My ideal of conversation that includes wide representation of perspectives, informed by the consensus view of current experts, pursued with an attempt to find a position with which all can live, brings the expert and the public dimensions together.
Philip KitcherEthical inquiry has always been motivated by the aim of improving human conduct. It doesn't follow from that that the goal is to produce a complete rule book that would be applicable to all cases.
Philip KitcherThe balance between literature and philosophy in Schopenhauer and Nietzsche is different from that struck in the novella, but, as Mann clearly pointed out in his writings about both thinkers, both modes are present.
Philip KitcherI don't deny that scientific investigation is capable of delivering important truths about nature, but that doesn't stop questions about whether, as it is practiced, science today lives up to its potential for benefiting humanity.
Philip KitcherThere are actually two separate issues here. The first is whether (as ancient philosophers and Nietzsche assume) only the privileged elite can live a worthwhile life. The second is whether it's possible to fulfill the roles of both serious artist and upstanding citizen. It seems to me that philosophy can dissect both questions, by delineating clearly the anatomy of the good life and the structural conditions of the roles.
Philip KitcherThere's a disciplined erotic component to it, so that the height of sexual contact is the embrace, the modest touch, a relatively chaste kiss. An important passage from the surviving 1942 diary (one I quote in the book) relates this mode of sexual expression to his own life. Mann had returned to his diary for 1927 (one of those he burned) and to his parting from the young man, Klaus Heuser, whom the family had met on holiday and invited to Munich.
Philip Kitcher