G. E. Moore Quotes on Knowledge
George Edward Moore was a British philosopher and, with Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein, a founding figure of the analytic tradition at Cambridge. This page collects quotes attributed to G. E. Moore on the topic of knowledge, drawn from across the philosopher's works.
Quotes
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“Here is one hand, and here is another.”
Proof of an External World," Proceedings of the British Academy 25 (1939). -
Attributed to G. E. Moore:
“A philosophical question, when fully understood, will be found to be already half answered.”
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Attributed to G. E. Moore:
“In ethics the difficulty has been to discover what we mean when we use the word good.”
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“Principia Ethica (1903; revised edition, Cambridge University Press, 1993).”
By far the most valuable things, which we know or can imagine, are certain states of consciousness, which may roughly be described as the pleasures of human intercourse and the enjoyment of beautiful objects. No one, probably, who has asked himself the question, has ever doubted that personal affection and the appreciation of what is beautiful in Art or Nature, are good in themselves; nor, if we c -
“The study of Ethics would, no doubt, be far more simple, and its results far more "systematic," if, for instance, pain were an evil of exactly the same magnitude as pleasure is a good; but we have no reason whatever to assume that the Universe is such that ethical truths must display this kind of symmetry ... .”
Principia Ethica (1903), ch. VI. -
“Principia Ethica (1903), ch. VI.”
The study of Ethics would, no doubt, be far more simple, and its results far more "systematic," if, for instance, pain were an evil of exactly the same magnitude as pleasure is a good; but we have no reason whatever to assume that the Universe is such that ethical truths must display this kind of symmetry ... . -
“It is raining but I do not believe that it is.”
One of the statements presenting what has become known as " Moore's paradox , from a famous lecture concerning logical inconsistency in 1942, as quoted in Reason in Theory and Practice (1969) by Roy Edgley, p. 71; in which he also stated "It is not raining, but I believe that it is." These sentences are not logically contradictory, and yet it seems that no one could make a true assertion by sincer -
“It is raining but I don't believe that it is. As quoted in Directives and Norms (1968) by Alf Ross, Brian Loar, p. 27.”
It is raining but I do not believe that it is. -
“It is raining but I don't believe that it is raining. As quoted in Foundations of Illocutionary Logic (1985) by John R. Searle and Daniel Vanderveken, p. 19.”
It is raining but I do not believe that it is.