"Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth's surface relative to other matter; second, telling other people to do so. The first is unpleasant and ill-paid; the second is pleasant and highly paid."
"A process which led from the amoeba to man appeared to philosophers to be obviously progress - though whether the amoeba would agree with this opinion is not known."
"Mathematics may be defined as the subject in which we never know what we are talking about, nor whether what we are saying is true. - from Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays"
"My sad conviction is that people can only agree about what they are not really interested in."
"Animal rights, taken to their logical conclusion, mean votes for oysters."
"So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence."
"If one man offers you democracy and another offers you a bag of grain, at what stage of starvation do you prefer the grain to the vote?"
"Boredom is a vital problem for the moralist, since at least half the sins of mankind are caused by the fear of it."
"Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty—a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture, without appeal to any part of our weaker nature, without the gorgeous trappings of paintings or music, yet sublimely pure and capable of a stern perfection such as only the greatest art can show."
"There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge."
"It has been said that man is a rational animal. All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this."
"Geometry has been, throughout, of supreme importance in the history of knowledge."
"One of the chief obstacles to intelligence is credulity, and credulity could be enormously diminished by instructions as to the prevalent forms of mendacity. Credulity is a greater evil in the present day than it ever was before, because, owing to the gro"
"Science is what you know, philosophy is what you don't know."
"When one admits that nothing is certain one must, I think, also add that some things are more nearly certain than others."
"I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong."
"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.†"
"I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong."
"If all our happiness is bound up entirely in our personal circumstances it is difficult not to demand of life more than it has to give."
"There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge."
"It is because modern education is so seldom inspired by a great hope that it so seldom achieves great results. The wish to preserve the past rather than the hope of creating the future dominates the minds of those who control the teaching of the young."
"Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom, in the pursuit of truth as in the endeavour after a worthy manner of life."
"Many people would rather die than think; in fact, most do."
"Everything is vague to a degree you do not realize till you have tried to make it precise."
"Men are born ignorant, not stupid. They are made stupid by education."