objectively true or false' which I don't accept. I think wisdom comes from abstracting certain lessons or patterns from a complex reality. 1 wise lesson is 1 fibre of the patch of cloth that is life. It depends on your place in reality and your relationship with the wisdom wether it applies to you or not.
For example: If I worry a lot and am anxious about the future, 'seize the day' would be a 'wise' lesson.
Yet, it might not be a wise lesson for me if i'm too impulsive and don't worry at all about anything. It would be really hard to do anything, for example if I have exams and i'm like: "i don't care" then I won't succeed in them. In this case, a wise lesson might be: take responsibility, be disciplined,...
I would argue both of them are wise lessons because they are very much 'real' lessons that are part of life and can be applied to many problems that different people experience, but it's not because it's wise that it'll necessarily always be perceived as wise. They are like I said: both a part of the complex structure that makes reality, it's relative to your position in life.
So I would say wisdom is anything but disgusting. Wisdom is something that you can't see, hear, smell or feel, until you need it. I think one could even argue: something could be wise independent of its intellectual content, or at least to a degree. One of the things that makes something wise is it's application to the listener's life, perhaps something that has intelligent content would positively correlate with it's applicability to life, but maybe there are other options too.
Perhaps wisdom is only to be perceived by someone (you could perceive your own thoughts as wise when you figure something out because you can perceive your own thoughts that 'pop up' in your head'). Maybe I can't BE wise, but people can perceive the things I say as wise. We certainly don't use the language that way when we talk about wisdom or someone being wise, but we don't always use language accurately either.
I also think the only time you would really be able to say "I have some wise advice for you", is when you yourself have experienced the impact of your thoughts as 'wise' firsthand.
For example: if suddenly a thought pops up in my head that makes me realize something and that really helps me in my own situation, I would then be able to share that realisation with others. Others might claim i'm 'wise', but really, I'm not wise. The thought that somewhat 'randomly' or 'uncontrollably' popped in my head were wise. Ofcourse this depends on what you would define as 'I'.
I would also like to add that maybe the value of your wisdom scales with it's applicability to different situations and different people. The more people can perceive it as wise, the more wise it is.
Longest comment I’ve ever seen. Brevity is the soul of wit.
you missed his point so hard i dont even know what to tell you
@@dunK1x truly wise
As a wise man once said "Those who attempt to explain things with wisdom are the greatest fools of all""
why is that ?, i dont even think thats an actual quote. i think you misinterpreted the fool, its not really a bad word because in this context the fool is the person who is trying out new things. just like how twain said “He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains a fool forever
@@lemonstrangler Its not, I just made it up, I put it here just to sound wise
Ooh, self-burn! Those are rare!
Hahaha 🤣
I see what he's saying though. A lot of wisdom is just crystalized knowledge and would validate some people's rigid/unflexible behaviour.
Wisdom is to knowledge what marketing is to engineering.
Well put
hey, that's a pretty wise saying
As Socrates once said:
"I know only one thing: that I know nothing."
Wisdom is like analogies, quotes and beliefs; there is one to justify and promote every and any point of view.
WISDOM IS PAGAN!
🤦🏽♂️🤦🏽♂️🤦🏽♂️
Wisdom is the successful application of knowledge. Slavoj is the failed product of cocaine and mental retardation.
@@retiredshitposter1062 Nope, wisdom is the integral of knowledge times intelligence over time.
.
That was an unwise statement
.
@@retiredshitposter1062 LMFAO
I understand the nitpicking about the definition of "wisdom" in the comments, but even using a simple dictionary definition along the lines of "knowledge gained through experience" we're still able to grasp the underlying point Zizek is making. Experience is subjective, and outcomes have inherent randomness; trying to boil down our previous experiences into a cohesive bit of knowledge is predicated upon the human desire to find patterns in randomness. Wisdom -- defined previously as "knowledge gained through experience" -- can in many cases be nothing more than pigeon superstition.
That's just definition picking though. www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/wisdom
If wisdom is insight then we have an entirely different discussion. Because the definition of insight: www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/insight
So then wisdom would be a power. I think Zizek just picked the definition that works for his particular dogma.
