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Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people.

Admiral Hyman G. Rickover

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Are you wondering why this page heading is "expositions" instead of "ideas"? After all, I use Admiral Rickover's two other objects as page headings: people and events. At least two reasons come to mind. Here follows the more important one.

I firmly believe that no original thought, no unique idea, no epiphany, no words of wisdom can be attributed to my ruminations, conversations, and essays to date. This belief may never change, although one of Pascal's insights provides measured hope. So, while discussing "ideas" is generally preferable, "ideas" are hardly ever original (certainly mine are not). They are expositions. They merely "expose" thoughts and ideas of others. Maybe, as Plato's Meno suggests, we already know all the answers; life merely offers an opportunity to reacquaint ourselves with them.

My fountains page provides sources to more teachers whose thoughts influence and inspire my reflections and essays. Please offer your own thoughts as you get inspired. Thanks in advance.

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"Our ideas" are only partly our ideas. Most of our ideas are abbreviations or residues of the thought of other people, of our teachers (in the broadest sense of the term) and of our teachers' teachers; they are abbreviations and residues of the thought of the past.

Leo Strauss: "Political Philosophy and History"

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