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All the important human advances that we know of since historical times began have been due to individuals of whom the majority faced virulent public opposition.

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
Important
Majority
Virulent
Progress
Advances
Public
Faced
Since
Dues
Times
Opposition
Individual
Individuals
Human
Began
Humans
Historical

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Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cozy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own.
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In America everybody is of the opinion that he has no social superiors, since all men are equal, but he does not admit that he has no social inferiors, for, from the time of Jefferson onward, the doctrine that all men are equal applies only upwards, not downwards.
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Heretical views arise when the truth is uncertain, and it is only when the truth is uncertain that censorship is invoked.
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Many people when they fall in love look for a little haven of refuge from the world, where they can be sure of being admired when they are not admirable, and praised when they are not praiseworthy.
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There are infinite possibilities of error, and more cranks take up fashionable untruths than unfashionable truths.
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3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is a paradox as is a paradox why the number 1 is not prime if it has no other divisors besides himself.
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It is a natural propensity to attribute misfortune to someone's malignity.
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The search for something permanent is one of the deepest of the instincts leading men to philosophy.
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A million million years gives us some time to prepare for the end . . . let us make the best of it.
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People who are vigorous and brutal often find war enjoyable.
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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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it [is] possible to suppose that, if Russia is allowed to have peace, an amazing industrial development may take place, making Russia a rival of the United States.
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Dogmatism and skepticism are both, in a sense, absolute philosophies one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or ignorance.
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If you question any candid person who is no longer young, he is very likely to tell you that, having tasted life in this world, he has no wish to begin again as a new boy in another.
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Broadly speaking, Protestants like to be good and have invented theology in order to keep themselves so, whereas Catholics like to be bad and have invented theology in order to keep their neighbors good. Hence, the social character of Catholicism and the individual character of Protestantism.
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The human animal, like others, is adapted to a certain amount of struggle for life [and] the mere absence of effort from his life removes an essential ingredient of happiness. [. . .] He forgets that to be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.
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Even in civilized mankind faint traces of monogamous instinct can be perceived.
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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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Science seems to be at war with itself.... Naive realism leads to physics, and physics, if true, shows naive realism to be false. Therefore naive realism, if true, is false therefore it is false.
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Mankind has become so much one family that we cannot insure our own prosperity except by insuring that of everyone else.
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