L.A. Paul Quotes

#1. Philosophers, especially metaphysicians, explore features of reality and of our mental life that are different from those explored by scientists.

L.A. Paul

#2. Often the features metaphysicians are interested in, like causation, time, and essence, involve features that seem so basic or are so generally embedded in the way we experience the world that it takes special attention and focus to draw them out and develop an account of their nature.

L.A. Paul

#3. It's always better to be deep rather than shallow. And I'm deep.

L.A. Paul

#4. We should listen to both philosophers and scientists, because the philosophical contribution is different from the scientific contribution, and both of them are worthwhile.

L.A. Paul

#5. There are laws of nature - of course there are - even if they don't exist in some sort of bizarre Platonic Heaven.

L.A. Paul

#6. I reject what I see as flat-footed accounts of the fundamental structure of the world, where we somehow assume that, because ordinary experience involves middle-sized objects in space and time, that fundamental reality must be essentially like that.

L.A. Paul

#7. The distinctive contribution that metaphysics makes to our understanding of reality is first that it considers questions about features of reality that the sciences don't, such as the intrinsic nature of causation or the dynamic character of temporal experience.

L.A. Paul

#8. I think, in fact, that the connections between philosophy and cognitive science haven't gone far enough, metaphysicians should be working closely with cognitive scientists when they try to understand the sources of our experience of parts of the world such as its causal and temporal parts.

L.A. Paul

#9. I have quite a bit of sympathy for the idea that psychology and cognitive science have much to offer philosophy, and that the reverse is true as well.

L.A. Paul

#10. Living rationally and authentically does not mean that you map out your future by thinking carefully about what it would be like if you chose one path versus another path and then choosing on that basis.

L.A. Paul