Robert Nozick quotes - page 2

Since I do not assume that there are such principles, I do not presume that the political realm will whither away. (Robert Nozick)
What persons may and may not do to one another limits what they may do through the apparatus of a state, or do to establish such an apparatus. View quote
Robert Nozick
Utopia is a framework for utopias, a place where people are at liberty to join together voluntarily to pursue and attempt to realize their own vision of the good life in the ideal community but where no one can impose his own utopian vision upon others. View quote
Robert Nozick
Through the evolutionary process, those who are able to engage in social cooperation of various sorts do better in survival and reproduction. View quote
Robert Nozick
I think philosophers can do things akin to theoretical scientists, in that, having read about empirical data, they too can think of what hypotheses and theories might account for that data. So there's a continuity between philosophy and science in that way. View quote
Robert Nozick
When I was 15 years old, or 16, I carried around on the streets of Brooklyn a paperback copy of Plato's Republic, front cover facing outward. I had read only some of it and understood less, but I was excited by it and knew it was something wonderful. View quote
Robert Nozick
Lacking much historical information and assuming (1) that victims of injustice generally do worse than they otherwise would and (2) that those from the least well-off group in the society have the highest probabilities of being the (descendants of) victims of the most serious injustice who are owed compensation by those who benefited from the injustices, ... then a rough rule of thumb for rectifying injustices might seem to be the following: organize society so as to maximize the position of whatever group ends up least well-off in the society. View quote
Robert Nozick
There is no justifiable prediction about how the hypothesis will hold up in the future; its degree of corroboration simply is a historical statement describing how severely the hypothesis has been tested in the past. View quote
Robert Nozick
Our starting point then, though nonpolitical, is by intention far from nonmoral. View quote
Robert Nozick
No one is entitled to a holding except by (repeated) applications of 1 and 2. View quote
Robert Nozick
None of these are permissible modes of transition from one situation to another. (Robert Nozick)
Our principles fix what our life stands for, our aims create the light our life is bathed in, and our rationality, both individual and coordinate, defines and symbolizes the distance we have come from mere animality. View quote
Robert Nozick
Is not the minimal state, the framework for utopia, an inspiring vision? View quote
Robert Nozick
The major public goals in my life are intellectual goals. There are various philosophical things that I want to work on and work out. View quote
Robert Nozick
The history of philosophy is actually full of people who argue for rather wild and incredible views, and their reputations are based on the skill of arguing for them. View quote
Robert Nozick
What hadn't been realized in the literature until now is that merely to describe how severely something has been tested in the past itself embodies inductive assumptions, even as a statement about the past. View quote
Robert Nozick
Examples one finds in the philosophical literature are somebody who's seen the trial of a child of theirs, where they're being proved guilty of some crime that would drive the parent into a depression, maybe a suicidal depression. View quote
Robert Nozick
I guess my tendency is to think essentially that the new wrinkles won't do the job if the old major idea didn't, and so you have to try something different. Then maybe they can all be combined in some coherent piece. View quote
Robert Nozick
It is, from another angle, an attack on requiring proof in philosophy. And it's also the case, I guess, that my temperament is to like interesting, new, bold ideas, and to try and generate them. View quote
Robert Nozick
Our principles fix what our life stands for, our aims create the light our life is bathed in, and our rationality, both individual and coordinate, defines and symbolizes the distance we have come from mere animality. It is by these means that our lives come to more than what they instrumentally yield. And by meaning more, our lives yield more. View quote
Robert Nozick
Individuals have rights and there are things no person or group may do to them (without violating their rights). So strong and far-reaching are these rights that they raise the question of what, if anything, the state and its officials may do. How much room do individual rights leave for the state? (Robert Nozick)
Some people steal from others, or defraud them, or enslave them, seizing their product and preventing them from living as they choose, or forcibly exclude others from competing in exchanges. None of these are permissible modes of transition from one situation to another. View quote
Robert Nozick
Some communities will be abandoned, others will struggle along, others will split, others will flourish, gain members, and be duplicated elsewhere. Each community must win and hold the voluntary adherence of its members. No pattern is imposed on everyone, and the result will be one pattern if and only if everyone voluntarily chooses to live in accordance with that pattern of community. View quote
Robert Nozick
In a free system any large, popular, revolutionary movement should be able to bring about its ends by such a voluntary process. As more and more people see how it works more and more will wish to participate in or support it. And so it will grow, without being necessary to force everyone or a majority or anyone into the pattern. View quote
Robert Nozick
Instead of trying to prove your opponent wrong, try to see in what sense he might be right. View quote
Robert Nozick