Bertrand Russell Quotes - Page 40

• I have throughout been curious about how much we can be said to know and with what degree of certainty or doubtfulness.

  Bertrand Russell

  Curiosity, Degrees, Curious

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• Heretical views arise when the truth is uncertain, and it is only when the truth is uncertain that censorship is invoked.

  Bertrand Russell

  Truth, Views, Speech

  Bertrand Russell (1972). “Atheism: collected essays, 1943-1949”, Arno Pr

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• [The church] is in its major part an opponent still of progress and improvement in all the ways that diminish suffering in the world, because it has chosen to label as morality a certain narrow set of rules of conduct which have nothing to do with human happiness; and when you say that this or that ought to be done because it would make for human happiness, they think that has nothing to do with the matter at all. "What has human happiness to do with morals? The object of morals is not to make people happy.

  Bertrand Russell

  Thinking, People, Suffering

  Bertrand Russell (2016). “Why I Am Not a Christian”, p.18, Lulu Press, Inc

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• When one admits that nothing is certain one must, I think, also admit that some things are much more nearly certain than others. It is much more nearly certain that we are assembled here tonight than it is that this or that political party is in the right. Certainly there are degrees of certainty, and one should be very careful to emphasize that fact, because otherwise one is landed in an utter skepticism, and complete skepticism would, of course, be totally barren and completely useless.

  Bertrand Russell

  Party, Thinking, Political

  Bertrand Russell (2016). “Why I Am Not a Christian”, p.22, Lulu Press, Inc

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• Bacon not only despised the syllogism, but undervalued mathematics, presumably as insufficiently experimental. He was virulently hostile to Aristotle , but he thought very highly of Democritus , Although he did not deny that the course of nature exemplifies a Divine purpose, he objected to any admixture of teleological explanation in the actual investigation of phenomena; everything, he held, should be explained as following necessarily from efficient causes .

  Bertrand Russell

  Purpose, Causes, Mathematics

  Bertrand Russell (2004). “History of Western Philosophy”, p.499, Routledge

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• I must confess that I am deeply troubled. I fear that human beings are intent upon acting out a vast deathwish and that it lies with us now to make every effort to promote resistance to the insanity and brutality of policies which encompass the extermination of hundreds of millions of human beings.

  Bertrand Russell

  Lying, Effort, Insanity

  Bertrand Russell (1967). “The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell”

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• Life seems to me essentially passion, conflict, rage. It is only intellect that keeps me sane; perhaps this makes me overvalue intellect against feeling.

  Bertrand Russell

  Passion, Feelings, Conflict

  Letter to Lady Ottoline Morrell in 1912. "The life of Bertrand Russell". Book by Ronald W. Clark, p. 174, 1975.

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• it [is] possible to suppose that, if Russia is allowed to have peace, an amazing industrial development may take place, making Russia a rival of the United States.

  Bertrand Russell

  Russia, United States, Development

  Bertrand Russell, Richard A. Rempel, Beryl Haslam (2000). “Uncertain Paths to Freedom: Russia and China, 1919-22”, p.190, Psychology Press

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• One of the commonest things to do with savings is to lend them to some Government. In view of the fact that the bulk of the public expenditure of most civilized Governments consists in payment for past wars or preparation for future wars, the man who lends his money to a Government is in the same position as the bad men in Shakespeare who hire murderers. The net result of the man's economical habits is to increase the armed forces of the State to which he lends his savings. Obviously it would be better if he spent the money, even if he spent it in drink or gambling.

  Bertrand Russell

  War, Men, Past

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “In Praise of Idleness”, p.5, Lulu Press, Inc

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• There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge and wisdom. Shall we instead choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels? I appeal as a human being to human beings; remember your humanity, and forget the rest.

  Bertrand Russell

  Peace, Lying, Humanity

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.716, Routledge

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• Altogether it will be found that a quiet life is characteristic of great men, and that their pleasures have not been of the sort that would look exciting to the outward eye.

  Bertrand Russell

  Eye, Men, Looks

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “The Conquest of Happiness”, p.35, Lulu Press, Inc

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• All the time that he can spare from the adornment of his person, he devotes to the neglect of his duties.

  Bertrand Russell

  Time, Neglect, Duty

  "Some Cambridge Dons of the Nineties" by Bertrand Russell, 1956.

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• It appeared to me obvious that the happiness of mankind should be the aim of all action, and I discovered to my surprise that there were those who thought otherwise.

  Bertrand Russell

  Happiness, Action, Surprise

  Bertrand Russell (2014). “The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell”, p.39, Routledge

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• It is because modern education is so seldom inspired by a great hope that it so seldom achieves great results. The wish to preserve the past rather that the hope of creatingfuture dominates the minds of those who control the teaching of the young.

  Bertrand Russell

  Education, Hope, Teaching

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• Modern American politicians have the same cowardice about denying an equally bloodthirsty even sillier god, Jehovah.
  None of us would seriously consider the possibility that all the gods of Homer really exist... I think that all of us would say in regard to those gods that we were atheists. In regard to the Christian God, I should, I think, take exactly the same line.

  Bertrand Russell

  Christian, Atheist, Thinking

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• Our instinctive emotions are those that we have inherited from a much more dangerous world, and contain, therefore, a larger portion of fear than they should.

  Bertrand Russell

  Dangerous World, Worry, Emotion

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• When it was first proposed to establish laboratories at Cambridge, Todhunter, the mathematician, objected that it was unnecessary for students to see experiments performed, since the results could be vouched for by their teachers, all of them of the highest character, and many of them clergymen of the Church of England.

  Bertrand Russell

  Teacher, Character, Science

  Bertrand Russell (1992). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell, 1903-1959”, p.620, Psychology Press

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• What is matter? Never mind.

  Bertrand Russell

  Mind, Matter, Spirituality

  Bertrand Russell, John G. Slater, Peter Köllner (1997). “Last Philosophical Testament: 1943-68”, p.322, Psychology Press

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• The twin conceptions of sin and vindictive punishment seem to be at the root of much that is most vigorous, both in religion and politics.

  Bertrand Russell

  Punishment, Roots, Evil

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Unpopular Essays”, p.147, Routledge

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• The first dogma which I came to disbelieve was that of free will. It seemed to me that all notions of matter were determined by the laws of dynamics and could not therefore be influenced by human wills.

  Bertrand Russell

  Law, Dynamics, Matter

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• This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the second chance were offered me.

  Bertrand Russell

  Second Chance, Found, Has Beens

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• Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth - more than ruin, more even than death.

  Bertrand Russell

  Halloween, Men, Anxiety

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “Why Men Fight: A Method of Abolishing the International Duel”, p.95, Lulu Press, Inc

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• Science, by itself, cannot supply us with an ethic. It can show us how to achieve a given end, and it may show us that some ends cannot be achieved. But among ends that can be achieved our choice must be decided by other than purely scientific considerations. If a man were to say, "I hate the human race, and I think it would be a good thing if it were exterminated," we could say, "Well, my dear sir, let us begin the process with you." But this is hardly argument, and no amount of science could prove such a man mistaken.

  Bertrand Russell

  Hate, Mistake, Science

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• The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists - that is why they invented hell.

  Bertrand Russell

  Cynical, Religion, Atheism

  Sceptical Essays "On the Value of Scepticism" (1928)

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• When the journey from means to end is not too long, the means themselves are enjoyed if the end is ardently desired.

  Bertrand Russell

  Mean, Journey, Long

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Authority and the Individual”, p.41, Routledge

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