“Do you think it's possible that things that seem to be discrete in three dimensions might all be part of the same bigger object in four dimensions? ...What if humanity- that collective noun we so often employ- really is, at a higher level, a singular noun? What it what we perceive in three dimensions as seven billion individual human beings are really all just aspects of one giant being?” IfsThinkingHumansSeemsMightHumanityThreeIndividualHuman BeingsLevelsFourObjectsHigherAspectLogicBiggerSevenBillionsCertaintyUncertaintyPerceiveGiantsReasoningDimensionsCollectivesWhat IfHigher LevelNounsOntologyDiscreteThree Dimensions Author:Robert J. Sawyer
“We think of the number "five" as applying to appropriate groups of any entities whatsoever - to five fishes, five children, five apples, five days... We are merely thinking of those relationships between those two groups which are entirely independent of the individual essences of any of the members of either group. This is a very remarkable feat of abstraction; and it must have taken ages for the human race to rise to it” ThinkingHumansChildrenTwoAgeIndividualNumbersRaceTakenFiveGroupsMembersLogicEssenceIndependentFishesCertaintyUncertaintyHuman RaceApplesReasoningAppropriateRemarkableEntityAbstractionFeatsOntology Author:Alfred North Whitehead
“A nervous excitability, a chronic exaltation of the passion, in which commingle the inferior life of the individual and its exterior manifestations, a state in which sentiment, idea, and will are confounded together, where for the lack of the powerful corrective of logic, the flights of imagination know no bounds, where life and human activity are deprived of a regulator, and move outside of material and concrete factors, by the sole interior force of the soul.” KnowsHumansIdeasSoulStatesTogetherMovingPassionIndividualForceImaginationPowerfulMaterialsActivityLogicBoundsJewFactorsFlightNervousManifestationSentimentsConcreteSoleInferiorsInteriorsDeprivedExteriorHuman ActivityExaltationRegulators Author:Kadmi Cohen
“To a person in love, the value of the individual is intuitively known. Love needs no logic for its mission. It roots in a bare wisdom that exists in senses more than mind, a wisdom that, in primitive form, evolved the mind which so often overlooks it.” NeedsMindPersonsFormValuesIndividualKnownRootsLogicMissionsSensesPrimitive Book:Autobiography of values Source: Autobiography of values
“You're people, in short, who must be stupid, insane, or evil to continue arguing in the face of indisputable facts and irrefutable logic that others must be forced into a state of helplessness and victimized by individual criminals or the state. Stupid, insane, or evil.” PeopleStatesFactsFacesEvilIndividualStupidLogicCriminalsArguingInsaneHelplessness Author:L. Neil Smith
“We're not all the same. A common liberal refrain is that differences between individuals are statistically more significant than those between cultural, ethnic, and racial groups. I don't see why the fact of inter-individual differences would nullify inter-group variance. That's liberal logic for you.” FactsIndividualDifferencesCommonGroupsLogicSignificantRefrainVarianceIndividual Differences Author:Ilana Mercer
“Recovering from suffering is not like recovering from a disease. Many people don’t come out healed; they come out different. They crash through the logic of individual utility and behave paradoxically. Instead of recoiling from the sorts of loving commitments that almost always involve suffering, they throw themselves more deeply into them. Even while experiencing the worst and most lacerating consequences, some people double down on vulnerability. They hurl themselves deeper and gratefully into their art, loved ones and commitments.” PeopleArtDifferentSufferingIndividualWorstDiseaseCommitmentConsequenceLogicDeeperBehaveVulnerabilityLoved OnesCrashUtilityHealedRecovering Book:The Road to Character Source: The Road to Character