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Simon Blackburn Biography

Simon Blackburn

Simon Blackburn FBA (born 12 July 1944) is an English academic philosopher known for his work in metaethics, where he defends quasi-realism, and in the philosophy of language; more recently, he has gained a large general audience from his efforts to popularise philosophy.

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Simon Blackburn Quotes

In Michigan recently a man won a lawsuit for substantial damages because, he claimed, a rear-end collision in his car had made him a homosexual.

Car, Collision, Homosexual, Men, Michigan, Won

The fantasist in whom the reality barrier has broken down is unreliable, believing things when he should not, and telling things as true when they are not.

Believe, Broken, Down, Reality, True

Nobody ever inferred from the multiple infirmities of Windows that Bill Gates was infinitely benevolent, omniscient, and able to fix everything.

Able, Bills, Fix, Inferred, Multiple, Window

An ethic gone wrong is an essential preliminary to the sweat shop or the concentration camp and the death march.

Camp, Essentials, Ethic, Gone, Sweat

A god that created the world and then walked off the site leaving it to its own devices is not a fit object of worship, nor a source of moral authority.

God, Leaving, Moral, Source, World

Respect, of course is a tricky term. I may respect your gardening by just letting you get on with it. Or, I may respect it by admiring it and regarding it as a superior way to garden.

Course, Garden, Gardening, May, Regarding, Way

It is sometimes said that one of the casualties of the general suspicion and mistrust that permeated the old Soviet Union was that the distinction between truth and other motivations to believe tended to break down. Upon hearing a purported piece of information, the reaction was not 'Is this true?' but 'Why is this person saying this? - What machinations or manipulations are going on here?' The question of truth did not, as it were, have the social space in which it could breath.

Believe, Down, Motivation, Old, Said, Space

The absolutist takes himself to speak to the ages, with the tongue of angels, but the relativist hears only one version among others, the subjectivity of the here and now.

Absolutism, Age, Among, Angel, Angels, Takes

Wittgenstein imagined that the philosopher was like a therapist whose task was to put problems finally to rest, and to cure us ofbeing bewitched by them. So we are told to stop, to shut off lines of inquiry, not to find things puzzling nor to seek explanations. This is intellectual suicide.

Bewitched, Cure, Intellectual, Philosophical, Shut, Suicide

Chance is as relentless as necessity.

Chance, Chances Are, Necessity, Relentless

This doctrine, that of the ghost in the machine, strictly separates the mind or soul from the body. And by doing so it takes the soul outside the sphere of mechanical or scientific explanation. It splits the world of the mind from the world of science. It is often supposed to protect our cherished free will.

Doctrine, Mechanical, Mind, Soul, Splits, Strictly

There may be rhetoric about the socially constructed nature of Western science, but wherever it matters, there is no alternative. There are no specifically Hindu or Taoist designs for mobile phones, faxes or televisions. There are no satellites based on feminist alternatives to quantum theory. Even that great public sceptic about the value of science, Prince Charles, never flies a helicopter burning homeopathically diluted petrol, that is, water with only a memory of benzine molecules, maintained by a schedule derived from reading tea leaves, and navigated by a crystal ball.

Faxes, Memories, Quantum, Reading, Tea Leaves, Wherever

If our best efforts come to nothing often enough, we need consolation, and thoughts of unfolding, infinite destiny, or karma , are sometimes consoling.

Best Effort, Destiny, Efforts, Enough, Infinite, Karma

The absolutist takes himself to read nature in her very own language, but the relativist insists that nature does not speak, and we hear only what we have elected to hear.

Absolutism, Doe, Language, Nature, Speak, Takes

The absolutist lays down the law, but the relativist hears only roaring and bawling. Or, when the relativist voice, as it is heard from philosophers such as Nietzsche or James, itself starts to grate and sounds shrill, as it often does, and when the relativist then offers concessions, the absolutist hears only insincerity. The war of words can often turn into a dialogue of the deaf, and this too if part of its power to arouse outrage and fury.

War, Law, Voice, Outrage, Lays, Part

Myself, I have never seen a bumper sticker saying " Hate if you Love Jesus ", but I sometimes wonder why not. It would be a good slogan for the religious Right.

Hate, Jesus, Religious, Right, Saying, Seen

People who have cut their teeth on philosophical problems of rationality, knowledge, perception, free will and other minds are well placed to think better about problems of evidence, decision making, responsibility and ethics that life throws up.

Cutting, Evidence, Life, Philosophical, Rationality, Responsibility

The absolutist trumpets his plain vision; the relativist sees only someone who is unaware of his own spectacles.

Absolutism, Absolutist, Relativist, Sees, Trumpets, Vision

The gods we make in our own image are tribal gods. They tell you how very, very little you should tolerate outsiders, who are less favoured of the Lord. Amazingly, there are no recorded cases of the holy man going up the mountain and finding that it's the others who are right. It always turns out that God wants unbelievers to suffer, and what could be more noble than to help him a little? When religion rules, toleration disappears, for you cannot cherish the verdict of death to the infidels, yet also tolerate those who disagree - for those are the very same infidels.

Disappears, Gods, Men, Mountain, Outsiders, Suffering

Contemporary culture is not very good on responsibility.

Contemporary, Culture, Good, Responsibility, Very Good

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