Bertrand Russell
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Western Philosophy20th
century philosophy
Russell in
1907
Name
Bertrand Arthur William Russell¡B3rd Earl Russell
Birth
May 18¡B1872(1872-05-18)Trellech¡BMonmouthshire¡BWales
Death
February 2¡B1970
(aged 97)Penrhyndeudraeth¡BWales
School/tradition
Analytic philosophyNobel
Prize in Literature (1950)
Main interests
Ethics¡Bepistemology¡Blogic¡Bmathematics¡Bphilosophy
of language¡Bphilosophy
of science¡Breligion
Notable ideas
Logical atomism¡Btheory
of descriptions¡Bknowledge
by acquaintance and
knowledge by description¡BRussell's
paradox¡BRussell's
teapot.
Influences
Leibniz¡BHume¡BG.E.
Moore¡BJohn
McTaggart¡BFrege¡BWhitehead¡BWittgenstein¡BMill¡BThomas
Paine
Influenced
Analytic Philosophy¡BWittgenstein¡BA.
J. Ayer¡BRudolf
Carnap¡BKurt
Godel¡BKarl
Popper¡BW.
V. Quine¡BN.
Chomsky¡BJ.
L. Austin¡BSaul
Kripke¡BMoritz
Schlick¡BAlfred
Tarski¡BFriedrich
Waismann¡BDonald
Davidson
Bertrand Arthur William Russell¡B3rd Earl
Russell¡BOM¡BFRS¡B(18
May
1872 ¡V
2 February
1970)¡Bwas a
British
philosopher¡Bhistorian¡Blogician¡Bmathematician¡Badvocate
for social reform¡Bpacifist¡Band
prominent
rationalist.
A prolific
writer¡Bhe was a populariser of
philosophy and a commentator on a large
variety of topics. Continuing a family tradition
in
political affairs; he was a prominent
anti-war
activist¡Bchampioning free trade between
nations and anti-imperialism.[1][2].
He also co-authored ,with
Alfred North Whitehead¡BPrincipia
Mathematica¡Ban attempt to ground
Mathematics on the laws of
Logic. The book has had a considerable
influence on
Analytic Philosophy.
Russell was born at the height of
Britain's
economic and political ascendancy. When he
died almost a century later¡Bthe
British Empire had all but vanished¡Bits
power had been dissipated by two
world wars and its imperial system had been
brought to an end. Among his post Second World
War political activities¡BRussell was a vigorous
proponent of
nuclear disarmament¡Bantagonist to
communist
totalitarianism and an outspoken
critic of the
Vietnam War.[3]
Previously he had achieved notoriety as a
"conscientious objector" during the First World
War¡Bvisited the emerging
Soviet Union which subsequently met with his
disapproval and campaigned vigorously against
Adolf Hitler in the 1930s as well as being
an accomplished mathematician.
In 1950¡BRussell was awarded the
Nobel Prize in
Literature¡B"in recognition of his varied and
significant writings in which he champions
humanitarian ideals and
freedom of thought".[4]
Contents
[hide]
1 Biography
1.1 Ancestry
1.2 Childhood and adolescence
1.3 University and first marriage
1.4 Early career
1.5 First World War
1.6 Between the wars¡Band second marriage
1.7 Second World War
1.8 Later life
1.9 Political causes
1.10 Final years and death
2 Philosophical work
2.1 Analytic philosophy
2.2 Logic and philosophy of mathematics
2.3 Philosophy of language
2.4 Logical atomism
2.5 Epistemology
2.6 Philosophy of science
2.7 Ethics
2.8 Religion and theology
3 Influence on philosophy
4 Activism
4.1 Pacifism¡Bwar and nuclear weapons
4.2 Communism and socialism
4.3 Women's suffrage
4.4 Sexuality
4.5 Race
5 Further reading
5.1 Selected bibliography of Russell's books
5.2 Books about Russell's philosophy
5.3 Biographical books
6 References
7 External links
7.1 Writings available online
7.2 Audio
7.3 Other
8 Succession
//
[edit]
Biography
Bertrand Russell was born on
18 May
1872 at Ravenscroft (now Cleddon Hall)¡BTrellech¡BMonmouthshire¡BWales¡Binto
an
aristocratic family.[4]
Bertrand Russell's father¡BJohn
Russell¡BViscount Amberley
[edit]
Ancestry
His paternal grandfather¡BJohn
Russell¡B1st Earl Russell¡Bwas the second son
of
John Russell¡B6th Duke of Bedford¡Band had
twice been asked to form a government by
Queen Victoria¡Bserving her as
Prime Minister in the 1840s and 1860s.
[5]
The Russells had been prominent for several
centuries in Britain before this¡Bcoming to power
and the peerage with the rise of the
Tudor dynasty. They established themselves
as one of Britain's leading
Whig (Liberal) families¡Band participated in
every great political event from the
Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1536-40 to
the
Glorious Revolution in 1688-9 to the
Great Reform Act in 1832.
[5][6]
Russell's mother Katherine (nee Stanley) was
also from an aristocratic family¡Band was the
sister of
Rosalind Howard¡BCountess of Carlisle.[3]
Russell's parents were quite radical for their
times¡XRussell's father¡BViscount
Amberley¡Bwas an
atheist and consented to his wife's affair
with their children's tutor¡Bthe biologist
Douglas Spalding. Both were early advocates
of
birth control at a time when this was
considered scandalous.
[7]
John Stuart Mill¡Bthe
Utilitarian philosopher¡Bstood as Russell's
godfather. Mill died the following year¡Bbut
his writings had a great impact upon Russell's
life.
[edit]
Childhood and adolescence
Russell had two siblings:
Frank (nearly seven years older than
Bertrand)¡Band Rachel (four years older). In June
1874 Russell's mother died of
diphtheria¡Bfollowed shortly by Rachel¡Band in
January 1876 his father also died of
bronchitis following a long period of
depression. Frank and Bertrand were placed
in the care of their staunchly
Victorian grandparents¡Bwho lived at
Pembroke Lodge in
Richmond Park.
John Russell¡B1st Earl Russell¡Bhis
grandfather¡Bdied in 1878¡Band was remembered by
Russell as a kindly old man in a wheelchair. As
a result¡Bhis widow¡Bthe Countess Russell (nee
Lady Frances Elliot)¡Bwas the dominant family
figure for the rest of Russell's childhood and
youth.
[3][7]
The countess was from a
Scottish
Presbyterian family¡Band successfully
petitioned a British
court to set aside a provision in Amberley's
will requiring the children to be raised as
agnostics. Despite her religious
conservatism¡Bshe held progressive views in other
areas (accepting
Darwinism and supporting
Irish Home Rule)¡Band her influence on
Bertrand Russell's outlook on
social justice and standing up for principle
remained with him throughout his life - her
favourite Bible verse¡B'Thou shalt not follow a
multitude to do evil.' (Exodus 23:2)¡Bbecame his
mantra. However¡Bthe atmosphere at Pembroke Lodge
was one of frequent prayer¡Bemotional repression
and formality; Frank reacted to this with open
rebellion¡Bbut the young Bertrand learned to hide
his feelings.
Russell's
adolescence was thus very lonely¡Band he
often contemplated
suicide. He remarked in his autobiography
that his keenest interests were in sex¡Breligion
and mathematics¡Band that only the wish to know
more mathematics kept him from suicide
[8]. He was educated at home by a series of
tutors,[4]
and he spent countless hours in his
grandfather's library.