Personally I feel like wisdom is the ability for a person to more often than not approach correctness. And there is a real correctness. Occasionally there are situations where there is more than one correct answer, but that doesn't mean that there are no correct answers. Imagine if the answers were not correct in computer science. We wouldn't be having discussions on the internet.
He talks some shit sometimes, he'll say anything. In the most basic sense of wisdom, if someone tries something risky but lives and another person doesn't take the risk....the person who took the risk has more wisdom about that thing that he tried than the other person. What is happening to the World?
Experience of mind split from reality is subjective.
He should first define wisdom or this is worthless. His whole argument hinges on “wisdom” in this context not being true wisdom but rather “wisdom” in being a “wise-guy” or popular sayings etc. These two spheres have nothing to do with each other. If this is a nonsensical argument in itself, or created by the language barrier I cannot tell.
Click-bait intellectualism.
It's simple: there's no wisdom. As every wisdom is sujective. As every subjective is not objective. And only objective is true. And only God sees, knows and is The Objective.
theres a language barrier in these comments
@@youtubecomment2382 that's, both, wise and true.
Regardless of what Zizek implicitly defines wisdom as, he himself takes his own words as wise, or at least wise in the sense of the word’s original connotation.
I think he’s saying that Christ wasn’t wise because he was a doer. He was extremely smart but in a way that was useful to mankind, not just himself. To be honest though, this guy is miles ahead of me.
I just love looking at the faces of the people sitting next to zizek, just not being able to keep up and getting progressively confused
Couple of interesting Christian statements about wisdom for Zizek:
in whom (Christ) are hidden all treasures of wisdom and knowledge -Colossians 2:3
The fear of the Lord is the beginnig of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction - Proverbs 1:7
The beginning of wisdom is this: Get wisdom. Though it cost all you have,
get understanding - Proverbs 4:7
So THAT'S why everyone told me to stop being a wise guy when I was growing up.
This will be on my mind for the next few days...
Indeed...
You future self confirms.
Indeed, it's still on my mind...
Well... here I am, It's still on my mind.
"I am generally opposed to wisdom." says the man who has never lived.
Said a man who has lived
Zizek: I will use wisdom to bash wisdom
Can´t stop loving him!
Becouse he is so Wise?
Zrownin No
Hi Phill Collins, I'm a fan
This is Prime Slavoj, he‘s absolutely right.
Slavoj Žižek is the greatest apologist of Christianity that I know. Thank you, professor.
In whichever way you put "wisdom", it will sound good, but is not thusly objectively verified as true. Is that the gist of it?
Yeah, I think you phrased it in the most articulate way possible. He did a horrible job of explaining his position.
it does not mean wisdom is to be unconsidered or brushed aside. just throwing in my two cents. not that you said that it wasnt
He honestly just is trying to overcomplicate authority bias as something more profound.
That seems to be the point, but he mischaracterizes wisdom as post-hoc justification. Another strawman fallacy to debate against pot-hoc fallacy that he pretends is a good argument.
@@michaelgirgis9019 agreed but english is not his first language. We can still appreciate how odd and funny he is lol.
Wisdom is being able to speak from experience, rather than in circles of rhetoric (scapegoating, justifications).
Does he know what it is he is opposed to?
You clearly didn't listen to the talk though it's less than 3 mins
You clearly didn't listen to the talk though it's less than 3 mins
wise words are enough to feel how you want to feel while telling others youre justifued
like the way he claps his hands like a kindergarten child when he is happy about his example
I love Zizek, and as someone who loves Zizek I must give push back. Here, I am a fan of Cioran (the following quote from him sums up my point perfectly):
I only write this kind of stuff, because explaining bores me terribly. That's why I say when I've written aphorisms it's that I've sunk back into fatigue, why bother. And so, the aphorism is scorned by "serious" people, the professors look down upon it. When they read a book of aphorisms, they say, "Oh, look what this fellow said ten pages back, now he's saying the contrary. He's not serious." Me, I can put two aphorisms that are contradictory right next to each other. Aphorisms are also momentary truths. They're not decrees. And I could tell you in nearly every case why I wrote this or that phrase, and when. It's always set in motion by an encounter, an incident, a fit of temper, but they all have a cause. It's not at all gratuitous
He's the kind of guy to be a contrarian, but only after rigorous debate and research about it, and building a boat for himself rather than just joining the opposing side of the offending argument.
