Famous Quotes by Bertrand Russell
Below are famous quotes by Bertrand Russell - British author, mathematician, & philosopher (1872 - 1970).
All exact science is dominated by the idea of approximation.
All movements go too far.
Change is scientific, progress is ethical; change is indubitable, whereas progress is a matter of controversy.
Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.
Even in civilized mankind faint traces of monogamous instincts can be perceived.
Every living thing is a sort of imperialist, seeking to transform as much as possible of its environment into itself.
Everything is vague to a degree you do not realize till you have tried to make it precise.
Few people can be happy unless they hate some other person, nation, or creed.
Freedom of opinion can only exist when the government thinks itself secure.
Government can easily exist without laws, but law cannot exist without government.
I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong.
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.
If there were in the world today any large number of people who desired their own happiness more than they desired the unhappiness of others, we could have paradise in a few years.
In all things it is a good idea to hang a question mark now and then on the things we have taken for granted.
In the part of this universe that we know there is great injustice, and often the good suffer, and often the wicked prosper, and one hardly knows which of those is the more annoying.
It has been said that man is a rational animal. All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this.
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 creating the future dominates the minds of those who control the teaching of the young.
Life is nothing but a competition to be the criminal rather than the victim.
Many people would rather die than think; in fact, most do.
Many people would sooner die than think; In fact, they do so.
Mathematics, rightly viewed, posses not only truth, but supreme beauty - a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture.
Men are born ignorant, not stupid; they are made stupid by education.
Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth -- more than ruin -- more even than death.... Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit. Thought looks into the pit of hell and is not afraid. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the world, and the chief glory of man.
Most people would sooner die than think; in fact they do so.
Obscenity is what happens to shock some elderly and ignorant magistrate.
One should respect public opinion insofar as is necessary to avoid starvation and keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny.
Order, unity and continuity are human inventions just as truly as catalogues and encyclopedias.
Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man.
Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.
Patriots always talk of dying for their country and never of killing for their country.
Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence, it will fade away as we adopt reason and science as our guidelines.
Science may set limits to knowledge, but should not set limits to imagination.
Sin is geographical.
So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence.
The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy - I mean that if you are happy you will be good.
The greatest challenge to any thinker is stating the problem in a way that will allow a solution.
The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists - that is why they invented hell.
The main things which seem to me important on their own account, and not merely as means to other things, are knowledge, art, instinctive happiness, and relations of friendship or affection.
The most savage controversies are those about matters as to which there is no good evidence either way.
The only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation.
The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others.
The place of the father in the modern suburban family is a very small one, particularly if he plays golf.
The secret of happiness is this: Let your interests be as wide as possible, and let your reactions to the things and persons that interest you be as far as possible friendly rather that hostile.
The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.
The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt.
The true spirit of delight, the exaltation, the sense of being more than Man, which is the touchstone of the highest excellence, is to be found in mathematics as surely as in poetry.
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.
The wise man thinks about his troubles only when there is some purpose in doing so; at other times he thinks about others things.
There are two motives for reading a book: one, that you enjoy it; the other, that you can boast about it.
There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge.
There is no nonsense so errant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate governmental action.
This is one of those views which are so absolutely absurd that only very learned men could possibly adopt them.
This is patently absurd; but whoever wishes to become a philosopher must learn not to be frightened by absurdities.
To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization, and at present very few people have reached this level.
To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.
Too little liberty brings stagnation and too much brings chaos.
We know too much and feel too little. At least, we feel too little of those creative emotions from which a good life springs.
We know very little, and yet it is astonishing that we know so much, and still more astonishing that so little knowledge can give us so much power.
What the world needs is not dogma but an attitude of scientific inquiry combined with a belief that the torture of millions is not desirable, whether inflicted by Stalin or by a Deity imagined in the likeness of the believer.
Whereas in art nothing worth doing can be done without genius, in science even a very moderate capacity can contribute to a supreme achievement.
Return to authors.