His brother Frank introduced him to the work of
Euclid¡Bwhich transformed Russell's life.[7][9]
[edit]
University and first marriage
Russell won a scholarship to read for the
Mathematics Tripos at
Trinity College¡BCambridge¡Band commenced his
studies there in 1890. He became acquainted with
the younger
G.E. Moore and came under the influence of
Alfred North Whitehead¡Bwho recommended him
to the
Cambridge Apostles. He quickly distinguished
himself in mathematics and philosophy¡Bgraduating
with a B.A. in the former subject in 1893 and
adding a fellowship in the latter in 1895.[10][11]
Russell first met the American
Quaker
Alys Pearsall Smith when he was seventeen
years old. He became a friend of the Pearsall
Smith family ¡X they knew him primarily as 'Lord
John's grandson' and enjoyed showing him off ¡X
and travelled with them to the continent; it was
in their company that Bertrand visited the
Paris Exhibition of 1889 and was able to
climb the
Eiffel Tower soon after it was completed.[12]
He soon fell in love with the puritanical¡Bhigh-minded
Alys¡Bwho was a graduate of
Bryn Mawr College near
Philadelphia¡Band¡Bcontrary to his
grandmother's wishes¡Bhe married her in December
1894. Their
marriage began to fall apart in 1902 when it
occurred to Russell¡Bwhile he was out on his
bicycle¡Bthat he no longer loved her; they
divorced nineteen years later¡Bafter a lengthy
period of separation.[13]
During this period¡BRussell had passionate (and
often simultaneous) affairs with a number of
women¡Bincluding Lady
Ottoline Morrell and the actress Lady
Constance Malleson.[14]
Alys pined for him for these years and continued
to love Russell for the rest of her life.[13]
[edit]
Early career
Russell began his published work in 1896 with
German
Social Democracy¡Ba study in politics that
was an early indication of a lifelong interest
in political and social theory. In 1896¡Bhe
taught German social democracy at the
London School of Economics¡Bwhere he also
lectured on the science of power in the autumn
of 1937.[15]
He was also a member of the
Coefficients dining club of social reformers
set up in 1902 by the
Fabian campaigners
Sidney and
Beatrice Webb.[16]
Russell became a fellow of the
Royal Society in 1908.[3]
The first of three volumes of
Principia Mathematica¡Bwritten with
Whitehead¡Bwas published in 1910¡Bwhich ,along
with the earlier
The Principles of Mathematics¡Bsoon made
Russell world famous in his field. In 1911¡Bhe
became acquainted with the Austrian engineering
student
Ludwig Wittgenstein¡Bwhom he viewed as a
genius and a successor who would continue his
work on logic. He spent hours dealing with
Wittgenstein's various phobias and his frequent
bouts of despair. The latter was often a drain
on Russell's energy¡Bbut he continued to be
fascinated by him and encouraged his
academic development¡Bincluding the
publication of Wittgenstein's
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus in 1922.[17]
[edit]
First World War
During the
First World War¡BRussell engaged in
pacifist activities¡Band¡Bin 1916¡Bhe was
dismissed from
Trinity College following his conviction
under the
Defence of the Realm Act. A later conviction
resulted in six months' imprisonment in
Brixton prison (see
Activism below)
[18]
[edit]
Between the wars¡Band second marriage
In August
1920¡BRussell travelled to
Russia as part of an official delegation
sent by the British government to investigate
the effects of the
Russian Revolution.[19]
During the course of his visit¡Bhe met
Lenin and had an hour-long conversation with
him. (In his autobiography¡Bhe mentions that he
found Lenin rather disappointing¡Band that he
sensed an "impish cruelty" in him.) He also
cruised down the Volga on a steam-ship.
Russell's lover
Dora Black also visited Russia independently
at the same time - she was enthusiastic about
the revolution¡Bbut Russell's experiences
destroyed his previous tentative support for it.
Russell subsequently lectured in
Beijing on philosophy for one
year¡Baccompanied by Dora.[4]
While in China¡BRussell became gravely ill with
pneumonia¡Band
incorrect reports of his death were
published in the Japanese press.[20]When
the couple visited
Japan on their return journey¡BDora notified
the world that "Mr Bertrand Russell¡Bhaving died
according to the Japanese press¡Bis unable to
give interviews to Japanese journalists".
Needless to say¡Bthe press were not amused and
did not appreciate the sarcasm.[21]
On the couple's return to England in September
1921¡BDora was seven months pregnant¡Band
Russell arranged a hasty divorce from
Alys¡Bmarrying Dora six days after the divorce
was finalised. Their children were
John Conrad Russell¡B4th Earl Russell¡Bborn on
November 3 1921 and
Katharine Jane Russell (now Lady Katharine
Tait) born on
December 29¡B1923.
Russell supported himself during this time by
writing popular books explaining matters of
physics¡Bethics
and
education to the
layman.
Together with Dora¡Bhe also founded the
experimental
Beacon Hill School in 1927. After he left
the school in 1932¡BDora continued it until 1943.
Upon the death of his elder brother Frank¡Bin
1931¡BRussell became the 3rd Earl Russell. He
once said that his
title was primarily useful for securing
hotel rooms.
Russell's marriage to Dora grew increasingly
tenuous¡Band it reached a breaking point over her
having two children with an American
journalist¡BGriffin Barry. In 1936¡Bhe took as
his third wife an
Oxford undergraduate named Patricia
("Peter") Spence¡Bwho had been his children's
governess since the summer of 1930. Russell
and Peter had one son¡BConrad
Sebastian Robert Russell¡Blater to become a
prominent historian¡Band one of the leading
figures in the
Liberal Democrat party.
[edit]
Second World War
After the Second World War¡BRussell taught at the
University of Chicago¡Blater moving on to
Los Angeles to lecture at the
University of California¡BLos Angeles. He was
appointed professor at the
City College of New York in 1940¡Bbut after a
public outcry¡Bthe appointment was annulled by a
court judgement: his opinions (especially those
relating to
sexual morality¡Bdetailed in Marriage and
Morals ten years earlier) made him "morally
unfit" to teach at the college. The protest was
started by the mother of a student who would not
have been eligible for his graduate-level course
in mathematical logic. Many intellectuals¡Bled by
John Dewey¡Bprotested his treatment. Dewey
and
Horace M. Kallen edited a collection of
articles on the CCNY affair in
The Bertrand Russell Case. He soon joined
the
Barnes Foundation¡Blecturing to a varied
audience on the history of philosophy; these
lectures formed the basis of
A History of Western Philosophy. His
relationship with the eccentric
Albert C. Barnes soon soured¡Band he returned
to Britain in 1944 to rejoin the faculty of
Trinity College.
During his return to Britain¡Bby steamship¡Bthe
Captain of the vessel he was sailing on asked
Russell if he had read The ABCs of
Relativity¡Bwhich he thought an excellent work.
Russell then had the pleasure of telling the
Captain who had written it.
[edit]
Later life
Russell in his later life.
During the 1940s and 1950s¡BRussell participated
in many broadcasts over the
BBC¡Bparticularly the
Third Programme¡Bon various topical and
philosophical subjects. By this time in his
life¡BRussell was world famous outside of
academic circles¡Bfrequently the subject or
author of
magazine and
newspaper articles¡Band was called upon to
offer up opinions on a wide variety of
subjects¡Beven mundane ones. En route to one of
his lectures in
Trondheim¡BRussell survived a
plane crash in Hommelvik October 1948 (24
survivors¡B43 on board).
A History of Western Philosophy (1945)
became a best-seller¡Band provided Russell with a
steady income for the remainder of his life. On
June 9¡B1949¡BRussell
was awarded the
Order of Merit and the following year he was
awarded the
Nobel Prize for Literature. When he was
given the Order of Merit¡BKing
George VI was affable but slightly
embarrassed at decorating a former
jailbird¡Bsaying that "You have sometimes behaved
in a manner that would not do if otherwise
adopted". Russell merely smiled¡Bbut afterwards
claimed that the reply "That's right¡Bjust like
your brother" immediately came to mind¡Bbut he
did not say it.
In 1952¡BRussell was divorced by Peter¡Bwith whom
he had been very unhappy. Conrad¡BRussell's son
by Peter¡Bdid not see his father between the time
of the divorce and 1968 (at which time his
decision to meet his father caused a permanent
breach with his mother). Russell married his
fourth wife¡BEdith
Finch¡Bsoon after the divorce¡Bon
December 15¡B1952.
They had known each other since 1926¡Band Edith
had taught
English at
Bryn Mawr College near
Philadelphia¡BPennsylvania¡Bsharing a house
for twenty years with Russell's old friend Lucy
Donnelly. Edith remained with him until his
death¡Band¡Bby all accounts¡Btheir relationship was
happy¡Bclose and loving throughout their marriage
and for the rest of Russell's life. Russell's
eldest son¡BJohn¡Bsuffered from serious
mental illness¡Bwhich was the source of
ongoing disputes between Russell and John's
mother¡BRussell's former wife¡BDora. John's wife
Susan was also mentally ill¡Band eventually
Russell and Edith became the legal guardians of
their three daughters (two of whom were later
diagnosed with
schizophrenia).
[edit]
Political causes
Russell spent the 1950s and 1960s engaged in
various political causes¡Bprimarily related to
nuclear disarmament and opposing the
Vietnam war (see also
Russell Vietnam War Crimes Tribunal). He
wrote a great many letters to world leaders
during this period. He also became a hero to
many of the youthful members of the
New Left. During the 1960s¡Bin
particular¡BRussell became increasingly vocal
about his disapproval of what he felt to be the
American government's near-genocidal policies.
In 1963 he became the inaugural recipient of the
Jerusalem Prize¡Ban award for writers
concerned with the freedom of the individual in
society. In October 1965 he tore up his
Labour Party card because he feared the
party was going to send soldiers to support the
Vietnam War.
[edit]
Final years and death
Russell published his three-volume autobiography
in 1967¡B1968 and 1969. Although he became
frail¡Bhe remained lucid¡Bwriting articles and
letters in the national newspapers up to his
death. In November
1969 he appealed to Secretary
General U Thant of the
United Nations to support an international
war crimes commission to investigate alleged
"torture and genocide" by the Americans in South
Vietnam. On
31 January
1970 he issued a statement which condemned "Israeli
aggression in the
Middle East"¡Bsaying that "We are frequently
told that we must sympathise with Israel because
of the suffering of the Jews in Europe at the
hands of the Nazis. ... What Israel is doing
today cannot be condoned¡Band to invoke the
horrors of the past to justify those of the
present is gross hypocrisy". This was read out
at the International Conference of
Parliamentarians in
Cairo on
3 February
1970¡Bthe day after Russell's death.[22]
Bertrand Russell died at 6.30 pm on
2 February
1970 at his home¡BPlas
Penrhyn¡Bin
Penrhyndeudraeth¡BMerionethshire¡BWales
of
influenza. He had previously fought that
illness off in December 1969. Upon his death¡Bhis
peerages descended on his eldest
son¡BJohn¡BViscount Amberley¡Bwho thence became the
fourth Earl.
