Thinkers' quotes Flashcards
Hobbes
“Life in a state of nature would be solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short”.
“The condition of man… is a condition of war of everyone against everyone.”
“Government is necessary not because men are bad, but because they care more for individualistic needs than society.”
Oakeshott
“To be conservative is to prefer the familiar to the unknown, to prefer the tried to the untried.”
“Men sail on a boundless and bottomless sea and the job of the state is only to keep afloat, not reach a specific destination.”
“In a kitchen, cookbooks are only useful after the experience of preparing the meal.”
“Rather than brutish and short, our lives in states of nature would be noisy, foolish and flawed.”
Burke
“We love the little platoon to which we belong”.
“Your representatives owe you their judgement, not just their efforts. They should not sacrifice this to your opinion.”
“No state or society should be based on philosophical abstractions.”
“Society is but a contract between the dead, the living and those yet to be born.”
“The state without the means to change is without the means of its conservation.”
Rand
“The people fit to inherit wealth are those with the ability to make their fortune no matter where they started.”
“Money is the barometer of a society’s virtue.”
“If civilisation is to survive it is the morality of altruism we need to reject and the morality of rational self interest we need to accept.”
Nozick
“Victimless crimes such as drug taking should be decriminalised. It is the individual’s responsibility, not the states to legislate against them doing it.”
“Even the most enterprising individuals are still freedom loving pack animals.”
“Taxation is legalised theft.”
Thatcher
“There is no such thing as society, only families and individuals.”
David Cameron
“I don’t support gay marriage in spite of being a conservative. I support gay marriage because I am a conservative.”
