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Quote by Simon Critchley

“Any philosophical and theoretical assurance that laughter is unique to the human being becomes somewhat unsure when one turns to the anthropological literature.”

Quote by Simon Critchley

Author

Simon Critchley

Simon Critchley is a British philosopher known for his contributions to existentialism and ethics. His work covers a wide range of topics, including political philosophy, aesthetics, and moral philosophy. Critchley's research interests include the ideas of philosophers such as Heidegger, Nietzsche, and Foucault. more

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“We might even define the human as a dynamic process produced by a series of identifications and misidentifications with animality.”

Humans Might Process Series Identification

Book:On Humour

Source: On Humour

“When the animal becomes human, the effect is pleasingly benign and we laugh outloud, "Okay come clean now. This isn't really about hunting, is it?" But when the human becomes animal, the effect is disgusting, and if we laugh at all, then it is what Beckett calls the "mirthless laugh", which laughs at that which is unhappy.”

Ifs Humans Animal Laughing Effects Okay Clean Unhappy Hunting Disgusting Benign Beckett

Author:Simon Critchley

“I've always been very keen on Pascal, and what I'm most keen on in Pascal is his emphasis upon human wretchedness. He has a phrase which goes something like 'Anxiety, boredom and inconstancy, that is the human condition' and I've always been very partial to that.”

Humans Conditions Anxiety Phrases Boredom Human Condition Emphasis Wretchedness Pascal Inconstancy

Author:Simon Critchley

“Melancholia for Freud is the relationship that the subject takes up with respect to itself from the position of what he calls conscience or what he later calls the super-ego. And that can be lacerated - if you think of the anorexic who sees themselves from the perspective of the image they have, of the image they have of themselves in the mirror which is false - that would be the super-ego. Super-ego is what generates depression and it is what has to be dealt with in psychoanalysis.”

Ifs Thinking Would Be Subjects Position Perspective Ego Conscience Mirrors Psychoanalysis Anorexics

Author:Simon Critchley

“The thing about humour is that the super-ego is also at play, so what interested me, particularly in the last chapter which is key to the book -and no one seems to have picked this up in writings on Freud - is that, in the later Freud, the essence of humour is the ability to look at myself and find myself ridiculous. That makes me laugh.”

Writing Looks Book Play Seems Lasts Ability Laughing Humour Keys Ego Essence Ridiculous Chapters Make Me Laugh

Author:Simon Critchley

“Philosophy for me is essentially atheistic. Now that's an anxious atheism. It's an atheism that is anxious because it inhabits questions that were resolved religiously in the pre-modern period.”

Philosophy Atheism Modern Periods Anxious Atheistic

Author:Simon Critchley

“Christianity in the West, opens up a perspective of depth into what it means to be a self. And that depth of the self is something that is experienced in the sight of God. So that the great thinkers of self and subjectivity are Paul and Augustine. They look at the self from the perspective of God and they find themselves wretched and interesting. Constituted by conflictual desires.”

Looks Mean Self Desire Interesting Christianity Perspective Sight West Depth Thinker Wretched Subjectivity Augustine Great Thinkers

Author:Simon Critchley

“Genuinely great humour recognises the world it's describing and yet we are also called into question by it. That's what great art should do. That's what great philosophy should do. The one thing about humour is that this is an everyday practice that does this.”

World Should Doe Art Philosophy Practice One Thing Humour Everyday Great Art Describing Recognise Great Philosophy

Author:Simon Critchley

“Always start where the energy is.”

Author:John Cleese

“It is not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.”

World Reason Whole Destruction Philosophical Fingers Contrary Whole World

Author:David Hume