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 Mormons had a divine revelation in favour of polygamy, but under pressure from the United States Government they discovered that the revelation was not binding.
Religion may in most of its forms be defined as the belief that the gods are on the side of the government.
The institution of representative government to us seems an essential part of democracy, but the ancients never thought of it. Its immense merit was that it enabled a large constituency to exert indirect power, and thus made possible the distribution of political responsibility throughout the great states of modern times.
Nine-tenths of the activities of a modern Government are harmful; therefore the worse they are performed, the better.
Education, and the life of the mind generally, is a matter in which individual initiative is the chief thing needed; the function of the state should begin and end with insistence on some kind of education, and, if possible, a kind which promotes mental individualism, not a kind which happens to conform to the prejudices of government officials.
If the Church is not now as bad as the Soviet Government, that is due to the influence of those who attacked the Church
It is entirely clear that there is only one way in which great wars can be permanently prevented, and that is the establishment of an international government with a monopoly of serious armed force.
In our complex world, there cannot be fruitful initiative without government, but unfortunately there can be government without initiative.
When the state intervenes to insure the indoctrination of some doctrine, it does so because there is no conclusive evidence in favor of that doctrine.
War can only be abolished by the establishment of a world government.
I think the subject which will be of most importance politically is Mass Psychology... Its importance has been enormously increased by the growth of modern methods of propaganda. Although this science will be diligently studied, it will be rigidly confined to the governing class. The populace will not be allowed to know how its convictions are generated.
Government can easily exist without laws, but law cannot exist without government.
Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.
Diet, injections, and injunctions will combine, from a very early age, to produce the sort of character and the sort of beliefs that the authorities consider desirable, and any serious criticism of the powers that be will become psychologically impossible. Even if all are miserable, all will believe themselves happy, because the government will tell them that they are so.