His ashes¡Bas his will directed¡Bwere scattered
after his cremation three days later.
[edit]
Philosophical work
[edit]
Analytic philosophy
Russell is generally recognised as one of the
founders of
analytic philosophy¡Beven of its several
branches. At the beginning of the 20th
century¡Balongside
G. E. Moore¡BRussell was largely responsible
for the British "revolt against
Idealism"¡Ba philosophy greatly influenced by
G. W. F. Hegel and his British apostle¡BF.
H. Bradley. This revolt was echoed 30 years
later in
Vienna by the
logical positivists' "revolt against
metaphysics". Russell was particularly
critical of a doctrine he ascribed to
idealism and
coherentism¡Bwhich he dubbed the
doctrine of internal relations; this¡BRussell
suggested¡Bheld that in order to know any
particular thing¡Bwe must know all of its
relations. Based on this Russell attempted to
show that it would make
space¡Btime¡Bscience
and the concept of
number not fully intelligible. Russell's
logical work with
Whitehead continued this project.
Russell and Moore strove to eliminate what they
saw as meaningless and incoherent assertions in
philosophy. They sought clarity and precision in
argument by the use of exact
language and by breaking down philosophical
propositions into their simplest grammatical
components. Russell¡Bin particular¡Bsaw formal
logic and
science as the principal tools of the
philosopher. Indeed¡Bunlike most philosophers who
preceded him and his early
contemporaries¡BRussell did not believe there was
a separate method for philosophy. He believed
that the main task of the philosopher was to
illuminate the most general propositions about
the
world and to eliminate confusion. In
particular¡Bhe wanted to end what he saw as the
excesses of metaphysics. Russell adopted
William of Ockham's principle against
multiplying unnecessary entities¡BOccam's
Razor¡Bas a central part of the method of
analysis.[23]
[edit]
Logic and philosophy of mathematics
Russell had great influence on modern
mathematical logic. The American philosopher
and logician
Willard Quine said Russell's work
represented the greatest influence on his own
work.
Russell's first mathematical book¡BAn Essay on
the Foundations of Geometry¡Bwas published in
1897. This work was heavily influenced by
Immanuel Kant. Russell soon realized that
the conception it laid out would have made
Albert Einstein's schema of
space-time impossible¡Bwhich he understood to
be superior to his own system. Thenceforth¡Bhe
rejected the entire
Kantian program as it related to mathematics
and
geometry¡Band he maintained that his own
earliest work on the subject was nearly without
value.
Interested in the definition of
number¡BRussell studied the work of
George Boole¡BGeorg
Cantor¡Band
Augustus De Morgan¡Bwhile materials in the
Bertrand Russell Archives at
McMaster University include notes of his
reading in
algebraic logic by
Charles S. Peirce and
Ernst Schroder. He became convinced that the
foundations of mathematics were to be found in
logic¡Band following
Gottlob Frege took an
existentialist approach in which logic was
in turn based upon
set theory. In 1900 he attended the first
International Congress of Philosophy in
Paris¡Bwhere he became familiar with the work
of the Italian mathematician¡BGiuseppe
Peano. He mastered Peano's new symbolism and
his set of
axioms for
arithmetic. Peano defined logically all of
the terms of these axioms with the exception of
0¡Bnumber¡Bsuccessor¡Band the singular
term¡Bthe¡Bwhich were the primitives of his
system. Russell took it upon himself to find
logical definitions for each of these. Between
1897 and 1903 he published several articles
applying Peano's notation to the classical
Boole-Schroder algebra of relations¡Bamong them
On the Notion of Order¡BSur la logique des
relations avec les applications a la theorie des
series¡Band On Cardinal Numbers.
Russell eventually discovered that Gottlob Frege
had independently arrived at equivalent
definitions for 0¡Bsuccessor¡Band number¡Band the
definition of number is now usually referred to
as the Frege-Russell definition. It was largely
Russell who brought Frege to the attention of
the English-speaking world. He did this in
1903¡Bwhen he published
The Principles of Mathematics¡Bin which the
concept of class is inextricably tied to the
definition of number. The appendix to this work
detailed a paradox arising in Frege's
application of second- and higher-order
functions which took first-order functions as
their arguments¡Band he offered his first effort
to resolve what would henceforth come to be
known as the Russell Paradox. Before writing
Principles¡BRussell became aware of Cantor's
proof that there was no greatest
cardinal number¡Bwhich Russell believed was
mistaken. The Cantor Paradox in turn was shown
(for example by Crossley) to be a special case
of the Russell Paradox. This caused Russell to
analyze
classes¡Bfor it was known that given any
number of elements¡Bthe number of classes they
result in is greater than their number. This in
turn led to the discovery of a very interesting
class - namely¡Bthe class of all classes. It
contains two kinds of classes: those classes
that contain themselves¡Band those that do not.
Consideration of this class led him to find a
fatal flaw in the so-called principle of
comprehension¡Bwhich had been taken for granted
by logicians of the time. He showed that it
resulted in a contradiction¡Bwhereby Y is a
member of Y¡Bif and only if¡BY is not a member of
Y. This has become known as
Russell's paradox¡Bthe solution to which he
outlined in an appendix to Principles¡Band which
he later developed into a complete theory¡Bthe
Theory of types. Aside from exposing a major
inconsistency in
naive set theory¡BRussell's work led directly
to the creation of modern
axiomatic set theory. It also crippled
Frege's project of reducing arithmetic to logic.
The Theory of Types and much of Russell's
subsequent work have also found practical
applications with
computer science and
information technology.
Russell continued to defend
logicism¡Bthe view that mathematics is in
some important sense reducible to logic¡Band
along with his former teacher¡BAlfred
North Whitehead¡Bwrote the monumental
Principia Mathematica¡Ban
axiomatic system on which all of mathematics
can be built. The first volume of the Principia
was published in 1910¡Band is largely ascribed to
Russell. More than any other single work¡Bit
established the specialty of mathematical or
symbolic logic. Two more volumes were
published¡Bbut their original plan to incorporate
geometry in a fourth volume was never
realized¡Band Russell never felt up to improving
the original works¡Bthough he referenced new
developments and problems in his preface to the
second edition. Upon completing the
Principia¡Bthree volumes of extraordinarily
abstract and complex reasoning¡BRussell was
exhausted¡Band he never felt his intellectual
faculties fully recovered from the effort.
Although the Principia did not fall prey to the
paradoxes in Frege's approach¡Bit was later
proven by
Kurt Godel that neither Principia
Mathematica¡Bnor any other consistent system of
primitive recursive arithmetic¡Bcould¡Bwithin that
system¡Bdetermine that every proposition that
could be formulated within that system was
decidable¡Bi.e. could decide whether that
proposition or its negation was provable within
the system (Godel's
incompleteness theorem).
Russell's last significant work in mathematics
and logic¡BIntroduction to Mathematical
Philosophy¡Bwas written by hand while he was in
jail for his
anti-war activities during
World War I. This was largely an explication
of his previous work and its philosophical
significance.
[edit]
Philosophy of language
Russell was not the first philosopher to suggest
that language had an important bearing on how we
understand the world; however¡Bmore than anyone
before him¡BRussell made language¡Bor more
specifically¡Bhow we use language¡Ba central part
of philosophy. Had there been no Russell¡Bit
seems unlikely that philosophers such as
Ludwig Wittgenstein¡BGilbert
Ryle¡BJ.
L. Austin¡Band
P. F. Strawson¡Bamong others¡Bwould have
embarked upon the same course¡Bfor so much of
what they did was to amplify or
respond¡Bsometimes critically¡Bto what Russell had
said before them¡Busing many of the techniques
that he originally developed. Russell¡Balong with
Moore¡Bshared the idea that clarity of expression
is a virtue¡Ba notion that has been a touchstone
for philosophers ever since¡Bparticularly among
those who deal with the philosophy of language.
Perhaps Russell's most significant contribution
to
philosophy of language is his
theory of descriptions¡Bas presented in his
seminal essay¡BOn
Denoting¡Bfirst published in 1905 in the
Mind philosophical journal¡Bwhich the
mathematician and philosopher
Frank P. Ramsey described as "a paradigm of
philosophy." The theory is normally illustrated
using the phrase "the present King of France"¡Bas
in "The present
king of
France is bald." What object is this
proposition about¡Bgiven that there is not¡Bat
present¡Ba king of France? (Roughly the same
problem would arise if there were two kings of
France at present: which of them does "the king
of France" denote?)
Alexius Meinong had suggested that we must
posit a realm of "nonexistent entities" that we
can suppose we are referring to when we use
expressions such as this; but this would be a
strange
theory¡Bto say the least.
Frege¡Bemploying his distinction between
sense and reference¡Bsuggested that such
sentences¡Balthough meaningful¡Bwere neither true
nor false. But some such propositions¡Bsuch as
"If the present king of France is bald¡Bthen the
present king of France has no hair on his head,"
seem not only truth-valuable but indeed
obviously true.
