Bertrand Russell: War Will Abolish Man

There are many great minds and philosophers discussed in our book and also discussed in class. People from Aristotle to Socrates That really paved the way for people in our generation.

I decided to pick someone that was a pioneer for philosophy just like these gentleman mentioned previous, and that is Bertrand Russell. Russell was a great thinker, philosopher, and even a mathematician. He was never shy to take a viewpoint on any matter, sometimes his viewpoints even changed which is one thing I find very admirable of Mr. Russell, he was always welcoming of different points and could be persuaded if he felt as if he may be wrong and or lacking correct information. Living from 1872-1970 he had a very full life of a miraculous ninety eight years.

He once said, “Either man will abolish war, or war will abolish man.” This is very direct and to the point that he is trying to make that society needs to get rid of war. While I do see where Mr. Russell is coming from, I feel like war is a part of life and will always be, war is a way for people and countries to show power and also a way for people to be punished for their actions. Without war I believe our world would actually be a more devastating place rather than a more peaceful place because there would not be consequences for the actions of leaders. If you think about World War II and how the allies infiltrated Normandy and took over control of the terror that was going on in Germany, without war who knows, Hitler’s army might still be in power in Germany and taking advantage of millions of people. The argument I make towards Bertrand is that there is always going to be evil in the world, and there will always be people that try to take advantage of others for their own personal gain, while it may take something drastic like World War II to see it, war can bring positive things to the

Russell’s beliefs was that God is not real. This in fact is probably the biggest of his works, many of the videos I watched were interviews with Mr. Russell were in regards to his views on religion. He was very outspoken about and against religion with quotes such as, “Religion is based ... mainly upon fear ... fear of the mysterious, fear of defeat, fear of death. Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand in hand. My own view on religion is that of Lucretius. I regard it as a disease born of fear and as a source of untold misery to the human race.” While he does make some intriguing points about religion, I feel as if much of what he is saying very contradictory. One reason I find him contradicting himself is because the first quote I heard of his, “Philosophy consists of speculation about matters where exact knowledge is not possible.” by saying this Russell is admitting that philosophy as a whole is consisting of speculation, and by that logic would his views on religion be speculation? I do realize on the contrary that he makes a very similar point to that there is no proof of religion, but by what he is saying philosophy is all speculation. Another reason I disagree with his views on religion is the argument posed to us by Aristotle that we talked about in class and that being that, “Anyone that does not believe in God is a fool.” He says this because if you say that you do not