Bertrand Russell

British philosopher and logician (1872–1970)

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Momentum10.6
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Lived 1872–1970, aged 98United Kingdom

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Wikipedia
128 languages
Cross-language footprint
Global rank
#211
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Era
1872–1970
Aged 98
Known for
The Threatening Sky
1966

Summary

Updated 2026-08-13

A philosopher who tried to prove all of mathematics could be built from pure logic, then spent the rest of his long life in and out of prison cells and protest movements, winning the Nobel Prize not for his technical work but for being willing to change his mind in public.

Biography

About

Bertrand Russell graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge in 1893 and became one of the early 20th century's prominent logicians, leading the British "revolt against idealism" alongside G. E. Moore. With Alfred North Whitehead he wrote Principia Mathematica, a landmark attempt to reduce mathematics to logic, and his article "On Denoting" became a paradigm of analytic philosophy. He went to prison during the First World War for pacifism, initially supported appeasing Nazi Germany before reversing course in 1943, then after 1945 welcomed American hegemony even at nuclear cost before turning aga…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Russell

said28 Dec 1902

Philosophy seems to me on the whole a rather hopeless business.

— Letter to Gilbert Murray, December 28, 1902

Bertrand Russell

said25 Nov 1902

Only in thought is man a God; in action and desire we are the slaves of circumstance.

— Letter to Lucy Donnely, November 25, 1902

Bertrand Russell

said6 Jul 1902

What a monstrous thing that a University should teach journalism! I thought that was only done at Oxford. This respect for the filthy multitude is ruining civilisation.

— Letter to Lucy Martin Donnely, July 6, 1902

Bertrand Russell

said1894

Thee will find out in time that I have a great love of professing vile sentiments, I don't know why, unless it springs from long efforts to avoid priggery.

— Letter to Alys Pearsall Smith (1894). Smith was a Quaker, thus the archaic use of "Thee" in this and other letters to her.

Bertrand Russell

said1893

I am looking forward very much to getting back to Cambridge, and being able to say what I think and not to mean what I say: two things which at home are impossible.

— Letter to Alys Pearsall Smith (1893); published in The Selected Letters of Bertrand Russell, Volume 1: The Private Years (1884–1914),

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