Bertrand Russell, "The Retreat from Pythagoras," My Philosophical Development (1959)

I think that the timelessness of mathematics has none of the sublimity that it once seemed to me to have, but consists merely in the fact that the pure mathematician is not talking about time. ...I think that we can ...mirror the world, like Leibniz's monads; and I think it is the duty of the philosopher to make himself as undistorting a mirror as he can. ...to recognize such distortions ...Of these, the most fundamental is that we view the world from the here and now, not with that large impersonality which theists attribute to the Deity. To achieve such impartiality is impossible for us, but we can travel a certain distance towards it. To show the road to this end is the supreme duty of the philosopher.

— Bertrand Russell on Time

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "I think that the timelessness of mathematics has none of the sublimity that it once seemed to me to have, but consists merely in the fact that the pure mathematician is not talking about time. ...I think that we can ...mirror the world, like Leibniz's monads; and I think it is the duty of the philosopher to make himself as undistorting a mirror as he can. ...to recognize such distortions ...Of these, the most fundamental is that we view the world from the here and now, not with that large impersonality which theists attribute to the Deity. To achieve such impartiality is impossible for us, but we can travel a certain distance towards it. To show the road to this end is the supreme duty of the philosopher." in the context of "Bertrand Russell, "The Retreat from Pythagoras," My Philosophical Development (1959)" to mean that wisdom is timeless.

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Bertrand Russell

About Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell (May 18, 1872 – February 2, 1970) was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic. In 1950, he was awarded a Nobel Prize in Literature.