photo of Bertrand Russell

"The secret of happiness is to face the world is horrible, horrible, horrible."

* * *

"A world full of happiness is not beyond human power to create; the obstacles imposed by inanimate
nature are not insuperable. The real obstacles lie in the heart of man, and the cure for these is a firm
hope, informed and fortified by thought."

* * *

"If there were in the world today any large number of people who desired their own happiness more
than they desired the unhappiness of others, we could have paradise in a few years."

* * *

"It appeared to me obvious that the happiness of mankind should be the aim of all action, and I
discovered to my surprise that there were those who thought otherwise."

* * *

"To be happy in this world, especially when youth is past, it is necessary to feel oneself not merely an
isolated individual whose day will soon be over, but part of the stream of life slowing on from the first
germ to the remote and unknown future."

* * *

"There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge.”

* * *

"Really high-minded people are indifferent to happiness, especially other people's."

* * *

"Nature, even human nature, will cease more and more to be an absolute datum: more and more, it
will become what scientific manipulation has made it."

Bertrand Russell
(1872 - 1970)
[Source: The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell, London, 1961, p. 371]

next




HOME

Utilitarianism
BLTC Research
Future Opioids
Superhappiness?
Utopian Surgery?
The End of Suffering
Wirehead Hedonism
The Good Drug Guide
Paradise Engineering
Quotations on Suffering
Bertrand Russell (Wikipedia)
MDMA: Utopian Pharmacology
Critique of Huxley's Brave New World
The Abolitionist Project (plus podcast)

e-mail
dave@bltc.com