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Common sense doesn't have the last word in ethics or anywhere else, but it has, as J. L. Austin said about language, the first word: it should be examined before it is discarded.

— Thomas Nagel The View From Nowhere (1986)

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More quotes by Thomas Nagel

Leading a human life is a full-time occupation, to which everyone devotes decades of intense concern.

Mortal Questions (1979)

Philosophy is the childhood of the intellect, and a culture that tries to skip it will never grow up.

The View From Nowhere (1986)

Consciousness is what makes the mind–body problem really intractable.

What is it like to be a bat? (1974)

I should not really object to dying if it were not followed by death.

Mortal Questions (1979)

Everyone is entitled to commit murder in the imagination once in a while, not to mention lesser infractions.

Concealment and Exposure and Other Essays (1998)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Thomas Nagel (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.