Bertrand russell books pdf free download
A lively and still one of the best introductions to philosophy, this book pays off both a closer reading for students and specialists, and a casual reading for the general public. Is there any knowledge in the world which is so certain that no reasonable man could doubt it? This question, which at first sight might not seem difficult, is really one of the most difficult that can be asked.
When we have realized the obstacles in the way of a straightforward and confident answer, we shall be well launched on the study of philosophy—for philosophy is merely the attempt to answer such ultimate questions, not carelessly and dogmatically, as we do in ordinary life and even in the sciences, but critically, after exploring all that makes such questions puzzling, and after realizing all the vagueness and confusion that underlie our ordinary ideas.
In daily life, we assume a To understand Bolshevism it is not sufficient to know facts; it is necessary also to enter with sympathy or imagination into a new spirit.
The chief thing that the Bolsheviks have done is to create a hope, or at any rate to make strong and widespread a hope which was formerly confined to a few. This aspect of the movement is as easy to grasp at a distance as it is in Russia—perhaps even easier, because in Russia present circumstances tend to obscure the view of the distant future. But the actual situation in Russia can only be understood superficially if we forget the hope which is the motive power of the whole.
Russell left a large assortment of writing. Since adolescence, Russell wrote about 3, words a day, in long hand, with relatively few corrections; his first draft nearly always was his last draft, even on the most complex, technical matters. His previously unpublished work is an immense treasure trove, and scholars are continuing to gain new insights into Russell's thought. Political and social activism occupied much of Russell's time for most of his long life, which 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, writing 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, Ralph Schoenman, then a young firebrand of the radical left.
Russell was never a complete pacifist; in his article on "The Ethics of War", he defended wars of colonization on utilitarian grounds when the side with the more advanced civilization could put the land to better use. However, Russell opposed nearly all wars between modern nations. His activism against British participation in World War I led to fines, the loss of his fellowship at Trinity College, Cambridge, and finally six months in prison.
In Russell called his stance "relative political pacifism"—he held that war was always a great evil, but 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, he supported the policy of appeasement; but by he acknowledged that in order to preserve democracy, Hitler had to be defeated. Russell was opposed to the use and possession of nuclear weapons for most of their existence, but he may not have always been of that opinion.
On November 20, , in a public speech at Westminster School, addressing a gathering arranged by the New Commonwealth, Russell 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. Russell felt this plan "had very great merits and showed considerable generosity, when it is remembered that America still had an unbroken nuclear monopoly. However Nicholas Griffin of McMaster University, in his book The Selected Letters of Bertrand Russell: The Public Years, , has claimed after obtaining a transcript of the speech that Russell's wording implies he didn't advocate the actual use of the atom bomb, but merely its diplomatic use as a massive source of leverage over the actions of the Soviets.
Griffin's interpretation was disputed by Nigel Lawson, the former British Chancellor, who was present at the speech and who claims it was quite clear to the audience that Russell was advocating an actual First Strike.
Whichever interpretation is correct, Russell later relented, instead arguing for mutual disarmament by the nuclear powers, possibly linked to some form of world government. In Russell released the Russell-Einstein Manifesto, co-signed by Albert Einstein and nine other leading scientists and intellectuals, which led to the first of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs in In , Russell became the first president of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.
He resigned two years later when the CND would not support civil disobedience, and formed the Committee of In , when he was in his late eighties, he was imprisoned for a week for inciting civil disobedience, in connection with protests at the Ministry of Defence and Hyde Park.
Increasingly concerned about the potential danger to humanity arising from nuclear weapons and other scientific discoveries, he also joined with Einstein, Oppenheimer, Rotblat and other eminent scientists of the day to establish the World Academy of Art and Science which was formally constituted in Russell made a cameo appearance playing himself in the anti-war Bollywood film "Aman" which was released in India in This was Russell's only appearance in a feature film.
The Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation began work in , in order to carry forward Russell's work for peace, human rights and social justice. Russell was an early critic of the official story in the John F. Kennedy assassination; his "16 Questions on the Assassination" from is still considered a good summary of the apparent inconsistencies in that case.
Russell visited the Soviet Union and met Lenin in , and on his return wrote a critical tract, The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism. He was unimpressed with the result of the Communist revolution, and said he was "infinitely unhappy in this atmosphere—stifled by its utilitarianism, its indifference to love and beauty and the life of impulse.
Politically, Russell envisioned a kind of benevolent, democratic socialism, similar in some ways to yet possessing important differences with the conception promoted by the Fabian Society.
