Quote

Too often, complaint is not about principled objection on moral grounds, but opportunistic objection on grounds of self-interest. To rectify this, we need to work on mastering the art of complaint.

Julian Baggini

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Julian Baggini
Age: 56
Born: 1968
Born: September 9
Author
Philosopher
Writer
Work
Complaints
Opportunistic
Moral
Rectify
Interest
Mastering
Often
Principled
Art
Objection
Self
Complaint
Need
Objections
Needs
Grounds

More quotes by Julian Baggini

Image
Indeed, without emotion it seems unlikely we can even have morality.
Julian Baggini
Image
The capacity to make free choices is not something we either have entirely or not at all. Rather, choices become freer the more they are the result of our own capacity to reflect on and assess facts and arguments.
Julian Baggini
Image
The truly humble feel the ground beneath their feet every day and do not only become aware of it when held aloft or pushed down to their knees.
Julian Baggini
Image
If philosophy is to be a valuable part of life, we have to appreciate it for its own sake, and not just for what it's done for us lately.
Julian Baggini
Image
Traditional arguments for the existence of God and contemporary attempts to use fine-tuning and cosmology to back up the case for his existence always strike me as kinds of games, since hardly anyone believes on the basis of these arguments at all.
Julian Baggini
Image
No one has ever understood anything better by assuming that there is no reason for why it is the way it is.
Julian Baggini
Image
The idea that the mind can extend even beyond the body is an intriguing one, and is bound to become more pressing as we increasingly develop technologies that augment our natural abilities.
Julian Baggini
Image
The only good reason to embrace a philosophical position is that you are convinced it is true or at least makes sense of the world better than the alternatives.
Julian Baggini
Image
Happiness is not the same as life satisfaction, while neither are identical to what we might call flourishing.
Julian Baggini
Image
Yesterday's news feeds our fear that our neighbours are more likely than not to be bad eggs: benefit fraudsters, bogus asylum seekers, paedophiles or jihadist terrorists.
Julian Baggini
Image
I think that a lot of social movements, political movements, powerful ones - certainly they form, collectively, an idea of the truth which becomes hard to question. It becomes a dogma, and from the inside it starts to look like common sense.
Julian Baggini
Image
If we find it hard to believe that winning millions might not be so lucky after all, we just don't have a good enough imagination. If I fantasise about winning the lottery, it doesn't take long before all sorts of worrisome potential consequences occur to me.
Julian Baggini
Image
Constructive complaint requires only two things: that what you are complaining about should be different, and that it can be different. It sounds simple, but too often our protests fail this test.
Julian Baggini
Image
Any celebration meal to which guests are invited, be they family or friends, should be an occasion for generous hospitality.
Julian Baggini
Image
No genuine choice is ever simply a matter of the arbitrary exercise of will. Take your choice of lunch today. You can't decide to want anything, but what you want will at least in part be a result of a series of other choices and judgments you've made in your life to date.
Julian Baggini
Image
The reason to be an atheist is not that it makes us feel better or gives us a more rewarding life. The reason to be an atheist is simply that there is no God and we would prefer to live in full recognition of that, accepting the consequences, even if it makes us less happy.
Julian Baggini
Image
The reason Buddhism can be so naturalised is because, stripped of its supernatural elements, its core teachings can be giving a sound, secular philosophical interpretation. In other words, it becomes a religion acceptable to the contemporary, naturalistic mind only when it ceases to be a religion.
Julian Baggini
Image
Morality is more than possible without God, it is entirely independent of him.
Julian Baggini
Image
In my experience, those who make the biggest fuss about not spending much at Christmas are generally the ones who buy what they want and eat where they want 12 months a year.
Julian Baggini
Image
Being virtuous is wonderful thing, but feeling virtuous is a shortcut to vice.
Julian Baggini