Almost nobody believes anymore that infants are insensate blobs. It seems both mad and evil to deny experience and feeling to a laughing, gurgling creature.
Paul BloomRead
I want to convince you that humans are, to some extent, natural born essentialists. What I mean by this is we don't just respond to things as we see them or feel them or hear them. Rather, our response is conditioned on our beliefs, about what they really are, what they came from, what they're made of, what their hidden nature is.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Humans interpret their experiences based on underlying beliefs about the nature of things.
In this quote, Paul Bloom suggests that human perception is not merely a reflexive response to stimuli; rather, it is deeply influenced by our underlying beliefs and concepts about the essence of the world around us. This essentialist perspective implies that our understanding and interactions with our environment are shaped by our assumptions regarding the true nature of things, which affects how we perceive and engage with them.
Themes
BeliefsPerceptionEssentialismNatureUnderstanding
In practice
Example use cases
During a philosophy lecture discussing the nature of human perception.
More from Paul Bloom
All quotes →Maybe one of the most heartening findings from the psychology of pleasure is there's more to looking good than your physical appearance. If you like somebody, they look better to you. This is why spouses in happy marriages tend to think that their husband or wife looks much better than anyone else thinks that they do.
Paul BloomRead
If you look within the United States, religion seems to make you a better person. Yet atheist societies do very well - better, in many ways, than devout ones.
Paul BloomRead
We benefit, intellectually and personally, from the interplay between different selves, from the balance between long-term contemplation and short-term impulse. We should be wary about tipping the scales too far. The community of selves shouldn't be a democracy, but it shouldn't be a dictatorship, either.
Paul BloomRead
Enjoying fiction requires a shift in selfhood. You give up your own identity and try on the identities of other people, adopting their perspectives so as to share their experiences. This allows us to enjoy fictional events that would shock and sadden us in real life.
Paul BloomRead
A sympathetic parent might see the spark of consciousness in a baby's large eyes and eagerly accept the popular claim that babies are wonderful learners, but it is hard to avoid the impression that they begin as ignorant as bread loaves.
Paul BloomRead
Similar quotes
Philosophy makes progress not by becoming more rigorous but by becoming more imaginative.
Richard RortyRead
Drink up, boys, drink up and don’t worry, if we finish this bottle we’ll go down and buy another one. Of course, it won’t be the same as the one we’ve got now, but it’ll still be better than nothing. Ah, what a shame they don’t make Los Suicidas mezcal anymore, what a shame that time pases, don’t you think? what a shame that we die, and get old, and everything good goes galloping away from us.
Roberto BolanoRead
As a small child, I felt in my heart two contradictory feelings, the horror of life and the ecstasy of life.
Charles BaudelaireRead
Islam is itself destiny and will not suffer destiny.
Muhammad IqbalRead
The missionaries go forth to Christianize the savages - as if the savages weren't dangerous enough already.
Edward AbbeyRead
A belief in feminism is a belief in personal freedom - the freedom to live a life free of fear of violence, to select a fulfilling career and be compensated fairly, to choose when to start a family, to marry whom you love. I want everyone, regardless of gender, to live a life free of restriction or fear, able to pursue their own personal brand of happiness and fulfillment.
Aisha TylerRead