Before I write the last general
entry on Bertrand Russell, let us have some fun with Russell’s aphorisms and my
comments on them.
***
A stupid
man’s report of what a clever man says can never be accurate, as he
unconsciously translates what he hears into something he can understand. I
propose to comment on this one in tandem with the next:
If a man
is offered a fact going against his instincts, he will scrutinize it closely,
and, unless the evidence is overwhelming he will refuse to believe it. If, on
the other hand, he is offered something in accordance to his instincts, he will
accept it on the slightest evidence. Unfortunately this is the way with
ideologies and with government policies, based on them. In this sense, an
ideologue (who does not have to be stupid, to behave stupidly, and otherwise
irresponsibly) is very much like a stupid man: he believes what he wants
to believe with little or trumped-up “evidence,” and interprets the statements
of others at his will.
In all
affairs, it is a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the
things you take for granted. This is the most basic principle of
acquiring knowledge, the Cartesian principle of doubt, which, strangely, but perhaps
naturally, most men (and less surprisingly, women) somehow consistently forego.
Life is
nothing but a competition to be the criminal rather than the victim. A
very profound statement of fact, which ought to be a mandatory subject for
reflection in the school of life, a.k.a. school of skepticism.
Many
people would sooner die than think. In fact, they do so. Just as I said,
echoing Kierkegaard, that the freedom of thought is the rarest form of freedom,
because very few people know how to exercise it.
Our
great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be
honest than a clever man. It is so very
true, particularly of democracies, because solid dictatorships love clever
people, knowing well how to control them.
Passive
acceptance of teacher’s wisdom is easy to most boys and girls. It involves no
effort of independent thought, and seems rational, because the teacher knows
more than his pupils. It is moreover the way to win the favor of the teacher,
unless he is an exceptional man. Yet the habit of passive acceptance is
disastrous in later life. It causes man to seek and accept a leader, and to
accept as a leader whoever is established in that position. This is the
basic problem of public (and private) education. The best educational systems
promote independent thinking in students, whereas such systems as the American
“multiple choice” promote slavish submission to authority and
encourage indoctrination, otherwise known as brainwashing.
The
problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are so sure of themselves,
while the wiser men are so full of doubt. What makes matters worse, in
world democracies, is that the wiser men have less chance for political
advancement than fools and fanatics, the latter seen as less
threatening, by the professional class of political staffers and handlers, who
are the ones who actually run these governments.
The time
you enjoy wasting is not wasted time. This is a terrific insight,
especially in tandem with the next two adages.
To be
able to fill leisure intelligently is the ultimate product of civilization, and
at present very few people have reached this level. Leisure is, indeed,
the most important part of an intelligent person’s life, but on the condition
that it is intelligently filled.
A
symptom of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one’s work is
terribly important. Busy-busy-busy is the outcome of one’s
obsession with the importance of one’s work. It leads to the ruination of
precious leisure, and I believe that a nervous breakdown is not the
worst of the consequences.
Mathematics
may be defined as a subject in which we never know what we are talking about,
nor whether what we are saying is true. I love this dictum, as it
brilliantly summarizes what mathematics is all about. No one who does
not understand this dictum perfectly can amount to anything in mathematics, in
science, or as a thinker in general.
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