Best 5 quotes of William B. Irvine on MyQuotes

In a full-fledged case of desire, by way of contrast, a creature is able to form a mental representation of the thing it desires, compare the current state [sic] with the desired state, and initiate action to diminish these states. Only a creature with considerable brainpower will have these abilities.

Most of us are “living the dream” living, that is, the dream we once had for ourselves.

Negative visualization, in other words, teaches us to embrace whatever life we happen to be living and to extract every bit of delight we can from it. But it simultaneously teaches us to prepare ourselves for changes that will deprive us of the things that delight us. It teaches us, in other words, to enjoy what we have without clinging to it.

Suppose you woke up one morning to discover that you were the last person on earth. [...] In the situation described, you could satisfy many material desires that you can't satisfy in our actual world. You could have the car of your dreams. You could even have a showroom full of expensive cars. You could have the house of your dreams - or live in a palace. You could wear very expensive clothes. You could acquire not just a big diamond ring but the Hope Diamond itself. The interesting question is this: without people around, would you still want these things?

...we can do some historical research to see how our ancestors lived. We will quickly discover that we are living in what to them would have been a dream world that we tend to take for granted things that our ancestors had to live without...