Question 1

What is the best book to start with?

Accepted Answer

The Problems of Philosophy, especially the last chapter, then In Praise of Idleness. One is the philosopher explaining the activity. The other is the public writer, still careful, and often garbled into a proverb he did not need.

Question 2

What is the most famous quote?

Accepted Answer

This library does not measure fame, and it does not rank lines by how often they are shared. The first line it files for Bertrand Russell that is not marked Questionable or Misattributed is “Philosophy is to be studied not for the sake of any definite answers to its questions, since no definite answers can, as a rule, be known to be true, but rather for the sake of the questions themselves.” (The Problems of Philosophy, chapter 15, Well attested).

Question 3

What is the most misquoted line?

Accepted Answer

None of the lines this library files for Bertrand Russell is marked Misattributed or Questionable. That is a fact about these cards, not a certificate that every popular sentence is theirs.

Question 4

What is one key idea, in a sentence?

Accepted Answer

Analysis: Break a problem until the remainder is either logic or a fact you can face.