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David Shatz Quotes

Total quotes: 8
“I didn't come to religion, I merely managed to hold on to it in conducive circumstances.”
— David Shatz, God and the Philosophers
Tagged: Why we believe what we believe, Philosophy, Religion
“That nobody is really a skeptic -- even while philosophizing -- becomes clear if you watch what we philosophers do, not what we say.”
— David Shatz, The Overexamined Life Is Not Worth Living
Tagged: Why we believe what we believe, Philosophy, Religion
“When a philosopher publishes an article called 'Why There Are No People' (an actual title!), he invites a joke: Whom does he think he's writing for? Whom will he blame if he gets turned down for tenure?”
— David Shatz, The Overexamined Life Is Not Worth Living
Tagged: Why we believe what we believe, Philosophy, Religion
“Only a mad person would want to conduct their life with complete, Spock-like logicality. We are possessed not of minds alone, but of hearts, emotions, needs, instincts, and habits; and we inhabit social contexts.”
— David Shatz, The Overexamined Life Is Not Worth Living
Tagged: Why we believe what we believe
“If you saw somebody trying to resolve a spat with a spouse by putting pen to paper and setting up numbered premises, you'd find it a crazy way to settle things, and maybe would also brand it as a tactic for fleeing the real issues. Only in philosophy does this sort of exactitude win an imprimatur; elsewhere, we find it stultifying, obsessive, and immature.”
— David Shatz, The Overexamined Life Is Not Worth Living
Tagged: Why we believe what we believe, Philosophy, Religion
“If he'd dropped his lifelong belief just because someone came up with an objection, it's not just that you'd be surprised, to a certain degree you'd think Quine was irrational. We all begin our inquiries somewhere, with a large complex of presuppositions and convictions. We should all be open to change, but all change is gradual.”
— David Shatz, The Overexamined Life Is Not Worth Living
Tagged: Why we believe what we believe, Philosophy, Religion
“In the sphere of religion, proofs for the existence of God don't always sway people into belief (the ontological argument of Anselm is notorious for not converting those who think it is sound); intellectual solutions to the problem of evil, however formidable, often fail to soothe the gut-level feeling that a perfect God would not allow evil; and, by the same token, objections to a theistic position don't always translate into the abandonment of belief, because other forces shape us.”
— David Shatz, The Overexamined Life Is Not Worth Living
Tagged: Why we believe what we believe, Philosophy, Religion
“An assumption that lies behind the questions we religious philosophers get asked is that philosophers internalize the conclusions that their intellects draw -- and live by them. David Hume taught us otherwise. Hume was fascinated by the divorce between philosophy and practical life. In my study, he said, I have come to appreciate that I lack adequate grounds for all sorts of things I take for granted in my life-- the regularity of nature, the reality of the physical world; yet when I exit, those intellectual imfirmities have not the slightest influence on my belief system.”
— David Shatz, The Overexamined Life Is Not Worth Living
Tagged: Why we believe what we believe, Philosophy, Religion
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