He was strongly critical of Stalin's regime, and of the practices of states proclaiming Marxism and Communism generally. Russell was a consistent enthusiast for democracy and world government, and advocated the establishment of a democratic international government in some of the essays collected in In Praise of Idleness , and also in Has Man a Future?
One who believes as I do, that free intellect is the chief engine of human progress, cannot but be fundamentally opposed to Bolshevism as much as to the Church of Rome.
The hopes which inspire communism are, in the main, as admirable as those instilled by the Sermon on the Mount, but they are held as fanatically and are as likely to do as much harm. For my part, while I am as convinced a Socialist as the most ardent Marxian, I do not regard Socialism as a gospel of proletarian revenge, nor even, primarily , as a means of securing economic justice.
I regard it primarily as an adjustment to machine production demanded by considerations of common sense, and calculated to increase the happiness, not only of proletarians, but of all except a tiny minority of the human race. Modern methods of production have given us the possibility of ease and security for all; we have chosen, instead, to 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, but there is no reason to go on being foolish for ever. As a young man, Russell was a member of the Liberal Party and wrote in favor of free trade and women's suffrage. In his pamphlet, Anti-Suffragist Anxieties , Russell wrote that some men opposed suffrage because they "fear that their liberty to act in ways that are injurious to women will be curtailed.
Russell wrote against Victorian notions of morality. Marriage and Morals 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, and advocated "trial marriages" or "companionate marriage", formalised 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, but 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, but 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, if they had children. This reflected his life at the time - his second wife Dora was openly having an affair, and would soon become pregnant by another man, but Russell was keen for their children John and Kate to have a "normal" family life.
Russell's private life was even more unconventional and freewheeling than his published writings revealed, but that was not well known at the time. For example, philosopher Sidney Hook reports that Russell often spoke of his sexual prowess and of his various conquests.
Some critics of Russell have pointed out racist passages in his early writings, as well as his initial praise for scientific eugenics. On November 16, , for instance, he 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 difficulties keeping the "coloured races" in their home countries and pointing out that at some point the pressure would become too great and immigration barriers would fall.
His remarks anticipated the population control movement of the s and the role of the United Nations. This policy may last some time, but 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, that 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, so the best we can do is to hope that those nations will see the wisdom of Birth Control We need a strong international authority.
Bertrand Russell", Birth Control News, vol 1, no. In another example, in early editions of his book Marriage and Morals he asserted:. In extreme cases there can be little doubt of the superiority of one race to another It seems on the whole fair to regard negroes as on the average inferior to white men, although for work in the tropics they are indispensable, so that their extermination apart from questions of humanity would be highly undesirable.
Later in his life, when eugenics had become less fashionable, Russell criticized eugenic programs for their vulnerability to corruption, and, by , he was to condemn the "unwarranted assumption" that "Negroes are congenitally inferior to white men" Education and the Social Order , Chap. Racism rapidly declined in acceptance throughout the second half of the 20th century. In fact, Russell seems to have been one of the leaders of change in this sphere.
It is sometimes maintained that racial mixture is biologically undesirable. There is no evidence whatever for this view. Nor is there, apparently, any reason to think that Negroes are congenitally less intelligent than white people, but as to that it will be difficult to judge until they have equal scope and equally good social conditions. There is a much later condemnation-in-passing of racism in Russell's "16 Questions on the Assassination" , in which he mentions "Senator Russell of Georgia and Congressman Boggs of Louisiana This is a selected bibliography of Russell's books in English sorted by year of first publication.
Note: This is a mere sampling, for Russell also authored many pamphlets, introductions, articles and letters to the editor. His works also can be found in any number of anthologies and collections, perhaps most notably, The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell , which McMaster University began publishing in This collection of his shorter and previously unpublished works is now up to 16 volumes, and many more are forthcoming.
An additional 3 volumes catalogue just his bibliography. The Russell Archives at McMaster also have more than 30, letters that he wrote. Bertrand Russell.
Bertrand Russell books and biography. Biography Click to expand. Collection of work Click to close. Sponsored Links. If you see a Google Drive link instead of source url, means that the file witch you will get after approval is just a summary of original book or the file has been already removed.
Loved each and every part of this book. I will definitely recommend this book to philosophy, non fiction lovers. Your Rating:. Your Comment:. Search icon An illustration of a magnifying glass. User icon An illustration of a person's head and chest. Sign up Log in. Web icon An illustration of a computer application window Wayback Machine Texts icon An illustration of an open book.
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