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One of the symptoms of approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work is terribly important, and that to take a holiday would bring all kinds of disaster. If I were a medical man, I should prescribe a holiday to any patient who considered his or her work important.

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
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An individual human existence should be like a river
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The first essential character [of civilization], I should say, is forethought. This, indeed, is what mainly distinguishes men from brutes and adults from children.
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I wish to propose for the reader's favourable consideration a doctrine which may, I fear, appear wildly paradoxical and subversive. The doctrine in question is this: that it is undesirable to believe a proposition when there is no ground whatever for supposing it true.
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Those who in principle oppose birth control are either incapable of arithmetic or else in favour of war, pestilence and famine as permanent features of human life.
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Upon hearing via Littlewood an exposition on the theory of relativity: To think I have spent my life on absolute muck.
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All definite knowledge - so I should contend - belongs to science all dogma as to what surpasses definite knowledge belongs to theology. But between theology and science there is a No Man's Land, exposed to attack by both sides this No Man's Land is philosophy.
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Right conduct can never, except by some rare accident, be promoted by ignorance or hindered by knowledge.
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To create a healthy philosophy you should renounce metaphysics but be a good mathematician.
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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.
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Life is just one cup of coffee after another, and don't look for anything else.
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Measures of sterilization should, in my opinion, be very definitely confined to persons who are mentally defective
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To think I have spent my life on absolute muck.
Bertrand Russell
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I do not pretend to start with precise questions. I do not think you can start with anything precise. You have to achieve such precision as you can, as you go along.
Bertrand Russell
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Children, after being limbs of Satan in traditional theology and mystically illuminated angels in the minds of educational reformers, have reverted to being little devils not theological demons inspired by the evil one, but scientific Freudian abominations inspired by the unconscious.
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A life which goes excessively against natural impulse is... likely to involve effects of strain that may be quite as bad as indulgence in forbidden impulses would have been. People who live a life which is unnatural beyond a point are likely to be filled with envy, malice and uncharitableness.
Bertrand Russell
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With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine. And I have tried to apprehend the Pythagorean power by which number holds sway about the flux. A little of this, but not much, I have achieved.
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There is an element of the busybody in our conception of virtue: unless a man makes himself a nuisance to a great many people, we do not think he can be an exceptionally good man.
Bertrand Russell
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There are three ways of securing a society that shall be stable as regards population. The first is that of birth control, the second that of infanticide or really destructive wars, and the third that of general misery except for a powerful minority.
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As soon as we abandon our own reason, and are content to rely upon authority, there is no end to our troubles.
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What science cannot discover, mankind cannot know.
Bertrand Russell