Quotessence
Home / Authors / Thomas Nagel
Thomas Nagel

Thomas Nagel Quotes

Philosopher

Filter quotes by topic

AllIfsActionEthicsMoralPsychologyWorldConsciousnessUniverseBelieveBeliefMindObjectivesProblemTheoryViewsAccountsConsciousFormKnowsLife Is

Famous Thomas Nagel Quotes

“If a psychological Maxwell devises a general theory of mind, he may make it possible for a psychological Einstein to follow with a theory that the mental and the physical are really the same. But this could happen only at the end of a process which began with the recognition that the mental is something completely different from the physical world as we have come to know it through a certain highly successful form of detached objective understanding. Only if the uniqueness of the mental is recognized will concepts and theories be devised especially for the purpose of understanding it.”

IfsKnowsWorldMindMayDifferentEndsHappensFormPurposeCertainProcessUnderstandingSuccessfulTheoryConceptsObjectivesPsychologicalRecognitionUniquenessDetachedMaxwell
Book:The View From Nowhere
Create image

“Once we have taken the backward step to an abstract view of our whole system of beliefs, evidence, and justification, and seen that it works only, despite its pretensions, by taking the world largely for granted, we are not in a position to contrast all these appearances with an alternative reality. We cannot shed our ordinary responses, and if we could it would leave us with no means of conceiving a reality of any kind.”

IfsWorldKindMeanWholeRealityBeliefViewsStepsTakenPositionOrdinaryEvidenceResponseAppearanceDespiteGrantedAlternativesAbstractContrastJustificationShedPretensionConceiving
Author:Thomas Nagel
Create image