The problem is general to what are called "definite
descriptions." Normally this includes all
terms beginning with "the"¡Band sometimes
includes names¡Blike "Walter Scott." (This point
is quite contentious: Russell sometimes thought
that the latter terms shouldn't be called names
at all¡Bbut only "disguised definite
descriptions," but much subsequent work has
treated them as altogether different things.)
What is the "logical form" of definite
descriptions: how¡Bin Frege's terms¡Bcould we
paraphrase them in order to show how the
truth of the whole depends on the truths of
the parts? Definite descriptions appear to be
like names that by their very nature denote
exactly one thing¡Bneither more or less.
What¡Bthen¡Bare we to say about the proposition as
a whole if one of its parts apparently isn't
functioning correctly?
Russell's
solution was¡Bfirst of all¡Bto analyze not the
term alone but the entire proposition that
contained a definite description. "The present
king of France is bald," he then suggested¡Bcan
be reworded to "There is an x such that x is a
present king of France¡Bnothing other than x is a
present king of France¡Band x is bald." Russell
claimed that each definite description in fact
contains a claim of
existence and a claim of uniqueness which
give this appearance¡Bbut these can be broken
apart and treated separately from the
predication that is the obvious content of the
proposition. The proposition as a whole then
says three things about some object: the
definite description contains two of them¡Band
the rest of the
sentence contains the other. If the object
does not exist¡Bor if it is not unique¡Bthen the
whole sentence turns out to be
false¡Bnot meaningless.
One of the major complaints against Russell's
theory¡Bdue originally to Strawson¡Bis that
definite descriptions do not claim that their
object exists¡Bthey merely presuppose that it
does.
Wittgenstein¡BRussell's student¡Bachieved
considerable prominence in the philosophy of
language after the posthumous publication of the
Philosophical Investigations. In Russell's
opinion¡BWittgenstein's later work was
misguided¡Band he decried its influence and that
of its followers (especially members of the
so-called "Oxford school" of
ordinary language philosophy¡Bwhom he
believed were promoting a kind of
mysticism). However¡BRussell still held
Wittgenstein and his early work in high
regard¡Bhe thought of him as¡B"perhaps the most
perfect example I have ever known of genius as
traditionally
conceived¡Bpassionate¡Bprofound¡Bintense¡Band
dominating." Russell's belief that philosophy's
task is not limited to examining ordinary
language is once again widely accepted in
philosophy.
[edit]
Logical atomism
Perhaps Russell's most systematic¡Bmetaphysical
treatment of philosophical analysis and his
empiricist-centric logicism is evident in what
he called
Logical atomism¡Bwhich is explicated in a set
of
lectures¡B"The Philosophy of Logical
Atomism," which he gave in 1918. In these
lectures¡BRussell sets forth his
concept of an
ideal¡Bisomorphic
language¡Bone that would mirror the world¡Bwhereby
our knowledge can be reduced to terms of
atomic propositions and their
truth-functional compounds. Logical atomism
is a form of radical empiricism¡Bfor Russell
believed the most important requirement for such
an ideal language is that every meaningful
proposition must consist of terms referring
directly to the objects with which we are
acquainted¡Bor that they are defined by other
terms referring to objects with which we are
acquainted. Russell excluded certain
formal¡Blogical terms such as all¡Bthe¡Bis¡Band so
forth¡Bfrom his isomorphic requirement¡Bbut he was
never entirely satisfied about our understanding
of such terms. One of the central themes of
Russell's atomism is that the world consists of
logically independent facts¡Ba plurality of
facts¡Band that our knowledge depends on the data
of our direct experience of them. In his later
life¡BRussell came to doubt aspects of logical
atomism¡Bespecially his principle of
isomorphism¡Bthough he continued to believe that
the process of philosophy ought to consist of
breaking things down into their simplest
components¡Beven though we might not ever fully
arrive at an ultimate
atomic
fact.
[edit]
Epistemology
Russell's
epistemology went through many phases. Once
he shed
neo-Hegelianism in his early years¡BRussell
remained a
philosophical realist for the remainder of
his life¡Bbelieving that our direct experiences
have primacy in the acquisition of knowledge.
While some of his views have lost favour¡Bhis
influence remains strong in the distinction
between two ways in which we can be familiar
with objects: "knowledge
by acquaintance" and "knowledge
by description". For a time¡BRussell thought
that we could only be acquainted with our own
sense data¡Xmomentary
perceptions of
colors¡Bsounds¡Band
the like¡Xand that everything else¡Bincluding the
physical objects that these were sense data
of¡Bcould only be inferred¡Bor reasoned to¡Xi.e.
known by description¡Xand not known directly.
This distinction has gained much wider
application¡Bthough Russell eventually rejected
the idea of an intermediate sense datum.
In his later philosophy¡BRussell subscribed to a
kind of
neutral monism¡Bmaintaining that the
distinctions between the
material and
mental worlds¡Bin the final analysis¡Bwere
arbitrary¡Band that both can be reduced to a
neutral property¡Xa view similar to one held by
the American philosopher/psychologist¡BWilliam
James¡Band one that was first formulated by
Baruch Spinoza¡Bwhom Russell greatly admired.
Instead of James' "pure
experience"¡Bhowever¡BRussell characterised the
stuff of our initial states of perception as
"events"¡Ba stance which is curiously akin to his
old teacher
Whitehead's
process philosophy.
[edit]
Philosophy of science
Russell frequently claimed that he was more
convinced of his method of doing philosophy¡Bthe
method of analysis¡Bthan of his philosophical
conclusions. Science¡Bof course¡Bwas one of the
principal components of analysis¡Balong with
logic and mathematics. While Russell was a
believer in the
scientific method¡Bknowledge derived from
empirical research that is verified through
repeated testing¡Bhe believed that science
reaches only tentative answers¡Band that
scientific progress is piecemeal¡Band attempts to
find organic unities were largely futile.
Indeed¡Bhe believed the same was true of
philosophy. Another founder of
modern philosophy of science¡BErnst
Mach¡Bplaced less reliance on method¡Bper
se¡Bfor he believed that any method that produced
predictable results was satisfactory and that
the principal role of the
scientist was to make successful
predictions. While Russell would doubtless
agree with this as a practical matter¡Bhe
believed that the ultimate objective of both
science and philosophy was to understand
reality¡Bnot simply to make predictions.
The fact that Russell made science a central
part of his method and of philosophy was
instrumental in making the
philosophy of science a
full-blooded¡Bseparate branch of philosophy and
an area in which subsequent philosophers
specialised. Much of Russell's thinking about
science is expressed in his 1914 book¡BOur
Knowledge of the External World as a Field for
Scientific Method in Philosophy. Among the
several schools that were influenced by Russell
were the
logical positivists¡Bparticularly
Rudolph Carnap¡Bwho maintained that the
distinguishing feature of scientific
propositions was their verifiability. This
contrasted with the theory of
Karl Popper¡Balso greatly influenced by
Russell¡Bwho believed that their importance
rested in the fact that they were potentially
falsifiable.
It is worth noting that outside of his strictly
philosophical pursuits¡BRussell was always
fascinated by science¡Bparticularly
physics¡Band he even authored several popular
science books¡BThe ABC of Atoms (1923) and The
ABC of Relativity (1925).
[edit]
Ethics
While Russell wrote a great deal on
ethical subject matters¡Bhe did not believe
that the subject belonged to philosophy or that
when he wrote on ethics that he did so in his
capacity as a philosopher. In his earlier
years¡BRussell was greatly influenced by
G.E. Moore's
Principia Ethica. Along with Moore¡Bhe then
believed that moral facts were
objective¡Bbut known only through
intuition; that they were simple properties
of objects¡Bnot
equivalent (e.g.¡Bpleasure is good) to the
natural objects to which they are often ascribed
(see
Naturalistic fallacy); and that these
simple¡Bundefinable moral properties cannot be
analyzed using the non-moral properties with
which they are associated. In time¡Bhowever¡Bhe
came to agree with his philosophical hero¡BDavid
Hume¡Bwho believed that ethical terms dealt
with
subjective
values that cannot be verified in the same
way as matters of fact.
Coupled with Russell's other doctrines¡Bthis
influenced the
logical positivists¡Bwho formulated the
theory of
emotivism or
cognitivism¡Bwhich states that ethical
propositions (along with those of
metaphysics) were essentially meaningless
and nonsensical or¡Bat best¡Blittle more than
expressions of
attitudes and
preferences. Notwithstanding his influence
on them¡BRussell himself did not construe ethical
propositions as narrowly as the positivists¡Bfor
he believed that ethical considerations are not
only meaningful¡Bbut that they are a vital
subject matter for civil discourse.
Indeed¡Bthough Russell was often characterised as
the
patron saint of rationality¡Bhe agreed with
Hume¡Bwho said that reason ought to be
subordinate to ethical considerations.
[edit]
Religion and theology
For most of his adult life Russell maintained
that
religion is little more than
superstition and¡Bdespite any positive
effects that religion might have¡Bit is largely
harmful to people. He believed religion and the
religious outlook (he considered
communism and other systematic
ideologies to be forms of religion) serve to
impede knowledge¡Bfoster fear and dependency¡Band
are responsible for much of the
war¡Boppression¡Band misery that have beset the
world.
