Moral claims aren't, as a class, truth-value apt or not. Catherine Wilson More Quotes by Catherine Wilson More Quotes From Catherine Wilson If you live in an acquisitive society you are likely to be acquisitive, but it isn't deeply rooted in human nature, except in the sense that it's deeply rooted to be psychologically receptive to your peers and to advertising. Catherine Wilson advertising peers human-nature People's wants are not fixed; they generally want what others in their chosen comparison class appear to be enjoying and what advertising presents to them as attainable for them and as bringing happiness. Catherine Wilson want class people Highly unequal societies are morally defective because they get to be that way through the exploitation by the clever and well-positioned ones of the vulnerabilities and weaknesses of others. The well-off then use their acquired political power to refuse to make sacrifices for others. This system brings us a wonderful range of products and experiences for consumers at the top of the privilege scale, but it also degrades and benumbs the workers at the lower end, as Adam Smith and Marx both said. Catherine Wilson sacrifice political clever There's nothing a priori good about equality. One person has three televisions, the other has two, so what? Catherine Wilson three two television Atomism had no absolute 'above' and 'below' and no such rulers, so favoured the undersranding of justice as an agreement amongst equals. Catherine Wilson above-and-below agreement justice In the old systems, hierarchies emanate power from above to below through forms of line management and are ideologically supported by cosmologies and theologies featuring celestial rulers and their deputies - the 'rule of the best.' Catherine Wilson hierarchy lines management 'Contract' succeeded 'status' as the basic organising principle in modern political vs. ancient society. Catherine Wilson ancient political principles Some critics thought the ontology and theory of qualities absurd. No one had ever seen these little atoms, and furthermore, how could their mere arrangement produce a noisy, colourful, world in which day followed night and animals generated their own kind? Instead of a world created, cared, for and supervised by supernatural persons, the Epicureans appeared to the theologians to be assigning everything to chance. The latter were appalled by Lucretius's view of religion as cruel and oppressive and by the Epicurean insistence that death is the end of all experience. Catherine Wilson views animal night Even if the gods did exist, the Epicureans argued, they didn't care about us. Rather, everything comes from nature, and all that really exists are atoms and void, moving and congregating. Catherine Wilson atoms care moving The Epicureans denied that the gods had created the world and also denied that they played any role in it. Catherine Wilson epicurean roles world About 70% of what I've written about is centered on the clashes and conformities between the emerging life and physical sciences and older metaphysical frameworks in the 17th and 18th centuries. The other 30% consists of one-off essays or researches into other intriguing contemporary topics such as visual experience, aesthetics, social justice issues, and the epistemology of moral knowledge. Catherine Wilson issues research justice Oddly, since by now I've written quite a lot on early modern philosophers, I didn't care for the history of philosophy, which I thought dull and obscure, until I got a minor job writing articles for a children's encyclopedia in the history of science and began to make connections between science and philosophy. Catherine Wilson jobs philosophy children I had the idea that there were secret laws of the universe that could explain the baffling human reality around me, and that philosophers maybe had the key to them. Catherine Wilson keys law reality In the academic setting, you take (typically) lonely, interesting middle-aged men and beautiful, intelligent young women, and everybody's motivations for display and conquest are engaged to the max. Sublimated, this can be a powerful force for the good - Plato had a lot to say about that - but acted upon it can bring evils without end. Catherine Wilson motivation lonely beautiful Claims like 'Slavery is wrong' are not fully common-sensical, so they must be at least partly theoretical. Catherine Wilson slavery claims common Outside of mathematics and logic, there are common sense truths, such as that it is snowing that normal observers, in a specified context can agree on, subject to vagueness considerations, and theoretical truths, such as that snow is crystallised water vapour, and maybe in-between truths. Catherine Wilson common-sense snow water I think we do have a better understanding now of how moral thought and discourse function. Catherine Wilson moral understanding thinking The (atomic) soul is mortal, and the best life is the one with the least pain and the most pleasure. Catherine Wilson pain soul life-is For seventeenth-century astronomers, the Epicurean doctrine of multiple worlds separated by void space was seen to fit with the new Copernican system in which every star was a sun, and the universe was a vast place with no centre. Catherine Wilson doctrine space stars For the chemists, who wanted to manufacture new medicines and elixirs and transform base substances into noble ones, the notion that there was no metaphysical barrier to doing so - it was just a matter of getting the particles into new arrangements - was encouraging. That was the Baconian programme. Catherine Wilson medicine noble substance
