Bertrand Russel
Bertrand Russel
Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, OM, FRSwas a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, writer, social critic, political activist and Nobel laureate. At various points in his life he considered himself a liberal, a socialist, and a pacifist, but he also admitted that he had "never been any of these things, in any profound sense". He was born in Monmouthshire into one of the most prominent aristocratic families in the United Kingdom...
add certain certainty nearly others
When one admits that nothing is certain one must, I think, also add that some things are more nearly certain than others
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Undoubtedly the desire for food has been, and still is, one of the main causes of great political events
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Folly is perennial and yet the human race has survived.
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The biggest cause of trouble in the world today is that the stupid people are so sure about things and the intelligent folks are so full of doubts.
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The professional moralist in our day is a man of less than average intelligence
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The professors must not prevent us from realizing that history is fun, and that the most bizarre things really happen
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There are no better friends than those forged through honest and often heated argument.
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What a man believes upon grossly insufficient evidence is an index into his desires -- desires of which he himself is often unconscious. If a man is offered a fact which goes against his instincts, he will scrutinize it closely, and unless the evidence is overwhelming, he will refuse to believe it. If, on the other hand, he is offered something which affords a reason for acting in accordance to his instincts, he will accept it even on the slightest evidence. The origin of myths is explained in this way.
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There is no nonsense so arrant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate governmental action
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Those who first advocated religious toleration were thought wicked, and so were the early opponents of slavery.
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To be worthy of the name, he must be free of two things; the force of tradition and tyranny of his own passions.
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As men begin to grow civilized, they cease to be satisfied with mere tabus, and substitute divine commands and prohibitions
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You must not kill your neighbor, whom perhaps you genuinely hate, but by a little propaganda this hate can be transferred to some foreign nation, against whom all your murderous impulses become patriotic heroism
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Young men and young women meet each other with much less difficulty than was formerly the case, and every housemaid expects at least once a week as much excitement as would have lasted a Jane Austen heroine throughout a whole novel