Philosophy is the childhood of the intellect, and a culture that tries to skip it will never grow up.
Thomas NagelRead
To look for a single general theory of how to decide the right thing to do is like looking for a single theory of how to decide what to believe.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes the complexity of decision-making and belief formation, suggesting there isn't a one-size-fits-all approach.
Thomas Nagel's quote reflects on the multifaceted nature of ethics and epistemology, indicating that just as we cannot condense belief systems into a single framework, we also cannot simplify moral decision-making into a singular theory. The statement implies that both belief and ethical conduct are inherently complex and influenced by numerous factors, which require individual consideration rather than a universal rule.
Themes
Decision MakingBeliefEthicsTheoryComplexity
In practice
Example use cases
In a philosophical debate on ethics, this quote could illustrate the nuance of moral consideration.
More from Thomas Nagel
All quotes βIt is prima facie highly implausible that life as we know it is the result of a sequence of physical accidents together with the mechanism of natural selection. We are supposed to abandon this naΓ―ve response, not in favor of a fully worked out physical/chemical explanation but in favor of an alternative that is really a schema for explanation, supported by some examples. What is lacking, to my knowledge, is a credible argument that the story has a nonnegligible probability of being true.
Thomas NagelRead
There is a tendency to seek an objective account of everything before admitting its reality.
Thomas NagelRead
Altruism itself depends on a recognition of the reality of other persons, and on the equivalent capacity to regard oneself as merely one individual among many.
Thomas NagelRead
Once we see an aspect of what we or someone else does as something that happens, we lose our grip on the idea that it has been done and that we can judge the doer and not just the happening.
Thomas NagelRead
The external view [of agency] forces itself on us at the same time that we resist it. One way this occurs is through the gradual erosion of what we do by the subtraction of what happens.
Thomas NagelRead
Similar quotes
There was a time when she had indulged in the hypothetical for hours a day, plotting the map that had led her here. But no life is a line, and hers was an uneven orbit around a dark star, a moth circling a dead bulb, searching for the light it once held.
Anthony MarraRead
Confidence cannot find a place wherein to rest in safety.
VirgilRead
Sir, I admit your general rule, That every poet is a fool, But you yourself may serve to show it, That every fool is not a poet.
Samuel Taylor ColeridgeRead
The feelings of my smallness and my nothingness always kept me good company.
Pope John XxiiiRead
He no longer dreamed of storms, nor of women, nor of great occurrences, nor of great fish, nor fights, nor contests of strength, nor of his wife. He only dreamed of places now and the lions on the beach. They played like young cats in the dusk and he loved them as he loved the boy. He never dreamed about the boy. He simply woke, looked out the open door at the moon and unrolled his trousers and put them on.
Ernest HemingwayRead
Why can't these American women stay in their own country? They are always telling us that it is the paradise for women. It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively anxious to get out of it.
Oscar WildeRead