21 ideas
22026 | Philosophy is homesickness - the urge to be at home everywhere [Novalis] |
8594 | People have had good reasons for thinking that the circle has been squared [Shoemaker] |
5311 | If observation goes up a level, we expect the laws of the lower level to remain in force [Wilson,EO] |
8596 | Inability to measure equality doesn't make all lengths unequal [Shoemaker] |
8597 | We couldn't verify the earth's rotation if everyone simultaneously fell asleep [Shoemaker] |
5312 | A child first sees objects as distinct, and later as members of groups [Wilson,EO] |
5309 | Beliefs are really enabling mechanisms for survival [Wilson,EO] |
8593 | Maybe billions of changeless years have elapsed since my last meal [Shoemaker] |
19591 | Desire for perfection is an illness, if it turns against what is imperfect [Novalis] |
5310 | Philosophers study the consequences of ethics instead of its origins [Wilson,EO] |
5313 | The rules of human decision-making converge and overlap in a 'human nature' [Wilson,EO] |
5316 | We undermine altruism by rewarding it, but we reward it to encourage it [Wilson,EO] |
5318 | Pure hard-core altruism based on kin selection is the enemy of civilisation [Wilson,EO] |
5317 | The actor is most convincing who believes that his performance is real [Wilson,EO] |
5308 | The only human purpose is that created by our genetic history [Wilson,EO] |
8598 | If things turn red for an hour and then explode, we wouldn't say the redness was the cause [Shoemaker] |
4226 | If three regions 'freeze' every three, four and five years, after sixty years everything stops for a year [Shoemaker, by Lowe] |
8595 | If three regions freeze every 3rd, 4th and 5th year, they all freeze together every 60 years [Shoemaker] |
5314 | Cultural evolution is Lamarckian and fast, biological evolution is Darwinian and slow [Wilson,EO] |
5315 | Over 99 percent of human evolution has been in the hunter-gatherer phase [Wilson,EO] |
5320 | It is estimated that mankind has produced 100,000 religions [Wilson,EO] |