“I am an atheist. I don't think there's anything divine. Beautiful, impressive, awe-inspiring - sure, but not divine.” Quote by Nomy Arpaly
“Sometimes I suspect that there are two prototypes of philosophers who write about humans - I call them "celestials" and "terrestrials", without implying that celestials have their heads in the clouds or that terrestrials have theirs buried in the ground. The difference between these two types is not so much in their theories but in whether or not they would find it a very sad thing if it turned out that the only way a human is superior to a wolf is this: the human brain is significantly more capacious and complex.” WritingSometimesBrainPhilosopherHuman BrainVery SadPrototype Author:Nomy Arpaly
“I would be ok if I found out for sure that if I am in any way superior to a wolf it is simply in virtue of my brain's higher capacity and complexity. A large difference - my cerebral equipment allows me to have such diverse concepts as "hope", "funky", "England", "multiplication", "three strikes" and "the categorical imperative" - but a difference in degree. Wolves, of course, are superior to me with regards to smelling, hearing, and running, and are generally superior to humans in that they don't kill each other.” RunningVirtueComplexityDiverseFunky Author:Nomy Arpaly
“The fact that only humans above a certain age can be morally virtuous, rather than babies or cats, means that that being moral requires some cognitive ability. If virtue is about desires, it is worth remembering that you can't desire some things without being able to conceive of them. Suppose a virtuous person will desire to make people happy and desire to tell the truth. You can't desire to make people happy without having the concept "happy" and you can't desire to be truthful if you don't have have the concept "lie", so a cat or a baby cannot desire these things.” PeopleMeanAgeRememberLyingDesireAbilityMoralVirtueBabyCatTelling The TruthTruthfulVirtuousBeing Truthful Author:Nomy Arpaly
“Moral virtues and intellectual virtues are very different from each other, and moral virtue has to do with motivation, not cognition. Moral virtue requires a human level of intelligence, but it doesn't require that one be an intelligent human.” DifferentMotivationMoralVirtueIntellectualIntelligent Author:Nomy Arpaly
“People of relatively low intelligence can be morally wonderful if they desire the right and the good (not necessarily under the description "right" or "good"). Their low intelligence sometimes results in their accidentally doing something wrong, but doing something wrong out of low intelligence alone is like stepping on a person's foot because you are (literally) blind or missing a cry for help because you are (literally) deaf. We do not judge the blind or deaf person as morally bad.” PeopleSometimesHelpingDesireWonderfulMissingCryJudgingBlindDeaf Author:Nomy Arpaly
“Virtue is about wanting right and good things, not about being particularly good at thinking.” ThinkingVirtueGood Things Author:Nomy Arpaly
“I am not committed in any way to the traditional concept of character - the concept of "character trait" as involving predictable behavior. I am committed to a view in the neighborhood - the view that the moral worth of one's actions depends on the quality of will expressed in them.” CharacterActionQualityMoralBehaviorCommittedNeighborhoodTraitsPredictableCharacter Trait Author:Nomy Arpaly
“Though we think intrinsic desires tend to be pretty stable, we do not think they imply anything like the amount of predictability in behavior that traditional virtue ethics requires for someone to have a one-word-in-English character trait such as "benevolence". Other things being equal, a person with more of a desire for other people's wellbeing will do more for other people's wellbeing, but things are almost never equal.” ThinkingCharacterDesireVirtueEqualBehaviorEthicsTraitsBenevolenceWellbeingPredictabilityBeing EqualCharacter Trait Author:Nomy Arpaly
“If I make a stupid decision but don't execute it because I'm, say, lazy, then I'm lucky, not rational. However, at other times a person acts for good reasons just as she does what she thinks she shouldn't do, not knowing that they are good reasons. Just like sometimes we are a lot less rational than we think we are, it is also true that sometimes we are a lot more rational than we think we are.” ThinkingSometimesReasonDecisionStupidLuckyRationalLazy Author:Nomy Arpaly
“Narrative nonfiction was not my forte. I always wanted to let my imagination run free, and the facts sometimes got in the way. At one point I wanted to illustrate Jack Prelutsky's enchanting poems. Unable to do that, I started devising and improvising my own poems, very raw at first. I immersed myself in verse, writing reams of stuff until it gelled.” WritingSometimesRunningImaginationVersesMy ImaginationEnchanting Author:Douglas Florian