Michael Schur

From the creator of The Good Place and the cocreator of Parks and Recreation, a hilarious, thought-provoking guide to living an ethical life, drawing on 2,500 years of deep thinking from around the world. Most people think of themselves as “good,” but it’s not always easy to determine what’s “good” or “bad”—especially in a world filled with complicated choices and pitfalls and booby traps and bad advice. Fortunately, many smart philosophers have been pondering this conundrum for millennia and they have guidance for us. With bright wit and deep insight, How to Be Perfect explains concepts like deontology, utilitarianism, existentialism, ubuntu, and more so we can sound cool at parties and become better people. Schur starts off with easy ethical questions like “Should I punch my friend in the face for no reason?” (No.) and works his way up to the most complex moral issues we all face. Such as: Can I still enjoy great art if it was created by terrible people? How much money should I give to charity? Why bother being good at all when there are no consequences for being bad? And much more. By the time the book is done, we’ll know exactly how to act in every conceivable situation, so as to produce a verifiably maximal amount of moral good. We will be perfect, and all our friends will be jealous. OK, not quite. Instead, we’ll gain fresh, funny, inspiring wisdom on the toughest issues we face every day.

The Correct Answer to Every Moral Question

How to Be Perfect

Aristotle describes virtues as a balance, e.g. too much generosity can be portrayed similarly to too little

Tate Kwiecinski

People with a deficiency of anger are those who are not angered by the right things, or in the right way, or at the right times, or towards the right people.... Such a person seems to be insensible and to feel no pain. Since he is not angered, he does not seem to be the sort to defend himself; and such willingness to accept insults to oneself and to overlook insults to one's family and friends is slavish.

I rinse my mouth with mouthwash for thirty full seconds, because that's what it says to do on the label. I drive with my hands at "ten and two" on the wheel, because that's what my driving instructor told me to do. I've always seen this behavior as virtuous and written off annoyed reactions to it as unfounded-but after I read Aristotle I understood how an excess of dutifulness can negatively impact the people around me: I am constantly killing everyone's buzz.

The more we try to learn and understand the lives being led by other people-the more we search for a golden mean of empathy-the less we will find it permissible to treat them with cruelty.

Kant holds humans in the highest possible regard and rejects any action that demeans them or turns them into tools used to achieve some other goal.

Quote by Kenyan philosopher and theologian John S. Mbiti

The individual does not and cannot exist alone…. He owes his existence to other people including those of past generations and his contemporaries. He is simply part of the whole.... Whatever happens to the individual happens to the whole group, and whatever happens to the whole group happens to the individual. The individual can only say, "I am, because we are; and since we are therefore I am."

One day you will be called upon to break a big law in the name of justice and rationality. Everything will depend on it…. How are you going to prepare for that day when it really matters? You have to stay "in shape" so that when the big day comes you will be ready. What you need is "anarchist calisthenics." Every day or so break some trivial law that makes no sense, even if it's only jaywalking. Use your own head to judge whether a law is just or reasonable. That way, you'll keep trim; and when the big day comes, you'll be ready.

How to Be Perfect quotes

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