Seven Ways of Looking at Pointless Suffering Quotes

“When our friend falls victim to an unexpected stroke, when our community is struck by a terrible crime or natural disaster, when we’re diagnosed with some awful malady, it somehow shocks us. Doesn’t the fact of our being surprised prove that we live in obliviousness to our surrounding suffering?”
― Scott Samuelson, Seven Ways of Looking at Pointless Suffering: What Philosophy Can Tell Us about the Hardest Mystery of All

“What we think of as distinctively human—technology, art, religion, politics, philosophy—depends on a gap between how the world is and how we think it should be. If there were no gap, we’d never have developed tools: What improvement could they offer?”
― Scott Samuelson, Seven Ways of Looking at Pointless Suffering: What Philosophy Can Tell Us About the Hardest Mystery of All

“if our soul has trembled with happiness and sounded like a harp string just once, all eternity was needed to produce this one event.”
― Scott Samuelson, Seven Ways of Looking at Pointless Suffering: What Philosophy Can Tell Us About the Hardest Mystery of All

“Evils which are patiently endured when they seem inevitable, become intolerable when once the idea of escape from them is suggested.”
― Scott Samuelson, Seven Ways of Looking at Pointless Suffering: What Philosophy Can Tell Us About the Hardest Mystery of All