4 ms·
So you reckon EO's calling him "Peeping Tom Bertrand Russell" because in one of his essays he calls a particular view of God a "Peeping Tom"? That would be ...
by gjm11 7y ago
So you reckon EO's calling him "Peeping Tom Bertrand Russell" because in one of his essays he calls a particular view of God a "Peeping Tom"? That would be ... strange, but I suppose you might well be right.
(I'm familiar with that essay, but didn't make the connection because, well, the fact that someone uses a particular phrase once isn't any reason to apply it at random to them in turn.)
Incidentally, I'm not sure it's exactly right to say that Russell started out doing good technical work in philosophy and then turned later on to anti-theism. E.g., A Free Man's Worship (not exactly anti-theism, but in the same ballpark) is two years before On Denoting (the paper introducing his account of definite descriptions).