Žižek isn't necessarily someone I agree with all that often (maybe half the time) but I love listening to him lol
He just won my heart
Brilliant, delicate, and at the same time brutal.
It’s like saying “yolo” before doing something stupid.
Or the saying, “you can’t be old and wise if you were never young and stupid.” It can be used to justify doing the most irresponsible shit. And I’m sure there’s plenty of other sayings that would directly contradict it, and some old bloats are probably out there using whatever quote they can to fit their situation.
No it's not. #yolo is a more fleshed out and coherent philosophy than anything (NOTHING) z*zek ever "devised" (shat out). Yolo, bitch.
The correct answer to those who say "Only those who risk profit" is that "profit => risk" is a logical implication, that means that risk is necessary to profit and profit is sufficient to risk, because if you profit you surely took the risk, but you may have risked and lost.
Wisdom to me always meant truly understanding the things you read and the understanding of experiences you have in your life. The things he's talking about are just people seeming to be wise by regurgitating other peoples quotes or making up a witty anecdote.
It's obvious he's not opposed to wisdom, but to opinism, philosophy and pseudothinking. And I agree. Wise guy.
+CristianKirk
i smirked a lil'
Even in Never Winter's Nights there is a difference between Wisdom and Knowledge.
I believe he is saying that what is referred to as "wisdom" is all too often merely a way of upholding views that are common at that time, and that it can be a danger to innovative thinking and problem-solving as a result; that although we can always invoke whatever idioms and turns of phrase we want to when faced with problems, it is always possible for a certain situation not to be explainable in those terms.
Why is "philosophy" in that bunch?
@Piotr Please explain this wisdom coming from the feeling of awe an idiot has for something, it doesn't make any sense at all ... So an idiot sees wood burning and is in awe ... where does wisdom fit in?
Damn, Zizek is so wise! XD
It seems he's generally opposed not to wisdom, but to sophism. Which is a fair point.
Nope, you missed the direct message. He's against wisdom.
So wise men have something to say for everything for every situation and that bothers him. But he is that person.
This dude is a showman
"Whatever I say, you can sell it as a wisdom" - however, life is CHANGE. Yes, those things are wise but not all at the same time in every life and in every moment. I don't agree with his point. Wisdom is simply more specific than that - it shouldn't be generally applied without thought to any and all situations, for the most part.
life is CHANGE from something definite to something else definite
-Aristotle
One doesnt have to share his opinion. But one can aknowledge that this guy is quite entertaining.
😂 You have made me laugh Mr. Žižek. Best wishes from Serbia
If you take the volume off and look explicitly to his body language you will be able to observe someone completely immerse in his own ideas. Immersed in though. Not in reflection or mindfulness but in thoughts. Lots of thoughts.
Somehow he transpires the opposite of what I search for. Hope he is happy.
He's talking about sophistry. Socrates would've agreed with him.
I think most people in the comments in their hurry to club in all what Zizek puts in this clip as a sort of a "wisdom" to contradict his stance forget that what Zizek is attacking is the a particularly generalized understanding of the word "wisdom" & that is to rationalize any occurrence in nature to make it seem like it happened for good. That is what he attacking nothing else. Wisdom the word itself is extremely vague & fluid & can mean potentially many things.
The interviewer just can't believe the genius he's witnessing
This man is a global treasure
I've watched a few this guy's videos waiting for him to impress me. I think this is his last video I'm going to watch
not even listening to his words i just love the accent
Little hard to understand but definetly
it just proves Socrates' point: "the greatest wisdom is knowing you know nothing." Human wisdom blows in the wind.
Wisdom is a virtue. I do now know of what this man speaks of.
But is really?
Wisdom is rather a euphemism for lies about basics of 'life'...take a few:fate wanted it to be so....you hate the thing about someone, that u cant accept about yourself...keep it on...you r important nd your opinion is important as well,,,u get from the world that u radiate into it....beauty comes from inside...you ll find the true her/him....be yourself...u can reach anything , only u need to want it
@@Interwurlitzer all true statements
What Žižek is saying here is precisely that anything that could be referred to as "wisdom" can be reduced to a banal aphorism. It's not an error due to a language barrier. Wisdom is just common sense shrouded in pathos, and since common sense is purely practical in nature it's awfuly inadequate to try to sell it with some "wise old man" kind of nearly spiritual authority. It's cheap and dishonest, that's why he's against it.
