Robert Nozick
Robert Nozick
Robert Nozickwas an American philosopher. He held the Joseph Pellegrino University Professorship at Harvard University, and was president of the American Philosophical Association. He is best known for his book Anarchy, State, and Utopia, a libertarian answer to John Rawls' A Theory of Justice. His other work involved decision theory and epistemology...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth16 November 1938
CountryUnited States of America
connection cosmology excited pleased theory
That connection between evolutionary cosmology and the theory of objectivity that I was formulating pleased and excited me a lot.
benefit benefits entity good individual people sacrifice social uses using
There is no social entity with a good that undergoes some sacrifice for its own good. There are only individual people, different individual people, with their own individual lives. Using one of these people for the benefit of others, uses him and benefits the others. Nothing more.
liberty taxation politics
Taxation of earnings from labor is on a par with forced labor. Seizing the results of someone's labor is equivalent to seizing hours from him and directing him to carry on various activities.
strong rights what-if
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?
liberty earning taxation
Taxation of earnings from labor is on a par with forced labor.
rights enforcement justified
Our main conclusions about the state are that a minimal state, limited, to the narrow functions of protection against force, theft, fraud, enforcement of contracts, and so on, is justified, but any more extensive state will violate persons' rights not to be forced to do certain things, and is unjustified; and that the minimal state is inspiring as well as right.
satisfied ifs dissatisfied
You can't satisfy everybody; especially if there are those who will be dissatisfied unless not everybody is satisfied.
trying might opponents
Instead of trying to prove your opponent wrong, try to see in what sense he might be right.
adults socialist capitalist
The socialist society would have to forbid capitalist acts between consenting adults.
imagination philosopher surprise
The scientists often have more unfettered imaginations than current philosophers do. Relativity theory came as a complete surprise to philosophers, and so did quantum mechanics, and so did other things.
struggle winning ifs-and
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.
justified states
No state more extensive than the minimal state can be justified.
wise sensitive-person people
Is there really someone who, searching for a group of wise and sensitive persons to regulate him for his own good, would choose that group of people that constitute the membership of both houses of Congress?
knowing perspective fundamentals
Wisdom is not just knowing fundamental truths, if these are unconnected with the guidance of life or with a perspective on its meaning. If the deep truths physicists describe about the origin and functioning of the universe have little practical import and do not change our picture of the meaning of the universe and our place within it, then knowing them would not count as wisdom.