Bertrand Russell Quotes - Page 33

• Common sense, however it tries,
  cannot avoid being surprised from time to time.

  Bertrand Russell

  Common Sense, Trying, Logic

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• My own view on religion is . . . It helped in early days to fix the calendar, and . . . to chronicle eclipses . . . These two services I am prepared to acknowledge.

  Bertrand Russell

  Two, Views, Calendars

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• Plato has dramatic strength ... but is quite unaware of the strength of the argument against his position ... and allows himself to be grossly unfair in arguing against it.

  Bertrand Russell

  Plato, Arguing, Argument

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• In spreading his ideas, Plato was willing to employ emotional appeals, state propaganda, and the use of force.

  Bertrand Russell

  Plato, Emotional, Ideas

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• The fact that all Mathematics is Symbolic Logic is one of the greatest discoveries of our age; and when this fact has been established, the remainder of the principles of mathematics consists of the analysis of Symbolic Logic itself.

  Bertrand Russell

  Discovery, Mathematical Logic, Age

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Principles of Mathematics”, p.5, Routledge

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• In our complex world, there cannot be fruitful initiative without government, but unfortunately there can be government without initiative.

  Bertrand Russell

  Government, World, Initiative

  Bertrand Russell (2016). “Authority and the Individual”, p.47, Lulu Press, Inc

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• When I found myself regarded as respectable, I began to wonder what sins I had committed. I must be very wicked, I thought. I began to engage in the most uncomfortable introspection.

  Bertrand Russell

  Wicked, Wonder, Sin

  Bertrand Russell, Andrew G. Bone (2005). “Détente Or Destruction, 1955-57”, p.363, Psychology Press

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• Beggars do not envy millionaires, though of course they will envy other beggars who are more successful.

  Bertrand Russell

  Successful, Envy, Millionaire

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “The Conquest of Happiness”, p.51, Lulu Press, Inc

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• It is not by delusion, however exalted, that mankind can prosper, but only by unswerving courage in the pursuit of truth.

  Bertrand Russell

  Pursuit, Mankind, Delusion

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Fact and Fiction”, p.38, Routledge

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• My doctor said to me afterwards, 'When you were ill you behaved like a true philosopher. Every time you came to yourself you made a joke.' I never had a compliment that pleased me more.

  Bertrand Russell

  Doctors, Philosopher, Compliment

  Bertrand Russell (1967). “The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell: 1914-1944: 1914/1944”

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• Dogmatism is the greatest of mental obstacles to human happiness.

  Bertrand Russell

  Obstacles, Dogmatism, Humans

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• There are three ways of securing a society that shall be stable as regards population. The first is that of birth control, the second that of infanticide or really destructive wars, and the third that of general misery except for a powerful minority.

  Bertrand Russell

  Powerful, War, Eugenics

  Bertrand Russell (2012). “The Impact of Science on Society”, p.117, Routledge

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• War grows out of ordinary human nature.

  Bertrand Russell

  War, Ordinary, Human Nature

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “Why Men Fight: A Method of Abolishing the International Duel”, p.5, Lulu Press, Inc

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• Uncertainty in the pressure of vivid hopes and fears is painful, but must be endured if we wish to live without the support of comforting fairy tales.

  Bertrand Russell

  Support, Comforting, Wish

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• ... mathematical knowledge ... is, in fact, merely verbal knowledge. "3" means "2+1", and "4" means "3+1". Hence it follows (though the proof is long) that "4" means the same as "2+2". Thus mathematical knowledge ceases to be mysterious.

  Bertrand Russell

  Mean, Numbers, Long

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• One of the most painful circumstances of recent advances in science is that each one makes us know less than we thought we did

  Bertrand Russell

  Painful, Circumstances, Knows

  Bertrand Russell (1947). “What is the Soul?”, p.2, Hayes Barton Press

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• Zeno was concerned with three problems... These are the problem of the infinitesimal, the infinite, and continuity.

  Bertrand Russell

  Education, Three, Statistics

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• To create a healthy philosophy you should renounce metaphysics but be a good mathematician.

  Bertrand Russell

  Philosophy, Renounce, Should

  "The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell".

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• For over two thousand years it has been the custom among earnest moralists to decry happiness as something degraded and unworthy

  Bertrand Russell

  Years, Two, Morality

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Bertrand Russell's Best”, p.120, Routledge

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• There is little of the true philosophic spirit in Aquinas. He does not, like the Platonic Socrates, set out to follow wherever the argument may lead.

  Bertrand Russell

  Doe, May, Littles

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Bertrand Russell's Best”, p.31, Routledge

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• I am paid by the word, so I always write the shortest words possible.

  Bertrand Russell

  Writing, Paid

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• Religion and Science are two aspects of social life, of which the former has been important as far back as we know anything of man

  Bertrand Russell

  Science, Men, Two

  Bertrand Russell (1997). “Religion and Science”, p.7, Oxford University Press, USA

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• [Kant] was like many people: in intellectual matters he was skeptical, but in moral matters he believed imjplicitly in the maximx that he had imbibed at his mother's knee.

  Bertrand Russell

  Mother, People, Intellectual

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• But I simply can't stand a view limited to this earth, I feel life is so small unless it has windows into other worlds...I like mathematics largely because it is not human.

  Bertrand Russell

  Views, Other Worlds, Earth

  Bertrand Russell (1992). “The Selected Letters of Bertrand Russell: The private years, 1884-1914”, Allen Lane

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• The purpose of education is to teach a defense against eloquence.

  Bertrand Russell

  Defense, Purpose, Teach

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