Quote

The reformative effect of punishment is a belief that dies hard, chiefly I think, because it is so satisfying to our sadistic impulses.

Bertrand Russell

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Effect
Prison
Effects
Sadistic
Belief
Chiefly
Dies
Impulses
Hard
Satisfying
Think
Impulse
Thinking
Punishment

More quotes by Bertrand Russell

Image
We know that the exercise of virtue should be its own reward, and it seems to follow that the enduring of it on the part of the patient should be its own punishment.
Bertrand Russell
Image
I am allowed to use plain English because everybody knows that I could use mathematical logic if I chose.
Bertrand Russell
Image
If the State does not acquire supremacy over [vast private] enterprises, it becomes their puppet, and they become the real State.
Bertrand Russell
Image
I do wish I believed in the life eternal, for it makes me quite miserable to think man is merely a kind of machine endowed, unhappily for himself, with consciousness.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Aristotle could have avoided the mistake of thinking that women have fewer teeth than men, by the simple device of asking Mrs. Aristotle to keep her mouth open while he counted.
Bertrand Russell
Image
I feel as if one would only discover on one's death bed what one ought to have lived for
Bertrand Russell
Image
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 creatingfuture dominates the minds of those who control the teaching of the young.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Obscenity is whatever happens to shock some elderly and ignorant magistrate.
Bertrand Russell
Image
There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge.
Bertrand Russell
Image
The world in which we live can be understood as a result of muddle and accident but if it is the outcome of deliberate purpose, the purpose must have been that of a fiend. For my part, I find accident a less painful and more plausible hypothesis.
Bertrand Russell
Image
One's work is never so bad as it appears on bad days, nor so good as it appears on good days.
Bertrand Russell
Image
When all experts agree, you need to watch out.
Bertrand Russell
Image
It has been said that man is a rational animal. All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Grasshopper always wrong in argument with chicken.
Bertrand Russell
Image
The sentiments of an adult are compounded of a kernel of instinct surrounded by a vast husk of education.
Bertrand Russell
Image
For the learning of every virtue there is an appropriate discipline, and for the learning of suspended judgment the best discipline is philosophy.
Bertrand Russell
Image
The main thing needed to make men happy is intelligence.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Some `advanced thinkers' are of the opinion that anyone who differs from the conventional opinion must be in the right. This is a delusion if it were not, truth would be easier to come by than it is.
Bertrand Russell
Image
I FIND IT SO DIFFICULT NOT TO HATE, WHEN I DO NOT HATE I FEEL WE FEW ARE SO LONELY IN THE WORLD
Bertrand Russell
Image
Freedom of opinion can only exist when the government thinks itself secure.
Bertrand Russell