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The human race may well become extinct before the end of the century. Speaking as a mathematician, I should say the odds are about three to one against survival.

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
Well
Race
Three
Ends
Extinct
Become
Mathematician
May
Odds
Wells
Speaking
Human
Survival
Humans
Century

More quotes by Bertrand Russell

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So long as there is death there will be sorrow, and so long as there is sorrow it can be no part of the duty of human beings to increase its amount, in spite of the fact that a few rare spirits know how to transmute it.
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The solution of the difficulties which formerly surrounded the mathematical infinite is probably the greatest achievement of which our age has to boast.
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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
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No man treats a motorcar as foolishly as he treats another human being. When the car will not go, he does not attribute its annoying behavior to sin he does not say, 'You are a wicked motorcar, and I shall not give you any more petrol until you go.' He attempts to find out what is wrong and to set it right.
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Televison allows thousands of people to laugh at the same joke and still remain alone.
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Thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit.
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Abstract work, if one wishes to do it well, must be allowed to destroy one's humanity one raises a monument which is at the same time a tomb, in which, voluntarily, one slowly inters oneself.
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Philosophers, for the most part, are constitutionally timid, and dislike the unexpected. Few of them would be genuinely happy as pirates or burglars. Accordingly they invent systems which make the future calculable, at least in its main outlines.
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What science cannot discover, mankind cannot know.
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In all affairs it's a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.
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If any philosopher had been asked for a definition of infinity, he might have produced some unintelligible rigmarole, but he would certainly not have been able to give a definition that had any meaning at all.
Bertrand Russell
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There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge.
Bertrand Russell
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Collective fear stimulates herd instinct, and tends to produce ferocity toward those who are not regarded as members of the herd.
Bertrand Russell
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I am allowed to use plain English because everybody knows that I could use mathematical logic if I chose.
Bertrand Russell
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When Benjamin Franklin invented the lightning-rod, the clergy, both in England and America, with enthusiastic support of George III, condemned it as an impious attempt to defeat the will of God.
Bertrand Russell
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Good nature is, of all moral qualities, the one that the world needs most, and good nature is the result of ease and security, not of a life of arduous struggle.
Bertrand Russell
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Nine-tenths of the activities of a modern Government are harmful therefore the worse they are performed, the better.
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If the ordinary wage-earner worked four hours a day, there would be enough for everybody, and no unemployment — assuming a certain very moderate amount of sensible organization. This idea shocks the well-to-do, because they are convinced that the poor would not know how to use so much leisure.
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How much good it would do if one could exterminate the human race.
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A great many worries can be diminished by realizing the unimportance of the matter which is causing anxiety.
Bertrand Russell