“The worship of the golden calf of old (cf. Ex 32:15-34) has found a new and heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of an economy which is faceless and lacking any truly humane goal.” HumansFoundGoalEconomyWorshipGoldenDictatorshipLackingCultHeartlessCalvesFaceless Author:Pope Francis
“We have created new idols. The worship of the ancient golden calf (cf. Ex 32:1-35) has returned in a new and ruthless guise in the idolatry of money and the dictatorship of an impersonal economy lacking a truly human purpose. The worldwide crisis affecting finance and the economy lays bare their imbalances and, above all, their lack of real concern for human beings; man is reduced to one of his needs alone: consumption.” MenNeedsHumansRealPurposeHuman BeingsEconomyWorshipConcernCrisisLaysAncientGoldenFinanceIdolsDictatorshipConsumptionConsumerismLackingExesRuthlessIdolatryOverconsumptionGuiseImbalanceCfsCalves Author:Pope Francis
“Implicit in the activist conception of government is the assumption that you can take the good things in a complex system for granted, and just improve the things that are not so good. What is lacking in this conception is any sense that a society, an institution, or even a single human being, is an intricate system of fragile inter-relationships, whose complexities are little understood and easily destabilized.” HumansLittlesGovernmentHuman BeingsUnderstoodInstitutionsGood ThingsComplexesGrantedComplexityAssumptionActivistConceptionFragileLackingIntricateImplicitComplex Systems Book:Is Reality Optional?: And Other Essays Source: Is Reality Optional?: And Other Essays
“The bourgeois thinkers of the eighteenth century thus turned Aristotle's formula on its head: satisfactions which the Greek philosopher had identified with leisure were now transposed to the sphere of work, while tasks lacking in any financial reward were drained of all significance and left to the haphazard attentions of decadent dilettantes. It now seemed as impossible that one could be happy and unproductive as it had once seemed unlikely that one could work and be human.” HumansLeftAttentionImpossibleCenturyTasksRewardsFinancialPhilosopherSatisfactionGreekSignificanceFormulasThinkerSpheresLeisureLackingUnlikelyBourgeoisDrainedGreek PhilosopherUnproductiveHaphazardDilettantes Author:Alain de Botton