Henry Sidgwick: Humanity

Henry Sidgwick was English philosopher. Explore interesting quotes on humanity.
Henry Sidgwick: 10 quotes0 likes

“I may begin by laying down as a principle that ‘all pain of human or rational beings is to be avoided’; and then afterwards may be led to enunciate the wider rule that ‘all pain is to be avoided’; it being made evident to me that the difference of rationality between two species of sentient beings is no ground for establishing a fundamental ethical distinction between their respective pains.”

Henry Sidgwick

"The Establishment of Ethical First Principles" (1879), in Essays on Ethics and Method (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2000), p. 30 https://books.google.it/books?id=Ci9x5WY3NesC&pg=PA30

“Now, I agree with Mill in holding that the scientific study of the structures and functions of the different governments that have actually existed in human societies cannot well be pursued in complete separation from the scientific study of other important elements of the societies in question : whether the aim of the student is to ascertain the causes of the differences in such governments or to examine their effects. But I do not think that there is any fundamental difference, in this respect, between the study of political relations and the study of economic relations, or, again, of religion, of art, of science and philosophy, as factors of social life. In each of these eases the student concentrates his attention on one element of human history which can only be partially separated from other components of the whole complex fact of social development. Experience seems to show that this kind of concentration, and consequent partial separation of historical and sociological study into special branches, is unavoidable in the division of intellectual labour which the growth of our knowledge renders necessary in a continually increasing degree.”

Henry Sidgwick

Elements of Politics (3rd ed., 1908), Ch. 1: Scope and Method of Politics

“A universal refusal to propagate the human species would be the greatest of conceivable crimes from a Utilitarian point of view.”

Henry Sidgwick book The Methods of Ethics

Source: The Methods of Ethics (1874), Book 4, chapter 5, section 3 (7th ed., 1907)