Martha Nussbaum

The four dimensions in the 16-axis model where this thinker scores highest. People in this archetype tend to lean the same way.

• UIUniversalist Impulse

  9 / 10
• VAVital Affirmation

  8 / 10
• TRTrust in Reason

  8 / 10
• TETrust in Experience

  8 / 10

The six thinkers whose 16-dimensional positions sit closest to this one. Useful as next-reading suggestions.

• Kwame Anthony AppiahFORGE

  Cosmopolitanism: rooted, partial, but reaching across. Identity is invented but real in its effects.

• ErasmusCARTOGRAPHER

  Folly speaks truth. Reform within tradition. The dignity of conversation and learning.

• Hugo GrotiusCARTOGRAPHER

  Natural law and international right — peace built on shared reason.

• Samuel PufendorfCARTOGRAPHER

  Duty grounded in sociability — the moral entity over the natural body.

• CondorcetFORGE

  Sketch of human progress — optimism written in hiding from the guillotine.

• Harriet MartineauFORGE

  Illustrations of Political Economy — sociology as moral observation.

Concepts where Martha Nussbaum sits in the conversation. Each links to a primer.

• Virtue ethics
  Don't ask "what should I do?" Ask "what kind of person should I become?"
• Justice
  What do we owe each other, and what makes a distribution fair?
• Eudaimonia — the good life
  Aristotle's answer: not pleasure, not virtue alone, but the activity of a whole life lived well.

Side-by-side with other philosophers, dimension by dimension.

• Martha Nussbaum VS Bernard Williams

Short exercises in the same tradition as Martha Nussbaum's thought. Each takes 5–25 minutes.

• Premortem →

  Imagine the failure of your plan in vivid detail before you start.

• Steelmanning the opposite →

  Write the strongest possible version of the view you most reject.

• Switch sides →

  Argue both sides of a debate, alternating, until you no longer know which side you started on.