In his 1949 speech¡B"Am I an Atheist or an
Agnostic?"¡BRussell expressed his difficulty over
whether to call himself an
atheist or an
agnostic:
As a philosopher¡Bif I were speaking to a purely
philosophic audience I should say that I ought
to describe myself as an Agnostic¡Bbecause I do
not think that there is a conclusive argument by
which one can prove that there is not a God. On
the other hand¡Bif I am to convey the right
impression to the ordinary man in the street I
think that I ought to say that I am an
Atheist¡Bbecause¡Bwhen I say that I cannot prove
that there is not a God¡BI ought to add equally
that I cannot prove that there are not the
Homeric gods.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BCollected Papers¡Bvol. 11¡Bp.
91
The problem with the word "agnostic" comes from
its misuse in the hands of Aldous Huxley's
uncle¡Bthe biologist who backed Darwin's "theory
of evolution"; none other than Thomas Huxley. He
used the word "agnostic" to mean "he wasn't
sure" while the word itself in its real sense
means "ignorant". Perhaps the word "ignorant"
for Huxley¡Bas for anyone else¡Bis
too-strong-a-word.
Though he would later question God's
existence¡Bhe fully accepted the
ontological argument during his
undergraduate years:
For two or three years...I was a Hegelian. I
remember the exact moment during my fourth year
[in 1894] when I became one. I had gone out to
buy a tin of tobacco¡Band was going back with it
along Trinity Lane¡Bwhen I suddenly threw it up
in the air and exclaimed: "Great God in Boots!
-- the ontological argument is sound!"
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BAutobiography of Bertrand
Russell¡BVol. 1¡B1967.
This quote has been used by many theologians
over the years¡Bsuch as by
Louis Pojman in his Philosophy of
Religion¡Bwho wish for readers to believe that
even a well-known atheist-philosopher supported
this particular argument for God's existence.
However¡Bsuch theologians should note
that¡Belsewhere in his autobiography¡BRussell
mentions the following:
About two years later¡BI became convinced that
there is no life after death¡Bbut I still
believed in God¡Bbecause the "First
Cause" argument appeared to be irrefutable.
At the age of eighteen¡Bhowever¡Bshortly before I
went to Cambridge¡BI read
Mill's Autobiography¡Bwhere I found a
sentence to the effect that his father taught
him the question "Who made me?" cannot be
answered¡Bsince it immediately suggests the
further question "Who made God?" This led me to
abandon the "First Cause" argument¡Band to become
an atheist.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BAutobiography of Bertrand
Russell¡BVol. 1¡B1967.
Russell made an influential analysis of the
omphalos hypothesis enunciated by
Philip Henry Gosse¡Xthat any argument
suggesting that the world was created as if it
were already in motion could just as easily make
it a few minutes old as a few thousand years:
There is no logical impossibility in the
hypothesis that the world sprang into being five
minutes ago¡Bexactly as it then was¡Bwith a
population that "remembered" a wholly unreal
past. There is no logically necessary connection
between events at different times; therefore
nothing that is happening now or will happen in
the future can disprove the hypothesis that the
world began five minutes ago.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BThe Analysis of Mind¡B1921¡Bpp.
159¡V60; cf. Philosophy¡BNorton¡B1927¡Bp. 7¡Bwhere
Russell acknowledges Gosse's paternity of this
anti-evolutionary argument.
As a young man¡BRussell had a decidedly religious
bent¡Bhimself¡Bas is evident in his early
Platonism. He longed for
eternal truths¡Bas he makes clear in his
famous essay¡B"A Free Man's Worship"¡Bwidely
regarded as a masterpiece of prose¡Bbut a work
that Russell came to dislike. While he rejected
the
supernatural¡Bhe freely admitted that he
yearned for a deeper meaning to life.
Russell's views on religion can be found in his
popular book¡BWhy
I Am Not a Christian and Other Essays on
Religion and Related Subjects (ISBN
0-671-20323-1). Its title essay was a talk
given on
March 6¡B1927
at Battersea Town Hall¡Bunder the auspices of the
South London Branch of the
National Secular Society¡BUK¡Band published
later that year as a
pamphlet. The book also contains other
essays in which Russell considers a number of
logical arguments for the
existence of God¡Bincluding the
first cause argument¡Bthe
natural-law argument¡Bthe
argument from design¡Band moral arguments. He
also discusses specifics about
Christian theology.
His conclusion:
Religion is based¡BI think¡Bprimarily and mainly
upon fear. It is partly the terror of the
unknown and partly¡Bas I have said¡Bthe wish to
feel that you have a kind of elder brother who
will stand by you in all your troubles and
disputes. [¡K] A good world needs
knowledge¡Bkindliness¡Band courage; it does not
need a regretful hankering after the past or a
fettering of the free intelligence by the words
uttered long ago by ignorant men.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BWhy I Am Not a Christian and
Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects
[edit]
Influence on philosophy
Russell had a major influence on modern
philosophy¡Bespecially in the
English-speaking world. While others were
also influential¡Bnotably Frege¡BMoore¡Band
Wittgenstein¡BRussell made analysis the dominant
methodology of professional philosophy. The
various analytic movements throughout the last
century all owe something to Russell's earlier
works.
Russell's influence on individual philosophers
is singular¡Bperhaps most notably in the case of
Ludwig Wittgenstein¡Bwho was his student
between 1911 and 1914. It should also be
observed that Wittgenstein exerted considerable
influence on Russell¡Bespecially in leading him
to conclude¡Bmuch to his regret¡Bthat mathematical
truths were purely tautological truths. Evidence
of Russell's influence on Wittgenstein can be
seen throughout the
Tractatus¡Bwhich Russell was instrumental in
having published. Russell also helped to secure
Wittgenstein's
doctorate and a faculty position at
Cambridge¡Balong with several fellowships
along the way. However¡Bas previously stated¡Bhe
came to disagree with Wittgenstein's later
linguistic and analytic approach to
philosophy¡Bwhile Wittgenstein came to think of
Russell as "superficial and glib"¡Bparticularly
in his popular writings. Russell's influence is
also evident in the work of
A. J. Ayer¡BRudolf
Carnap¡BAlonzo
Church¡BKurt
Godel¡BDavid
Kaplan¡BSaul
Kripke¡BKarl
Popper¡BW.
V. Quine¡BJohn
R. Searle¡Band a number of other philosophers
and logicians.
Some see Russell's influence as mostly
negative¡Bprimarily those who have been critical
of Russell's emphasis on science and logic¡Bthe
consequent diminishing of metaphysics¡Band of his
insistence that ethics lies outside of
philosophy. Russell's admirers and detractors
are often more acquainted with his
pronouncements on social and political
matters¡Bor what some (e.g.¡Bbiographer
Ray Monk) have called his "journalism"¡Bthan
they are with his technical¡Bphilosophical work.
There is a marked tendency to conflate these
matters¡Band to judge Russell the philosopher on
what he himself would certainly consider to be
his non-philosophical opinions. Russell often
cautioned people to make this distinction.
Russell left a large assortment of writing. From
his adolescent years¡BRussell wrote about 3,000
words a day¡Bin long hand¡Bwith relatively few
corrections; his first draft nearly always was
his last draft¡Beven on the most
complex¡Btechnical matters. His previously
unpublished work is an immense treasure
trove¡Band scholars are continuing to gain new
insights into Russell's thought.
[edit]
Activism
Political and social
activism occupied much of Russell's time for
most of his long life¡Bwhich makes his prodigious
and seminal writing on a wide range of technical
and non-technical subjects all the more
remarkable.
Russell remained politically active to the
end¡Bwriting and exhorting world leaders and
lending his name to various causes. Some
maintain that during his last few years he gave
his youthful followers too much license and that
they used his name for some outlandish purposes
that a more attentive Russell would not have
approved. There is evidence to show that he
became aware of this when he fired his private
secretary¡BRalph
Schoenman¡Bthen a young firebrand of the
radical left.
[edit]
Pacifism¡Bwar and nuclear weapons
"War does not determine who is right¡Bonly who is
left."
Despite the ready image still provided by
popular culture¡BRussell was never a complete
pacifist. He resisted specific
wars¡Bprotesting against them in specific ways¡Bon
the grounds that they were contrary to the
interests of civilization¡Band thus immoral.
Indeed¡Bin his 1915 article on "The
Ethics of War"¡Bhe defended wars of
colonization on the same utilitarian grounds: he
felt conquest was justified if the side with the
more advanced civilization could put the land to
better use. So¡Bwhen it is said¡Brightly¡Bthat
Russell opposed nearly all wars between modern
nations¡Bit must be understood in this sense.
Russell's activism against British participation
in
World War I led to fines¡Ba loss of freedom
of travel within Britain¡Band the non-renewal of
his fellowship at
Trinity College¡BCambridge.
He was attacked as a 'traitor' in the
press¡Btreated like a security risk by his own
government¡Band many of his closest friends
deserted him. He was eventually sentenced to
prison in 1918 on the tenuous grounds that he
had interfered in British Foreign Policy - he
had argued that British workers should be wary
of the United States Army¡Bfor it had experience
in strike-breaking. He was released after
serving six months¡Bbut was still closely
supervised until the end of the war.
