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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.

Bertrand Russell

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Bertrand Russell
Age: 97 †
Born: 1872
Born: May 18
Died: 1970
Died: February 2
Analytic Philosopher
Autobiographer
Epistemologist
Essayist
Journalist
Logician
Mathematician
Metaphysician
Peace Activist
Philosopher
Tryleg
Bertrand Arthur William Russell
Russell
Bertrand Russell
3rd Earl Russell
Bertrand Russell
Earl Russell
Bertrand Arthur William Russell
3rd Earl Russell
Much
Science
Stills
Power
Give
Still
Astonishing
Littles
Engineering
Little
Philosophical
Giving
Knowledge

More quotes by Bertrand Russell

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Religions, which condemn the pleasures of sense, drive men to seek the pleasures of power. Throughout history power has been the vice of the ascetic.
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Each act of cruelty is eternally a part of the universe nothing that happens later can make that act good rather than bad, or can confer perfection on the whole of which it is a part.
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Memory demands an image.
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Machines deprive us of two things which are certainly important ingredients of human happiness, namely, spontaneity and variety.
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Dr. Arnold . . . the admired reformer of public schools, came across some cranks who thought it a mistake to flog boys. Anyone reading his outburst of furious indignation against this opinion will be forced to the conclusion that he enjoyed inflicting floggings.
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The demand for certainty is one which is natural to man, but is nevertheless an intellectual vice. If you take your children for a picnic on a doubtful day, they will demand a dogmatic answer as to whether it will be fine or wet, and be disappointed in you when you cannot be sure.
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One eminently orthodox Catholic divine laid it down that a confessor may fondle a nun's breasts, provided he does it without evil intent.
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Religions that teach brotherly love have been used as an excuse for persecution, and our profoundest scientific insight is made into a means of mass destruction.
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But I simply can't stand a view limited to this earth, I feel life is so small unless it has windows into other worlds...I like mathematics largely because it is not human.
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Sir Arthur Eddington deduces religion from the fact that atoms do not obey the laws of mathematics. Sir James Jeans deduces it from the fact that they do.
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What the world needs is not dogma but an attitude of scientific inquiry.
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Choose your parents wisely.
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True happiness for human beings is possible only to those who develop their godlike potentialities to the utmost.
Bertrand Russell
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The saviors of the world, society's last hope.
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There's a Bible on that shelf there. But I keep it next to Voltaire - poison and antidote.
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Dread of disaster makes everybody act in the very way that increases the disaster.
Bertrand Russell
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The axiomatic method has many advantages over honest work.
Bertrand Russell
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To create a healthy philosophy you should renounce metaphysics but be a good mathematician.
Bertrand Russell
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The doctrine (of) maintaining that the language of daily life, with words used in their ordinary meanings, suffices for philosophy . . . I find myself totally unable to accept . . . . Because it makes almost inevitable the perpetuation amongst philosophers of the muddle-headedness they have taken over from common sense.
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The mind is a strange machine which can combine the materials offered to it in the most astonishing ways.
Bertrand Russell