That is not what he is saying here.
What he is saying is that everything and its opposite can appear equally wise in any situation. Therefore wisdom is meaningless, and the idea of wisdom as generally understood is a scam.
Anyone can appear wise by stating an obvious self-contradiction as if it meant something.
If it was practical, it would be predictive rather than providing justification only in hindsight. Things that have predictive powers are not called wisdom, they are called theories.
@@davidwuhrer6704 the first guy in the comment section who claims he got it that actually got it, interesting how long that took to find. Not very surprising however considering we are indeed on TH-cam.
In fact, that's exactly what wisdom is, and why it's so frustrating : it is the recognition that, for a thought to be true, the contrary must also be. Wisdom is paradoxical thinking. It is not conformist, in the sense that it refutes any one sided view, and refutes itself over and over. In showing that any thought can be the expression of truth, it shows that the same thought can be wrong. And that's why Socrates and Jesus are not only philosophers, but wise guys : both are powerful expressions of contrary thinking in history. Zizek is, also, a great friend of invertion : love is evil, happiness is oppression, etc.
What’s he’s trying to say is…….”man has no wisdom”
Whatever people try to sell as wisdom depends on subjectivity and context.
It all comes down to linguistic tricks.
A philosopher against wisdom? I'm glad there is one. This so called wisdom is nothing but pretty words that bring about endless disagreement, diminishing our conceptualization of what even is right. Slavoj Zizek is damn right about this one. On and on have I heard this type of "reasoning" through wisdom, and let me tell you- it is the most disgusting, and most obnoxious thing to witness as someone who actually and honestly desires to study philosophy.
I feel like studying philosophy is like studying chinese medicine.
@@imadmoujahid3431 it is, I do love philosophy very much. Now, whether it's beautiful is a matter of aesthetics, but I digress.
My point is that I hate everything that makes a caricature of, and curbs general understanding of, philosophy. "Wisdom", being one of them, also gets to be the object of my disdain.
@@imadmoujahid3431 in simpler terms: what we call wisdom is not and should not be a representative of philosophy. As Zizek pointed out, a wisdom may be constructed in various ways, in which it contradicts other wisdoms that could be used by the same speaker. This proves that wisdom is convention not really interested in truth, but rather in persuasion and feel-good or feel-smart. language. Philosophy, being what it is, should not be assumed to be something that is a selling convention. Yet it is so often and it annoys me (and Zizek alike)
@@fountainovaphilosopher8112 another question: what's the difference between philosophy and wisdom?
@@imadmoujahid3431 philosophy is a discipline and/or a subject; a study of everything as some might put it.
Wisdom (or at least what it is supposed to be) is the state of being wise; that is, expressing specific uncommon knowledge.
'A wisdom ', depending how you use it, can also be a proposition that appears as that uncommon knowledge, which is referred to here.
I thought for a second that the video was at 1.5 speed :)
I love this man.
But the problem is that embracing eternity makes more sense in both arguments than embracing the finite, the impermanent, the worldly things and pleasures.
"Slavoj Zizek says something you can't possibly justify"
*slavoj says some cool but regular shit everyone agrees with *
Wisdom is nothing but the gold watch old men receive after a lifetime of filling the role they were handed instead of forging their own path. That's my gold watch for 15 years destroying my body repairing auto collisions until my wife made me go back to school.
It's a shitty watch, not even real gold.
Is there somewhere a video, or in a book of Zizek, where he explains it more? And is there somewhere where he speaks/explains Kierkegaard?
Wisdom as a practical thing (as in knowing when to take risks and when to avoid them) and the combining of instinct with conscious knowledge/experience is a pretty 'real' thing. Wisdom is wisdom because it's not 'fact' and it's about knowing that every insight doesn't fit every situation. The 4 examples that he gave can all be true in different circumstances.
Exactly his point, you'll gain experience and develop methodologies based on knowledge/experience you have gained then you'll succeed in doing something. It's not practically viable that you choose a wise man's word on a scenario and work on that. Wisdom is somewhat a type of assertion that you get after you succeed/fail in doing something.
"And so on and so on, and so backwards and so forth".
I wish everybody had got up and walked out: "Where are you all going?"
