Quotes
[E]rrors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.
David Hume, A treatise of human nature, Oxford, 1978
George Orwell once remarked that political thought, especially on the left, is a sort of masturbation fantasy in which the world of fact hardly matters. That’s true, unfortunately, and it’s part of the reason that our society lacks a genuine, responsible, serious left-wing movement.
Noam Chomsky and Carlos Peregrín Otero, Radical priorities, Edinburgh ; Oakland, CA, 1984, p. 200
Do we value ’life’ even if unconscious, or do we value life only as a vehicle for consciousness? Our attitude to the doctrine of the sanctity of life very much depends on our answer to this question.
Jonathan Glover, Causing death and saving lives, London, 1990, p. 45
El ambiente está lleno de intelectuales sin obra que en realidad son políticos sin votos: a tales seres no se les puede pedir un pensamiento que, por desmitificador, pueda alienarlos de las grandes mayorías. Se trata del tipo de animal político que puede ser marxista si es que hay un segmento de la opinión local para el cual el marxismo es la “buena doctrina”, pero que jamás podría lanzarse a la aventura del pensamiento a que se entregó Karl Marx, ni aspiraría a ello.
Carlos Escudé, Realismo periférico: fundamentos para la nueva política exterior argentina, Buenos Aires, 1992, p. 11
Nagel once claimed that it is psychologically impossible to believe the Reductionist View. Buddha claimed that, though it is very hard, it is possible. I find Buddha’s claim to be true. After reviewing my arguments, I find that, at the reflective or intellectual level, though it is very hard to believe the Reductionist View, this is possible. My remaining doubts or fears seem to me irrational. Since I can believe this view, I assume that others can do so too. We can believe the truth about ourselves.
Derek Parfit, Reasons and persons, Oxford, 1984, p. 280
El sistema mundial nació el 12 de octubre de 1492. Como es sabido, el parto fue doloroso, ya que involucró la subyugación de centenares de pueblos en cuatro continentes. Para millones de personas, su cristianización fue literalmente su crucifixión.
Mario Bunge, Tres mitos de nuestro tiempo: virtualidad, globalización, igualamiento, Santa Fe, 2001, p. 29
[À] l’instant qu’un peuple se donne des représentants, il n’est plus libre; il n’est plus.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Du contrat social, ou principes du droit politique, Amsterdam, 1772, p. 15
In 1878 [George Arnold, M. C. Escher’s father,] left Japan. He did not find it difficult to get work back in Holland. After some fruitful visits to colleagues at the Ministry of Transport, he applied for the post of District Engineer in Maastrich. After his stay in Japan, and as the result of an inheritance, his financial position had improved. So he started to look for a wife.
‘However, Catholic Maastrich was not suitable in this respect,’ he writes in his autobiography. ‘I did know some gifted and attractive women and girls in the Protestant circle but these by no means fitted the equation w = 1/2m + 10, in which ‘w’ is the right age for a girl and ’m’ represents the man’s age.
F. H. Bool, Escher: The Complete Graphic Work, London, 1982, p. 10
Cuando era todavía profesor en la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras de la Universidad de Buenos Aires, una mañana irrumpió un muchacho en su aula y lo interpeló:-Profesor, tiene que interrumpir la clase.
-¿Por qué? -interrumpió Borges.
-Porque una asamblea estudiantil ha decidido que no se dicten más clases hoy para rendir homenaje al Che Guevara.
-Ríndanle homenaje después de clase -agregó Borges.
-No. Tiene que ser ahora y usted se va.
-Yo no me voy, y si usted es tan guapo, venga a sacarme del escritorio.
-Vamos a cortar la luz -prosiguió el otro.
-Yo he tomado la precaución de ser ciego. Corte la luz, nomás.
Borges se quedó, habló a oscuras, fue el único profesor que dictó su clase hasta el final y sus alumnos, impresionados, no se movieron del aula.
Jorge Luis Borges and María Esther Vásquez, Borges, sus días y su tiempo [reportaje por], Barcelona, 1984, pp. 33-34
Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.
Bertrand Russell, The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell 1872-1914, London, 1967, p. 13
Curiously, peace-time appeals for individuals to make small sacrifice in the rate at which they increase their standard of living seem to be less effective than war-time appeals for individuals to lay down their lives.
Richard Dawkins, The selfish gene, Oxford, 2009, p. 9
I wish to propose for the reader’s favourable consideration a doctrine which may, I fear, appear wildly paradoxical and subversive. The doctrine in question is this: that it is undesirable to believe a proposition when there is no ground whatever for supposing it true.
Bertrand Russell, Sceptical essays, London ; New York, 1928
[T]he dictates of utility are neither more nor less than the dictates of the most extensive and enlightened (that is well-advised) benevolence.
Jeremy Bentham, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, London, 1789, p. 10
In some intellectual circles, it is considered naive or foolish to be guided by moral principles. About this form of idiocy, I will have nothing to say.
Noam Chomsky, Language and politics, Oakland, 2004, pp. 369-372
A valid utopianism is distinguished from an invalid one by the fact that the former allows an evaluative assessment of real social phenomena.
Carlos Santiago Nino, The constitution of deliberative democracy, New Haven, 1996, p. 10
Thus we have, I think, a rather complete refutation of those strange people who think life is nice. In the first place, life is clearly not nice for that substantial proportion of mankind (soon to be a majority) who must live from day to day from hand to mouth for ever on the verge or over the verge of starvation. Ask some of the thousands who starve each day how much they enjoy the beautiful birds and flowers and trees. Ask them their opinion of God’s love and His tender mercy. Or if perchance you don’t believe in God, then ask them their opinion of the love and tender mercy of their fellow human beings, the rich gods across the sea who couldn’t care less about their sufferings -at any rate not enough to go out of their way to help them. Ask them those questions. They count too.
Louis Pascal, Judgement day, in Peter Singer (ed.) Applied ethics, Oxford, 1986, pp. 105–123, pp. 113-114
Penalties against possession of a drug should not be more damaging to an individual than the use of the drug itself.
Jimmy Carter, quoted in Alexander T. Shulgin and Ann Shulgin, Pihkal: a chemical love story, Berkeley, 1991, p. 452
Under English law, not to speak of other systems, the sort of commodity called justice, is not only sold, but, being like gunpowder and spirits made of different degrees of strength, is sold at different prices, suited to the pockets of so many different classes of customers.
Jeremy Bentham, The works of Jeremy Bentham, Edinburgh, 1838, p. 134
Experimental psychology raises, in an especially acute form, a central contradiction of much animal experimentation. For if the monkeys Harlow used do not crave affection like human infants, and if they do not experience loneliness, terror and despair like human infants, what is the point of the experiments? But if the monkeys do crave affection, and do feel loneliness, terror and despair in the way that humans do, how can the experiments possibly justified?
Lori Gruen and Peter Singer, Animal liberation: a graphic guide, London, England, 1987, p. 81
Comme on voit aussi que presque jamais il n’est arrivé qu’aucun de leurs sectateurs les ait surpassés; et je m’assure que les plus passionnés de ceux qui suivent maintenant Aristote se croiraient hereux s’ils avaient autant de connaissance de la nature qu’il en a eu, encore même que ce fût à condition qu’ils n’en auraient jamais davantage. Ils sont comme la lierre, qui ne tend point à monter plus haut que les arbres qui le soutiennent, et même souvent qui redescend après qu’il est parvenu jusqu’à leur faît.
René Descartes, A discourse on the method of correctly conducting one’s reason and seeking truth in the sciences, Oxford, 2006, p. 6