In 1943 Russell called his stance towards
warfare "relative political pacifism"¡Xhe held
that war was always a great
evil¡Bbut in some particularly extreme
circumstances (such as when
Adolf Hitler threatened to take over Europe)
it might be a lesser of multiple evils. In the
years leading to
World War II¡Bhe supported the policy of
appeasement; but by 1940 he acknowledged
that in order to preserve democracy¡BHitler
had to be defeated. This same reluctant value
compromise was shared by his acquaintance
A.A. Milne.
Russell was fairly consistently opposed to the
continued existence of nuclear weapons from the
time of their first use. However¡Bon
November 20¡B1948¡Bin
a public speech at
Westminster School¡Baddressing a gathering
arranged by the New Commonwealth¡BRussell shocked
some observers with comments that seemed to
suggest a
preemptive nuclear strike on the
Soviet Union might be justified. Russell
apparently argued that the threat of war between
the
United States and the
Soviet Union would enable the United States
to force the Soviet Union to accept the
Baruch Plan for international atomic energy
control. (Earlier in the year he had written in
the same vein to
Walter W. Marseille.) Russell felt this plan
"had very great merits and showed considerable
generosity¡Bwhen it is remembered that America
still had an unbroken nuclear monopoly." (Has
Man a Future?¡B1961). However Nicholas Griffin of
McMaster University¡Bin his book The Selected
Letters of Bertrand Russell: The Public
Years¡B1914-1970¡Bhas claimed (after obtaining a
transcript of the speech) that Russell's wording
implies he didn't advocate the actual use of the
atom bomb¡Bbut merely its diplomatic use as a
massive source of leverage over the actions of
the Soviets. Griffin's interpretation was
disputed by
Nigel Lawson¡Bthe former British
Chancellor¡Bwho was present at the speech¡Bclaims
it was quite clear that Russell was advocating
an actual First Strike. Whichever interpretation
is correct¡BRussell later relented¡Binstead
arguing for mutual disarmament by the nuclear
powers¡Bpossibly linked to some form of
world government.
In 1955 Russell released the
Russell-Einstein Manifesto¡Bco-signed by
Albert Einstein and nine other leading
scientists and intellectuals¡Ba document which
led to the first of the
Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs
in 1957. In 1958¡BRussell became the first
president of the
Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. He
resigned two years later when the CND would not
support
civil disobedience¡Band formed the
Committee of 100. In September
1961 he was imprisoned for a week for
inciting civil disobedience¡Bwhen he took part in
a huge ban-the-bomb demonstration at the
Ministry of Defence but the sentence was
quashed on account of his age.
In 1962 during the
Cuban Missile Crisis Russell sent telegrams
to
Kennedy¡BKhrushchev¡Bthe
UN Secretary-General
U Thant and British prime minister
Macmillan¡Bwhich may have helped to prevent
further escalation and a possible nuclear war.
Khrushchev replied with a long letter¡Bpublished
by the Russian news agency
ITAR-TASS¡Bwhich was mainly addressed to
Kennedy and the Western world.[24]
Increasingly concerned about the potential
danger to humanity arising from nuclear weapons
and other scientific discoveries¡Bhe also joined
with Einstein¡BOppenheimer¡BRotblat and other
eminent scientists of the day to establish the
World Academy of Art and Science which was
formally constituted in 1960.
Russell made a cameo appearance playing himself
in the anti-war
Bollywood film "Aman"
which was released in India in 1967. This was
Russell's only appearance in a feature film.
The
Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation began work
in 1963¡Bin order to carry forward Russell's work
for peace¡Bhuman rights and social justice. He
began public opposition to U.S. policy in
Vietnam with a letter to the
New York Times dated
March 28¡B1963. By the autumn of 1966 he had
completed the manuscript of "War Crimes in
Vietnam". Then¡Busing the American justifications
for the Nuremberg Trials¡BRussell¡Balong with
Jean-Paul Sartre¡Borganised what he called an
international War Crimes Tribunal¡Ba.k.a the
Russell Tribunal.
Russell was an early critic of the official
story in the
John F. Kennedy assassination; his "16
Questions on the Assassination" from 1964 is
still considered a good summary of the apparent
inconsistencies in that case.
[edit]
Communism and socialism
Russell initially expressed great hope in "the
Communist experiment". However¡Bwhen he visited
the
Soviet Union and met
Lenin in 1920¡Bhe was unimpressed with the
system in place. On his return he wrote a
critical tract¡BThe
Practice and Theory of Bolshevism. He was
"infinitely unhappy in this atmosphere¡Xstifled
by its utilitarianism¡Bits indifference to love
and beauty and the life of impulse." He believed
Lenin to be similar to a religious
zealot¡Bcold and possessing "no love of
liberty."
In the
United Kingdom general election¡B1922 and
UK General Election¡B1923 Russell stood as a
Labour Party candidate in the
Chelsea constituency¡Bbut only on the basis
that he knew he was extremely unlikely to be
elected in such a safe Conservative seat¡Band he
wasn't on either occasion.
Politically¡BRussell envisioned a kind of
benevolent¡Blibertarian
socialism¡Bsimilar in some ways to¡Byet
possessing important differences from¡Bthe
conception promoted by the
Fabian Society. He was strongly critical of
Stalin's regime¡Band of the practices of
states proclaiming
Marxism and
Communism generally. Russell was a
consistent enthusiast for democracy and
world government¡Band advocated the
establishment of a democratic international
government in some of the essays collected in In
Praise of Idleness (1935)¡Band also in Has Man a
Future? (1961).
One who believes as I do¡Bthat free intellect is
the chief engine of human progress¡Bcannot but be
fundamentally opposed to Bolshevism as much as
to the Church of Rome. The hopes which inspire
communism are¡Bin the main¡Bas admirable as those
instilled by the Sermon on the Mount¡Bbut they
are held as fanatically and are as likely to do
as much harm.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BThe Practice and Theory of
Bolshevism¡B1920
For my part¡Bwhile I am as convinced a Socialist
as the most ardent Marxian¡BI do not regard
Socialism as a gospel of proletarian revenge¡Bnor
even¡Bprimarily¡Bas a means of securing economic
justice. I regard it primarily as an adjustment
to machine production demanded by considerations
of common sense¡Band calculated to increase the
happiness¡Bnot only of proletarians¡Bbut of all
except a tiny minority of the human race.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡B"The Case for Socialism" (In
Praise of Idleness¡B1935)
Modern methods of production have given us the
possibility of ease and security for all; we
have chosen¡Binstead¡Bto have overwork for some
and starvation for the others. Hitherto we have
continued to be as energetic as we were before
there were machines; in this we have been
foolish¡Bbut there is no reason to go on being
foolish for ever.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BIn Praise of Idleness¡B1935
[edit]
Women's suffrage
As a young man¡BRussell was a member of the
Liberal Party and wrote in favor of
free trade and
women's suffrage. In his 1910
pamphlet¡BAnti-Suffragist Anxieties¡BRussell wrote
that some men opposed suffrage because they
"fear that their liberty to act in ways that are
injurious to women will be curtailed." In 1907
he was nominated by the National Union of
Suffrage Societies to run for
Parliament in a
by-election¡Bwhich he lost by a wide margin.
[edit]
Sexuality
Russell wrote against
Victorian notions of morality.
Marriage and Morals (1929) expressed his
opinion that sex between a man and woman who are
not married to each other is not necessarily
immoral if they truly love one another¡Band
advocated "trial marriages" or "companionate
marriage"¡Bformalised relationships whereby young
people could legitimately have sexual
intercourse without being expected to remain
married in the long term or to have children (an
idea first proposed by Judge
Ben Lindsey). This might not seem extreme by
today's standards¡Bbut it was enough to raise
vigorous protests and denunciations against him
during his visit to the
United States shortly after the book's
publication. Russell was also ahead of his time
in advocating open
sex education and widespread access to
contraception. He also advocated easy
divorce¡Bbut only if the marriage had
produced no children - Russell's view was that
parents should remain married but tolerant of
each other's sexual infidelity¡Bif they had
children. This reflected his life at the time -
his second wife Dora was openly having an
affair¡Band would soon become pregnant by another
man¡Bbut Russell was keen for their children John
and Kate to have a "normal" family life.
Russell was also active within the
Homosexual Law Reform Society¡Bbeing one of
the signatories of
Anthony Edward Dyson's letter calling for a
change in the law regarding homosexual
practices¡Bwhich were legalised in
1967¡Bwhen Russell was still alive.
Russell's private life was even more
unconventional and freewheeling than his
published writings revealed¡Bbut that was not
well known at the time. For example¡Bphilosopher
Sidney Hook reports that Russell often spoke
of his
sexual prowess and of his various conquests.
