“In spite of ferocious differences of opinion about other moral issues, there seems to be something approaching consensus that it is cruel and malicious to interfere with the life-enhancing illusions of others —unless those illusions are themselves the cause of of even greater ills. The disagreements come over what these greater ills might be- and this has led to the break down of the whole rationale. Keeping secrets from people for their own good can often be wise, but it takes only one person to give away a secret, and since there are disagreements about which cases warrant discretion, the result is an unsavory miasma of hypocrisy, lies, and frantic but fruitless attempts at distraction.”

Breaking the Spell (2006)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "In spite of ferocious differences of opinion about other moral issues, there seems to be something approaching consensu…" by Daniel Dennett?
Daniel Dennett photo
Daniel Dennett 86
American philosopher 1942

Related quotes

François de La Rochefoucauld photo

“All of us are responding to the fact there is no system that can keep any promises. Everybody is fighting each other under the illusion that it is the "other people" that are causing the problem.”

Charles A. Reich (1928–2019) American lawyer

The Liberals' Mistake (1987)
Context: All of us are responding to the fact there is no system that can keep any promises. Everybody is fighting each other under the illusion that it is the "other people" that are causing the problem. We don't realize that we are all in the same boat. We are all suffering from the absence of a system that can pull us together and assure us that the results of each person's work will come back to him and enhance his life in some way.
Neither Democrats nor Republicans today offer any vision of how we can overcome our present difficulties and build a more satisfying life. Both offer merely palliatives and, at best, a holding pattern. We have to look beyond the politicians to see a different future.

Paulo Coelho photo
Ben Carson photo

“Disagreement is part of being a person who has choices. One of those choices is to respect others and engage in intelligent conversation about differences of opinion without becoming enemies, eventually allowing us to move forward to compromise.”

Ben Carson (1951) 17th and current United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development; American neurosurgeon

Source: One Nation: What We Can All Do to Save America's Future

Seneca the Younger photo
Salvador Dalí photo
Ursula K. Le Guin photo
Anne Bradstreet photo

“The principal might yield a greater sum,
Yet handled ill, amounts but to this crumb;”

Anne Bradstreet (1612–1672) Anglo-American poet

To Her Father with Some Verses.

Kenneth Arrow photo
Aldo Capitini photo

Related topics