Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
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...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth18 May 1872
The significance of a fact is relative to [the general body of scientific] knowledge. To say that a fact is significant in science, is to say that it helps to establish or refute some general law; for science, though it starts from observation of the particular, is not concerned essentially with the particular, but with the general. A fact, in science, is not a mere fact, but an instance. In this the scientist differs from the artist, who, if he deigns to notice facts at all, is likely to notice them in all their particularity.
The first man who said "fire burns" was employing scientific method, at any rate if he had allowed himself to be burnt several times. This man had already passed through the two stages of observation and generalization. He had not, however, what scientific technique demands-a careful choice of significant facts on the one hand, and, on the other hand, various means of arriving at laws otherwise than my mere generalization.
Scientific method, although in its more refined forms it may seem complicated, is in essence remarkably simply. It consists in observing such facts as will enable the observer to discover general laws governing facts of the kind in question. The two stages, first of observation, and second of inference to a law, are both essential, and each is susceptible of almost indefinite refinement. (1931)
Cruelty is, in theory, a perfectly adequate ground for divorce, but it may be interpreted so as to become absurd.
Ideas and principles that do harm are as a rule, though not always, cloaks for evil passions.
There's a Bible on that shelf there. But I keep it next to Voltaire - poison and antidote.
Much of the most important evils that mankind have to consider are those which they inflict upon each other through stupidity or malevolence or both.
It is only in marriage with the world that our ideals can bear fruit; divorced from it, they remain barren.
Children, after being limbs of Satan in traditional theology and mystically illuminated angels in the minds of educational reformers, have reverted to being little devils; not theological demons inspired by the evil one, but scientific Freudian abominations inspired by the unconscious.
There is no difference between someone who eats too little and sees Heaven and someone who drinks too much and sees snakes.
Ethical metaphysics is fundamentally an attempt, however disguised, to give legislative force to our own wishes.
I've always thought respectable people scoundrels, and I look anxiously at my face every morning for signs of my becoming a scoundrel.
Affection cannot be created; it can only be liberated.
No people anywhere in the world would accept being expelled en masse from their own country; how can anyone require the people of Palestine to accept a punishment which nobody else would tolerate?