In order to refute a conclusion, you have to put forth the best possible argument for it. Rebecca Goldstein More Quotes by Rebecca Goldstein More Quotes From Rebecca Goldstein I like that there are so many different ways of looking at the world and I like all of the particular narratives. In any case we will never all see the same way on these [religious] issues. It's the way liberals and conservatives will never see the same way on individuals whereas it’s different orientations and they go too deep down and when we're dealing with questions that can't be definitively answered by science that's where you're sort of... your orientation swells in to fill up the gaps and so we're never always going to agree. Rebecca Goldstein issuesdifferentreligious I was raised in an Orthodox Jewish household and I wouldn't say so much it's informed my views, but it's informed my interest, so I think as a child I was often very baffled by knowledge claims. Rebecca Goldstein viewschildrenthinking Philosophy addresses, in a systematic and progress-making way, questions of deep concern to everyone. Rebecca Goldstein systematicprogressphilosophy Everybody have equal rights to a life of full flourishing. Philosophy slowly, slowly has given us arguments saying, look, you already committed to your own life flourishing, and you're being inconsistent if you don't expand it. So philosophy often works in trying to show us that there's an inner incoherence in our points of view. We're all committed to one thing when it comes to us and our own kind, but we're not willing to expand it and we're guilty of inconsistency. Rebecca Goldstein rightsviewsphilosophy It's very important to remember that the philosophers were social dissidents. They were social critics. The man in the street or woman in the street did not particularly cherish what they said. Socrates was killed. Rebecca Goldstein philosopherimportantmen It's something that's very often said that philosophy, as opposed to science, never makes any progress. Rebecca Goldstein progresssaidphilosophy Are there experts, ethical experts, that's very offensive to all of us? Because it's part of our humanity to have a stake in these questions to feel that we ourselves know the difference between right and wrong. And then along come these experts, philosophers, claiming, you know, an expertise, a special training, a special skill, a special talent. Rebecca Goldstein differencesskillshumanity One of the interesting things about the ancient Greeks is that they really didn't have our conception of individual rights. They didn't have our conception of all lives matters. And it was really was true for them, that certain lives matter a lot more than others. It didn't dawn on them that all lives, although different, can be lives of equal mattering. And that is actually something a huge ethical lesson. Rebecca Goldstein greekrightsinteresting Philosophy is this amazing technique we've devised for getting reality to answer us back when we're getting it wrong. Science itself can't make those arguments. You actually have to rely on philosophy, on philosophy of science. Rebecca Goldstein techniquephilosophyreality So dogma, doctrine, unexamined assumptions, that's what it is to be sharing that, the hippies shadow, no way of grounding it to reality. It's where we're just cut off from reality unless we can argue, we can substantiate, we can justify, we can convince each other. Rebecca Goldstein cuttinghippiereality The essence of ethics is that, to the extent that any one of us matters, every single person matters in exactly the same way, those lives( the crash victims) mattered just as much as yours does. Rebecca Goldstein top-news