"We thought you were wise and had something to teach us but now you've proven us wrong."
They stood in the lobby silently together. Motionless.
A student came to Nasrudin looking for a wise man to teach him. He wanted to spend a day with Nasrudin first to see what kind of man he was. It was a cold day, and Nasrudin blew into his hands. "What are you doing?" asked the student. "I'm blowing in my hands to warm them up" said Nasrudin. They went to eat. Nasrudin blew on his soup. "What are you doing now?" asked the student. "The soup is hot, I'm blowing on it to cool it off." The student got up and said he could not be the student of a teacher from whose mouth came hot and cold at the same time.
@@davidwuhrer6704 What he said sounds smart but what the man was doing was practical
@@MiguelMartinez-il9vs Sure, I mean, wouldn't you? But the student was looking for a teacher who was consistent, not for someone pragmatic who changes what comes out of his mouth to whatever suits him on the occasion.
Neither are wrong in this story, but Nasrudin was known as both a wise man and a fool. He can teach us best by being the worst teacher:
A monk came to town who claimed to have a philosophy that could find the answer to any question. "And yet," said Nasrudin, "just yesterday one of my students asked me a question that I found unable to answer." "Tell me what the question was, and my philosophy will find the answer" asserted the monk. "The question was," said Nasrudin, "'What are you doing in my house in the middle of the night?'"
@@davidwuhrer6704 That’s a good point about looking for consistency. I didn’t see it that way. I am a very practical person but now I’m changing my mind of reading a good philosophy book any recommendations?
@@MiguelMartinez-il9vs Sophie's World is often recommended as a good introduction.
Superb
I adore this video ✅☑️
Woahhh this was so liberating! Basically what he is trying to say is that it is wise to not discriminate things as wise or unwise, because if you do, you fall where society wants you to fall. You will be a conformist all your life. That was so liberating!
I could tell.
I find it incredibly funny how many people are thinking about the supposed profoundness of Zizek's statement, even thought what he really says is incredibly basic. Which is exactly his point.
I recently hear about wisdom from Thai Forrest Tradition. It's in a totally different meaning. Rather dynamic state of mind, which have insight into characteristics of non-essenciality (non-self is a special case), impermanence of everything here and unsatisfactory aspect of each this moment.
So, no matter what, wisdom is never wrong and always right in hindsight, but doesn't help with foresight.
I believe the problem laid out by Zizek is hidden in the fact that we cannot rationalize what to follow in life, By that I mean that life is as good an argument as death and when people say to be a stoic or a cynic, the truth is that it depends on what values you believe are more important and will bring that which you want.
to put it in simple terms, what you want is completely subjective and has no argument to rationally support. let's say I wish to live; life is not good nor bad, it just is, there is no logical reason to live nor is there any reason to die.
I am now going to use an example that resonates with what Zizek said. let's say a wise man predicates on living in the moment. Is he wrong? What if another wise man says you should think of the future. is he wrong? the answer is that their just both ways of going about life and depending on what you want (which has no logical explanation or argument) you will choose a certain one and call the man you agree with wise and the other stupid.
I am sorry if my writing is poor as I do not speak English natively. Also, I might be wrong and if you think I am, please write a comment so I can learn.
This is a great response!!
I think you summed it up well. I would say "do what you want".
i am not quite sure what he means, when he is saying 'wisdom' ... for me wisdom is not a confirmist thing ... what is good or bad for one isn't nesesarily good or bad for others ... for me wisdom is seeing (or trying to see) all the perspectives there are and not opposing a certain one onto anywhom (animals as well, many forget all the other life there is) ...
when one has learned as many aspects there are, or able to be conceived, or even trying to conceive the seemingly unconceivable (weather how intense or even if you looked at these so called earthly aspects at all or not) that is being wise for me - if you actually learn these things for yourself and are not just trying to be wise or seem like that to others
isn't that what philosophy means? philia and sphoia as in the love of wisdom?
so i ask myself ... what does Slavoj mean when he says wisdom ...
His argument is strong but the basis on it depends on what he is defining "wisdom" as
@@rahe2141 he probably just meant it a certain way xD
He has the perfect pronunciation of "YOU KNOW" to snap you out of a daydream
His point only stands in a world without absolute truth. This is the dilema of chaos 🤷♂️