The Needs of Strangers: An Essay on Privacy, Solidarity, and the Politics of Being HumanWhat do we need in order to survive? Whose needs do we have a right to speak for? Which needs can be satisfied through political actions, and which cannot? To answer these vital questions, Michael Ignatieff returns to the ancient languages of religion, art, and tragedy—and to important texts by Shakespeare, St. Augustine, and the great writers of the Enlightenment. Drawing on these sources, he has written an incisive, moving interpretation of community and democracy in a work that not only examines the breakdown of human solidarity but shows how it might be re-created. The Needs of Strangers restores philosophy to its proper place as a guide to the art of being human. |
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Page 76
... death itself . They are like those condemned prisoners who in the very hour of their execution astonish their executioners by the avidity with which they wolf down their last meal.22 This indifference to mortality was the scandal of ...
... death itself . They are like those condemned prisoners who in the very hour of their execution astonish their executioners by the avidity with which they wolf down their last meal.22 This indifference to mortality was the scandal of ...
Page 91
... death , as reason says we must , such victories as we do achieve over death law and government , science and art - would never be attempted . It is the ' happy artifice of nature ' - the persuasiveness of our needs and desires that ...
... death , as reason says we must , such victories as we do achieve over death law and government , science and art - would never be attempted . It is the ' happy artifice of nature ' - the persuasiveness of our needs and desires that ...
Page 99
... death , the philosopher's self - command demands too much of the common run of men . Hume was fond of both these examples of his own argument . Months after Hume's death , Boswell took a woman of the streets up to some waste ground ...
... death , the philosopher's self - command demands too much of the common run of men . Hume was fond of both these examples of his own argument . Months after Hume's death , Boswell took a woman of the streets up to some waste ground ...
Contents
Tragedy and Utopia | 7 |
THE NATURAL AND THE SOCIAL | 25 |
BODY AND SPIRIT | 55 |
Copyright | |
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The Needs of Strangers: An Essay on Privacy, Solidarity, and the Politics of ... Michael Ignatieff No preview available - 1986 |
The Needs of Strangers: An Essay on Privacy, Solidarity, and the Politics of ... Michael Ignatieff No preview available - 1986 |
Common terms and phrases
Adam Smith amour de soi Augustine Augustinian available from Penguin basic need beggar belonging blind body books available Bosch's Boswell Cambridge capacity capitalist certainty choice choose Christian citizens civic claim commercial society common Cordelia critique daughters David Hume death desire Discourse on Inequality division of labour duty economic equality Essays father flesh fraternity freedom give happiness Haywain heath Hieronymus Bosch human nature human needs Hume Treatise Hume's hunger individuals inequality insisted J. G. A. Pocock justice King Lear Lear's liberty live London madness man's Marx means metaphysical Michael Ignatieff modern moral necessity needs of strangers never obligation Paradise Pascal passion Philosophy pity poor question reason reconcile Religion religious republic respect retinue rich Rousseau Saint satisfaction scarcity secular self-command Social Contract solidarity species spiral of need spiritual need Stoic things Thou Tom O'Bedlam tragedy utopia virtue vision welfare yearning