When1: 1974
When2: 1993
Who: Robert Nozick [Nozick, Robert]
What: philosopher
Where: USA
works\ Anarchy, State and Utopia [1974]; Philosophical Explanations [1981]; Examined Life [1989]; Nature of Rationality [1993]
Detail: He lived 1938 to ?.
Epistemology
Beliefs are knowledge if true and if non-belief does not somehow require original belief. However, people cannot judge either truth or what required non-belief is. People often choose something now, rather than wait for something equal or better in future {time preference}, because they discount future benefits as less probable.
Ethics
Morality is about mental processes and current actions, not about action results, reasons, or purposes.
Politics
People have rights, free exercise of rights leads to the most-productive society, and governments should be minimal to preserve liberties {libertarianism, Nozick}. If society has ideal income pattern and if good basketball player plays to gain the most, exercise his rights and freedom, and reach his ideal, income pattern will alter away from ideal {Wilt Chamberlain argument}. Therefore, liberty and equality can conflict. All ideals are possibly in conflict.
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Date Modified: 2022.0224