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Inferences of Science and Common Sense differ from those of deductive logic and mathematics in a very important respect, namely, when the premises are true and the reasoning correct, the conclusion is only probable.

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
Conclusion
Inferences
Important
Logic
Inference
Mathematics
Probable
Respect
Differ
Common
Namely
Premises
Science
Reasoning
Sense
Correct
Deductive
True

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I am compelled to fear that science will be used to promote the power of dominant groups rather than to make men happy.
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One should as a rule respect public opinion in so far as is necessary to avoid starvation and to keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny.
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Aristotle maintained that women have fewer teeth than men although he was twice married, it never occurred to him to verify this statement by examining his wives' mouths.
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I conclude that, while it is true that science cannot decide questions of value, that is because they cannot be intellectually decided at all, and lie outside the realm of truth and falsehood. Whatever knowledge is attainable, must be attained by scientific methods and what science cannot discover, mankind cannot know.
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No rules, however wise, are a substitute for affection and tact.
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Your writing is never as good as you hoped but never as bad as you feared.
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The desire to understand the world and the desire to reform it are the two great engines of progress, without which human society would stand still or retrogress.
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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.
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Religion may in most of its forms be defined as the belief that the gods are on the side of the government.
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Shakespeare . . . If he does not give you delight, you had better ignore him [if you can].
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Human nature is so constructed that it gives affection most readily to those who seem least to demand it.
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The newspapers at one time said that I was dead but after carefully examining the evidence I came to the conclusion that this statement was false.
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I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy – ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of life for a few hours of that joy. ... I have sought it, finally, because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined.
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Contempt for happiness is usually contempt for other people's happiness, and is an elegant disguise for hatred of the human race.
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I am paid by the word, so I always write the shortest words possible.
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Of course not. After all, I may be wrong.
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Belief in God and a future life makes it possible to go through life with less of stoic courage than is needed by skeptics.
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A sense of duty is useful in work but offensive in personal relations. People wish to be liked, not to be endured with patient resignation.
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Science tells us what we can know, but what we can know is little, and if we forget how much we cannot know we become insensitive to many things of great importance.
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To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization, and at present very few people have reached this level.
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