[edit]
Race
As with his views on religion¡Bwhich developed
considerably throughout his long life¡BRussell's
views on the matter of race did not remain
fixed. By 1951¡BRussell
was a vocal advocate of racial equality and
intermarriage; he penned a chapter on "Racial
Antagonism" in New Hopes for a Changing World
(1951)¡Bwhich read:
It is sometimes maintained that racial mixture
is biologically undesirable. There is no
evidence whatever for this view. Nor is
there¡Bapparently¡Bany reason to think that
Negroes are congenitally less intelligent than
white people¡Bbut as to that it will be difficult
to judge until they have equal scope and equally
good social conditions.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BNew Hopes for a Changing
World (London: Allen & Unwin¡B1951¡Bp. 108)
Passages in some of his early writings support
birth control. On November 16¡B1922¡Bfor
instance¡Bhe gave a lecture to the General
Meeting of Dr.
Marie Stopes's Society for Constructive
Birth Control and Racial Progress on "Birth
Control and International Relations," in which
he described the importance of extending Western
birth control worldwide; his remarks anticipated
the population control movement of the 1960s and
the role of the United Nations.
This policy may last some time¡Bbut in the end
under it we shall have to give way--we are only
putting off the evil day; the one real remedy is
birth control¡Bthat is getting the people of the
world to limit themselves to those numbers which
they can keep upon their own soil... I do not
see how we can hope permanently to be strong
enough to keep the coloured races out; sooner or
later they are bound to overflow¡Bso the best we
can do is to hope that those nations will see
the wisdom of Birth Control.... We need a strong
international authority.
¡V "Lecture by the Hon. Bertrand Russell"¡BBirth
Control News¡Bvol 1¡Bno. 8 (December 1922)¡Bp.2
Another passage from early editions of his book
Marriage and Morals (1929)¡Bwhich Russell later
clarified as referring only to the situation as
resulting from environmental conditioning¡Band
which he had removed from later editions¡Breads:
In extreme cases there can be little doubt of
the superiority of one race to another.... There
is no sound reason to regard negroes as on the
average inferior to white men¡Balthough for work
in the tropics they are indispensable¡Bso that
their extermination (apart from questions of
humanity) would be highly undesirable.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡BMarriage and Morals (1929)
Russell later criticized eugenic programs for
their vulnerability to corruption¡Band¡Bin 1932¡Bhe
condemned the "unwarranted assumption" that
"Negroes are congenitally inferior to white men"
(Education and the Social Order¡BChap. 3).
Responding in 1964 to a correspondent's
enquiry¡B"do you still consider the Negroes an
inferior race¡Bas you did when you wrote Marriage
and Morals?"¡BRussell replied:
I never held Negroes to be inherently inferior.
The statement in Marriage and Morals refers to
environmental conditioning. I have had it
withdrawn from subsequent editions because it is
clearly ambiguous.
¡V Bertrand Russell¡Bletter dated March 17¡B1964 in
Dear Bertrand Russell... a selection of his
correspondence with the general
public¡B1950-1968. edited by Barry Feinberg and
Ronald Kasrils.(London: Allen & Unwin¡B1969¡Bp.
146)
[edit]
Further reading
[edit]
Selected bibliography of Russell's books
This is a selected bibliography of Russell's
books in English sorted by year of first
publication.
¡P 1896¡BGerman Social Democracy¡BLondon:
Longmans¡BGreen.
¡P 1897¡BAn Essay on the Foundations of
Geometry¡BCambridge: At the University Press.
¡P 1900¡BA Critical Exposition of the Philosophy
of Leibniz¡BCambridge: At the University Press.
¡P 1903¡BThe
Principles of Mathematics¡BCambridge: At the
University Press.
¡P 1905
On Denoting¡BMind vol. 14¡BNS¡BISSN:
00264425¡BBasil Blackwell
¡P 1910¡BPhilosophical Essays¡BLondon:
Longmans¡BGreen.
¡P 1910¡V1913¡BPrincipia
Mathematica (with
Alfred North Whitehead)¡B3 vols.¡BCambridge:
At the University Press.
¡P 1912¡BThe
Problems of Philosophy¡BLondon: Williams and
Norgate.
¡P 1914¡BOur Knowledge of the External World as a
Field for Scientific Method in
Philosophy¡BChicago and London: Open Court
Publishing.
¡P 1916¡BPrinciples of Social
Reconstruction¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1916¡BJustice in War-time¡BChicago: Open Court.
¡P 1917¡BPolitical
Ideals¡BNew York: The Century Co.
¡P 1918¡BMysticism and Logic and Other
Essays¡BLondon: Longmans¡BGreen.
¡P 1918¡BRoads to Freedom: Socialism¡BAnarchism¡Band
Syndicalism¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1919¡BIntroduction
to Mathematical Philosophy¡BLondon: George
Allen & Unwin¡B(ISBN
0-415-09604-9 for Routledge paperback).
¡P 1920¡BThe
Practice and Theory of Bolshevism,London:
George Allen & Unwin
¡P 1921¡BThe
Analysis of Mind¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1922¡BThe
Problem of China¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1923¡BThe Prospects of Industrial Civilization
(in collaboration with Dora Russell)¡BLondon:
George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1923¡BThe ABC of Atoms¡BLondon: Kegan
Paul¡BTrench¡BTrubner.
¡P 1924¡BIcarus¡Bor the Future of Science¡BLondon:
Kegan Paul¡BTrench¡BTrubner.
¡P 1925¡BThe ABC of Relativity¡BLondon: Kegan
Paul¡BTrench¡BTrubner.
¡P 1925¡BWhat
I Believe¡BLondon: Kegan Paul¡BTrench¡BTrubner.
¡P 1926¡BOn Education¡BEspecially in Early
Childhood¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1927¡BThe Analysis of Matter¡BLondon: Kegan
Paul¡BTrench¡BTrubner.
¡P 1927¡BAn Outline of Philosophy¡BLondon: George
Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1927¡BWhy
I Am Not a Christian¡BLondon: Watts.
¡P 1927¡BSelected Papers of Bertrand Russell¡BNew
York: Modern Library.
¡P 1928¡BSceptical Essays¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1929¡BMarriage and Morals¡BLondon: George Allen
& Unwin.
¡P 1930¡BThe Conquest of Happiness¡BLondon: George
Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1931¡BThe Scientific Outlook¡BLondon: George
Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1932¡BEducation and the Social Order¡BLondon:
George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1934¡BFreedom and
Organization¡B1814¡V1914¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1935¡BIn Praise of Idleness¡BLondon: George
Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1935¡BReligion and Science¡BLondon: Thornton
Butterworth.
¡P 1936¡BWhich Way to Peace?¡BLondon: Jonathan
Cape.
¡P 1937¡BThe Amberley Papers: The Letters and
Diaries of Lord and Lady Amberley (with Patricia
Russell)¡B2 vols.¡BLondon: Leonard & Virginia
Woolf at the Hogarth Press.
¡P 1938¡BPower:
A New Social Analysis¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1940¡BAn Inquiry into Meaning and Truth¡BNew
York: W. W. Norton & Company.
¡P 1946¡BA
History of Western Philosophy and Its Connection
with Political and Social Circumstances from the
Earliest Times to the Present Day¡BNew York:
Simon and Schuster.
¡P 1948¡BHuman Knowledge: Its Scope and
Limits¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1949¡BAuthority and the Individual¡BLondon:
George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1950¡BUnpopular Essays¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1951¡BNew Hopes for a Changing World¡BLondon:
George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1952¡BThe Impact of Science on Society¡BLondon:
George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1953¡BSatan in the Suburbs and Other
Stories¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1954¡BHuman Society in Ethics and
Politics¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1954¡BNightmares of Eminent Persons and Other
Stories¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1956¡BPortraits from Memory and Other
Essays¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1956¡BLogic and Knowledge: Essays 1901¡V1950
(edited by Robert C. Marsh)¡BLondon: George Allen
& Unwin.
¡P 1957¡BWhy I Am Not A Christian and Other Essays
on Religion and Related Subjects (edited by Paul
Edwards)¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1958¡BUnderstanding History and Other
Essays¡BNew York: Philosophical Library.
¡P 1959¡BCommon Sense and Nuclear Warfare¡BLondon:
George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1959¡BMy
Philosophical Development¡BLondon: George
Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1959¡BWisdom of the West ("editor"¡BPaul
Foulkes)¡BLondon: Macdonald.
¡P 1960¡BBertrand Russell Speaks His
Mind¡BCleveland and New York: World Publishing
Company.
¡P 1961¡BThe Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell
(edited by R.E. Egner and L.E. Denonn)¡BLondon:
George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1961¡BFact and Fiction¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1961¡BHas Man a Future?¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1963¡BEssays in Skepticism¡BNew York:
Philosophical Library.
¡P 1963¡BUnarmed Victory¡BLondon: George Allen &
Unwin.
¡P 1965¡BOn the Philosophy of Science (edited by
Charles A. Fritz¡BJr.)¡BIndianapolis: The
Bobbs-Merrill Company.
¡P 1967¡BRussell's Peace Appeals (edited by
Tsutomu Makino and Kazuteru Hitaka)¡BJapan:
Eichosha's New Current Books.
¡P 1967¡BWar Crimes in Vietnam¡BLondon: George
Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1967¡V1969¡BThe Autobiography of Bertrand
Russell¡B3 vols.¡BLondon: George Allen & Unwin.
¡P 1969¡BDear Bertrand Russell... A Selection of
his Correspondence with the General Public
1950¡V1968 (edited by Barry Feinberg and Ronald
Kasrils)¡BLondon: George Allen and Unwin.
