The triumph of science has been mainly due to its practical utility, and there has been an attempt to divorce this aspect from that of theory, thus making science more and more a technique, and less and less a doctrine as to the nature of the world. The penetration of this point of view to philosophers is very recent.
Bertrand RussellIn spreading his ideas, Plato was willing to employ emotional appeals, state propaganda, and the use of force.
Bertrand RussellI do not pretend to be able to prove that there is no God. I equally cannot prove that Satan is a fiction. The Christian god may exist; so may the gods of Olympus, or of ancient Egypt, or of Babylon. But no one of these hypotheses is more probable than any other: they lie outside the region of even probable knowledge, and therefore there is no reason to consider any of them.
Bertrand RussellOne 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.
Bertrand RussellMathematics is, I believe, the chief source of the belief in eternal and exact truth, as well as a sensible intelligible world.
Bertrand Russell