Free Thought and Official Propaganda Quotes

“Education should have two objects: first, to give definite knowledge—reading and writing, languages and mathematics, and so on; secondly, to create those mental habits which will enable people to acquire knowledge and form sound judgments for themselves.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“It is clear that the most elementary condition, if thought is to be free, is the absence of legal penalties for the expression of opinions. No great country has yet reached to this level, although most of them think they have.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“William James used to preach the “will to believe.” For
my part, I should wish to preach the “will to doubt.” None
of our beliefs are quite true; all have at least a penumbra of
vagueness and error. The methods of increasing the degree of
truth in our beliefs are well known; they consist in hearing all
sides, trying to ascertain all the relevant facts, controlling our
own bias by discussion with people who have the opposite
bias, and cultivating a readiness to disregard any hypothesis
which has proved inadequate…
In religion and politics, on the contrary, though there is
as yet nothing approaching scientific knowledge, everybody
considers it de rigueur to have a dogmatic opinion, to be
backed up by inflicting starvation, prison, and war, and to
be carefully guarded from argumentative competition with
any different opinion.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“It is clear that thought is not free if the profession of certain opinions makes it impossible to earn a living. It is clear also that thought is not free if all the arguments on one side of a controversy are perpetually presented as attractively as possible, while the arguments on the other side can only be discovered by diligent search. Both these obstacles exist in every large country known to me, except China, which is the last refuge of freedom.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“If there is to be toleration in the world, one of the things taught in schools must be the habit of weighing evidence, and the practice of not giving full assent to propositions which there is no reason to believe true. For example, the art of reading the newspapers should be taught. The schoolmaster should select some incident which happened a good many years ago, and roused political passions in its day. 41 He should then read to the school children what was said by the newspapers on one side, what was said by those on the other, and some impartial account of what really happened. He should show how, from the biased account of either side, a practised reader could infer what really happened, and he should make them understand that everything in newspapers is more or less untrue. The cynical scepticism which would result from this teaching would make the children in later life immune from those appeals to idealism by which decent people are induced to further the schemes of scoundrels.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“Our system of education turns young people out of the schools able to read, but for the most part unable to weigh evidence or to form an independent opinion. They are then assailed, throughout the rest of their lives, by statements designed to make them believe all sorts of absurd propositions, such as that Blank’s pills cure all ills, that Spitzbergen is warm and fertile, and that Germans eat corpses.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“methods of increasing the degree of truth in our beliefs are well known; they consist in hearing all sides, trying to ascertain all the relevant facts, controlling our own bias by discussion with people who have the opposite bias, and cultivating a readiness to discard any hypothesis which has proved inadequate.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“If there is to be toleration in the world, one of the things taught in schools must be the habit of weighing evidence, and the practice of not giving full assent to propositions which there is no reason to believe true. For example, the art of reading the newspapers should be taught. The schoolmaster should select some incident which happened a good many years ago, and roused political passions in its day. 41 He should then read to the school children what was said by the newspapers on one side, what was said by those on the other, and some impartial account of what really happened. He should show how, from the biased account of either side, a practised reader could infer what really happened, and he should make them understand that everything in newspapers is more or less untrue. The cynical scepticism which would result from this teaching would make the children in later life immune from those appeals to idealism by which decent people are induced to further the schemes of scoundrels”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“Religious toleration, to a certain extent, has been won
because people have ceased to consider religion so important
as it was once thought to be. But in politics and economics,
which have taken the place formerly occupied by religion,
there is a growing tendency to persecution, which is not by
any means confined to one party.

The persecution of opinion
in Russia is more severe than in any capitalist country. I met
in Petrograd an eminent Russian poet, Alexander Block,
who has since died as the result of privations. The Bolsheviks
allowed him to teach aesthetics, but he complained that they
insisted on his teaching the subject “from a Marxian point
of view.” He had been at a loss to discover how the theory of
rhythmics was connected with Marxism, although, to avoid
starvation, he had done his best to find out..

The examples of America and Russia illustrate the
conclusion to which we seem to be driven — namely, that so
long as men continue to have the present fanatical belief in
the importance of politics free thought on political matters
will be impossible, and there is only too much danger that the
lack of freedom will spread to all other matters, as it has done
in Russia. Only some degree of political skepticism can save
us from this misfortune.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“. For example, the art of reading the newspapers should be taught. The schoolmaster should select some incident which happened a good many years ago, and roused political passions in its day. He should then read to the school children what was said by the newspapers on one side, what was said by those on the other, and some impartial account of what really happened. He should show how, from the biased account of either side, a practised reader could infer what really happened, and he should make them understand that everything in newspapers is more or less untrue. The cynical scepticism which would result from this teaching would make the children in later life immune from those appeals to idealism by which decent people are induced to further the schemes of scoundrels.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“Only the guardians, in Plato’s language, are to think; the rest are to obey, or to follow leaders like a herd of sheep. This doctrine, often unconsciously, has survived the introduction of political democracy, and has radically vitiated all national systems of education.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“The persecution of opinion in Russia is more severe than in any capitalist country. I met in Petrograd an eminent Russian poet, Alexander Block, who has since died as the result of privations. The Bolsheviks allowed him to teach æsthetics, but he complained that they insisted on his teaching the subject “from a Marxian point of view.” He had been at a loss to discover how the theory of rhythmics was connected with Marxism, although, to avoid starvation, he had done his best to find out. Of course, it has been impossible in Russia ever since the Bolsheviks came into power to print anything critical of the dogmas upon which their regime is founded.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“Men would be chosen for jobs on account of fitness to do the work, not because they flattered the irrational dogmas of those in power.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“We may say that thought is free when it is exposed to free competition among beliefs—i.e., when all beliefs are able to state their case, and no legal or pecuniary advantages or disadvantages attach to beliefs. This is an ideal which, for various reasons, can never be fully attained. But it is possible to approach very much nearer to it than we do at present.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“The opinions which are still persecuted strike the majority as so monstrous and immoral that the general principle of toleration cannot be held to apply to them. But this is exactly the same view as that which made possible the tortures of the Inquisition.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“William James used to preach the “will to believe.” For my part, I should wish to preach the “will to doubt.” None of our beliefs are quite true; all have at least a penumbra of vagueness and error.”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda

“children”
― Bertrand Russell, Free Thought and Official Propaganda