Note: This is a mere sampling¡Bfor Russell also
authored many pamphlets¡Bintroductions¡Barticles
and letters to the editor. His works also can be
found in any number of anthologies and
collections¡Bperhaps most notably The Collected
Papers of Bertrand Russell¡Bwhich
McMaster University began publishing in
1983. This collection of his shorter and
previously unpublished works is now up to 16
volumes¡Band many more are forthcoming. An
additional three volumes catalogue just his
bibliography. The Russell Archives at
McMaster University also have more than
30,000 letters that he wrote.
Additional References:
A. Russell
¡P 1900¡BSur la logique des relations avec des
applications a la theorie des series¡BRivista di
matematica 7: 115-148.
¡P 1901¡BOn the Notion of Order¡BMind (n.s.) 10:
35-51.
¡P 1902¡B(with
Alfred North Whitehead)¡BOn Cardinal
Numbers¡BAmerican Journal of Mathematics 23:
367-384.
B. Secondary references:
¡P John Newsome Crossley. A Note on Cantor's
Theorem and Russell's Paradox¡BAustralian Journal
of Philosophy 51: 70-71.
¡P
Ivor Grattan-Guinness¡B2000. The Search for
Mathematical Roots 1870-1940. Princeton
University Press.
[edit]
Books about Russell's philosophy
¡P Bertrand Russell: Critical Assessments¡Bedited
by A. D. Irvine¡B4 volumes¡BLondon:
Routledge¡B1999. Consists of essays on Russell's
work by many distinguished philosophers.
¡P Bertrand Russell¡Bby John Slater¡BBristol:
Thoemmes Press¡B1994.
¡P Bertrand Russell's Ethics. by Michael K.
Potter¡BBristol: Thoemmes Continuum¡B2006. A clear
and accessible explanation of Russell's moral
philosophy.
¡P The Philosophy of Bertrand Russell¡Bedited by
P.A. Schilpp¡BEvanston and Chicago: Northwestern
University¡B1944.
¡P Russell¡Bby A. J. Ayer¡BLondon: Fontana¡B1972.
ISBN 0-00-632965-9. A lucid summary
exposition of Russell's thought.
¡P The Lost Cause: Causation and the Mind-Body
Problem¡Bby
Celia Green. Oxford: Oxford Forum¡B2003.
ISBN 0-9536772-1-4 Contains a sympathetic
analysis of Russell's views on
causality.
[edit]
Biographical books
¡P Bertrand Russell: 1872¡V1920 The Spirit of
Solitude by
Ray Monk (1997)
ISBN 0-09-973131-2
¡P Bertrand Russell: 1921¡V1970 The Ghost of
Madness by
Ray Monk (2001)
ISBN 0-09-927275-X
¡P Bertrand Russell: Philosopher and Humanist¡Bby
John Lewis (1968)
¡P Bertrand Russell¡Bby
A. J. Ayer (1972)¡Breprint ed. 1988:
ISBN 0-226-03343-0
¡P The Life of Bertrand Russell¡Bby
Ronald W. Clark (1975)
ISBN 0-394-49059-2
¡P Bertrand Russell and His World¡Bby Ronald W.
Clark (1981)
ISBN 0-500-13070-1
[edit]
References
1.
^ Richard Rempel (1979). "From Imperialism
to Free Trade: Couturat¡BHalevy and Russell's
First Crusade". Journal of the History of Ideas
40 (3): 423-443.
2.
^ Bertrand Russell [1917] (1988). Political
Ideals. Routledge.
ISBN 0-415-10907-8.
3. ^
a
b
c
d
http://russell.mcmaster.ca/~bertrand/
4. ^
a
b
c
d The Nobel Foundation (1950).
Bertrand Russell: The Nobel Prize in Literature
1950. Retrieved on June 11¡B2007.
5. ^
a
b Bloy¡BMarjie¡BPh.D..
Lord John Russell (1792-1878). Retrieved on
2007-10-28.
6.
^ Cokayne¡BG.E.; Vicary Gibbs¡BH.A.
Doubleday¡BGeoffrey H. White¡BDuncan Warrand and
Lord Howard de Walden¡Beditors. The Complete
Peerage of England¡BScotland¡BIreland¡BGreat
Britain and the United Kingdom¡BExtant¡BExtinct or
Dormant¡Bnew ed.. 13 volumes in 14. 1910-1959.
Reprint in 6 volumes¡BGloucester¡BU.K.: Alan
Sutton Publishing¡B2000.
7. ^
a
b
c Paul¡BAshley.
Bertrand Russell: The Man and His Ideas..
Retrieved on
2007-10-28.
8.
^ The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell¡Bp.38
9.
^ Lenz¡BJohn R. (date unknown). "Bertrand
Russell and the Greeks" (PDF).
Retrieved on
2007-10-27.
10.
^ O'Connor¡BJ. J.; E. F. Robertson (October
2003).
Alfred North Whitehead. School of
Mathematics and Statistics¡BUniversity of St
Andrews¡BScotland. Retrieved on
2007-11-08.
11.
^ Griffin¡BNicholas; Albert C. Lewis.
Bertrand Russell's Mathematical Education.
Notes and Records of the Royal Society of
London¡BVol. 44¡BNo. 1. 51-71. Retrieved on
2007-11-08.
12.
^ Wallechinsky¡BDavid; Irving Wallace (1981).
Famous Marriages Bertrand Russell & Alla
Pearsall Smith¡BPart 1. The People's Almanac.
Retrieved on
2007-11-15.
13. ^
a
b Wallechinsky¡BDavid; Irving Wallace (1981).
Famous Marriages Bertrand Russell & Alla
Pearsall Smith¡BPart 3. The People's Almanac.
Retrieved on
2007-11-15.
14.
^ Kimball¡BRoger.
Love¡Blogic & unbearable pity: The private
Bertrand Russell. The New Criterion Vol.
11¡BNo. 1¡BSeptember 1992. The New Criterion.
Retrieved on
2007-11-15.
15.
^ Simkin¡BJohn.
London School of Economics. Retrieved on
2007-11-16.
16.
^ Russell¡BBertrand (2001). in Ray Perkins:
Yours Faithfully¡BBertrand Russell: Letters to
the Editor 1904-1969. Chicago: Open Court
Publishing¡B16.
ISBN 0-8126-9449-X. Retrieved on
2007-11-16.
17.
^
Russell on Wittgenstein
18.
^ Vellacott¡BJo (1980). Bertrand Russell and
the Pacifists in the First World War. Brighton:
Harvester Press.
ISBN 0855274549.
19.
^
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970). Farlex¡BInc..
Retrieved on
2007-12-11.
20.
^
"Bertrand Russell Reported Dead" (PDF).
The New York Times (April 21¡B1921). Retrieved on
2007-12-11.
21.
^ Russell¡BBertrand (2000). in Richard A .
Rempel:
"Uncertain Paths to Freedom: Russia and
China¡B1919-22". Routledge¡Blxviii.
ISBN 0415094119.
22.
^
Russell's last political speech
23.
^ Russell¡BBertrand (1992). The Analysis of
Matter. London: Routledge¡B424.
ISBN 0-415-08297-8.
24.
^ Horst-Eberhard Richter (2006). Die Krise
der Mannlichkeit in der unerwachsenen
Gesellschaft. Psychosozial-Verlag.
ISBN 3898065707.
[edit]
External links
Wikiquote has a collection of quotations
related to:
Bertrand Russell
Wikisource has original works written by or
about:
Bertrand Russell
[edit]
Writings available online
Works by Bertrand Russell at
Project Gutenberg
"Mysticism" (1961)
"A Free Man's Worship" (1903)
"Am I an Atheist or an Agnostic?" (1947)
"Icarus¡Bor The Future of Science" 1923
"Has Religion Made Useful Contributions to
Civilization?" 1930
"Ideas that Have Harmed Mankind" (1950)
"In Praise of Idleness" (1932)
"What Desires Are Politically Important?"
(1950)
Political Ideals (1917)
The Problem of China
The Problems of Philosophy
Proposed Roads to Freedom (1918)
"16 Questions on the Assassination" (of
President Kennedy)
The Analysis Of Mind
What is an Agnostic?
Why I am not a Christian
The War and Non-Resistance¡XA Rejoinder to
Professor Perry
War and Non-Resistance (1915)
The Ethics of War (1915)
Principia Mathematica (1910)
"The Elements of Ethics" (1910)
The Principles of Mathematics (1903)
An essay on the foundations of geometry
From:
www.archive.org
History of Western Philosophy (1946)
My Philosophical Development (1959)
Portraits from Memory and Other Essays
(1956)
Unpopular Essays (1950)
Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy
(1920)
The Scientific Outlook (1954)
An Outline of Philosophy (1951)
Common Sense and Nuclear Warfare (1959)
Our Knowledge of the External World (1914)
Legitimacy Versus Industrialism 1814-1848
(1935)
Authority and the Individual (1949)
Education and the Social Order (1932)
Nightmares of Eminent Persons and Other Stories
(1954)
Why Men Fight: A Method of Abolishing the
International Duel (1917)
Justice in Wartime (1917)
Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays (1917)