I Think It Would Be A Great

Other Animals Can Make Sounds, And Sounds Can Indicate Pleasure And Pain. But Language, A Distinctly Human Capacity, Isn´t Just For Registering Pleasure And Pain. It´s About Declaring What Is Just And What Is Unjust, And Distinguishing Right From Wrong. We Don´t Grasp These Things Silently, And Then Put Words To Them; Language Is The Medium Through Which We Discern And Deliberate About The Good.

They Say The State Should Not Impose On Its Citizens A Preferred Way Of Life, But Should Leave Them As Free As Possible To Choose Their Own Values And Ends, Consistent With A Similar Liberty For Others.

There's No Necessary Connection Between Maximizing Social Utility Or Economic Wealth And Creating A Flourishing Democracy. The First Does Not Guarantee The Second. The Only Way To Create A Flourishing Democracy Is To Find Ways To Reason Together About The Big Questions, Including Hard Questions About Justice And The Common Good, To Reason Together About These Questions So That We As Citizens Can Decide How To Shape The Forces That Govern Our Lives.

It's True That To Speak Of An Ethic Of Giftedness, Which Is Very Much The Ethic That I Deploy In Raising Questions About Designer Children And Genetic Engineering - An Appreciation Of The Giftedness Of The Child Or The Giftedness Of Life Does Have Religious Resonance, Because A Great Many Religious Traditions Emphasize The Sense In Which The Good Things In Life Are Not All Our Own Doing; They Are Gifts From God.

The Most Fateful Change That Unfolded During The Past Three Decades Was Not An Increase In Greed. It Was The Expansion Of Markets, And Of Market Values, Into Spheres Of Life Where They Don’t Belong.