Open-mindedness should not be fostered because, as Scripture teaches, Truth is great and will prevail, nor because, as Milton suggests, Truth will always win in a free and open encounter. It should be fostered for its own sake.

Freedom is the recognition of contingency.

At 12, I knew that the point of being human was to spend one's life fighting social injustice.

What counts as rational argumentation is as historically determined and as context-dependent, as what counts as good French.

If the body had been easier to understand, nobody would have thought that we had a mind.

My principal motive is the belief that we can still make admirable sense of our lives even if we cease to have... an ambition of transcendence.

Academic disciplines are subject to being overtaken by attacks of "knowingness"- a state of mind and soul that prevents shudders of awe and makes one immune to enthusiasm.