Sublime

We think that human beings, at least in ethical theory, all have equal rights, and that justice involves equality; Aristotle thinks that justice involves, not equality, but right proportion, which is only sometimes equality

Though an atheist, Ayer rejected the idea that one could even talk about atheism with meaning, because it was just as nonsensical to say “There is no God” as it was to say “God exists,” as neither statement could ever be verified.

There was no purpose in the universe; there were only atoms governed by mechanical laws. He disbelieved in popular religion* and he argued against the nous of Anaxagoras. In ethics he considered cheerfulness the goal of life, and regarded moderation and culture as the best means to it. He disliked everything violent and passionate; he disapproved o

Leibniz, in his private thinking, is the best example of a philosopher who uses logic as a key to metaphysics. This type of philosophy begins with Parmenides, and is carried further in Plato’s use of the theory of ideas to prove various extra-logical propositions. Spinoza belongs to the same type, and so does Hegel. But none of these is so clear cu

He maintained that material objects only exist through being perceived. To the objection that, in that case, a tree, for instance, would cease to exist if no one was looking at it, he replied that God always perceives everything; if there were no God, what we take to be material objects would have a jerky life, suddenly leaping into being when we l

The relation of ethics to politics raises another ethical question of considerable importance. Granted that the good at which right action should aim is the good of the whole community, or, ultimately, of the whole human race, is this social good a sum of goods enjoyed by individuals, or is it something belonging essentially to the whole, not to th