303 – “Everything we do belongs to a world that we have not created.”

–Thomas Nagel

Quote Number:  380

Source: Nagel, Thomas. “Moral Luck.” in Mortal Questions. By Thomas Nagel. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. 2012, Pg 38.

Source Notes: Context:
“The problem of moral luck cannot be understood without an account of the internal conception of agency and its special connection with the moral attitudes as opposed to other types of value. I do not have such an account. The degree to which the problem has a solution can be ‘determined only by seeing whether in some degree the incompatibility between this conception and the various ways in which we do not control what we do is only apparent. I have nothing to offer on that topic either. But it is not enough to say merely that our basic moral attitudes toward ourselves and others are determined by what is actual; for they are also threatened by the sources of that actuality, and by the external view of action which forces itself on us when we see how everything we do belongs to a world that we have not created.”

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