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If One Holds These High Principles Clearly Before One's Eyes, And Compares Them With The Life And Spirit Of Our Times, Then It Appears Glaringly That Civilized Mankind Finds Itself At Present In Grave Danger. In The Totalitarian States It Is The Rulers Themselves Who Strive Actually To Destroy That Spirit Of Humanity. In Less Threatened Parts It Is Nationalism And Intolerance, As Well As The Oppression Of The Individuals By Economic Means, Which Threaten To Choke These Most Precious Traditions.

-Albert Einstein

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If One Holds These

Albert Einstein

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If One Holds These High Principles Clearly Before One's Eyes, And Compares Them With The Life And Spirit Of Our Times, Then It Appears Glaringly That Civilized Mankind Finds Itself At Present In Grave Danger. In The Totalitarian States It Is The Rulers Themselves Who Strive Actually To Destroy That Spirit Of Humanity. In Less Threatened Parts It Is Nationalism And Intolerance, As Well As The Oppression Of The Individuals By Economic Means, Which Threaten To Choke These Most Precious Traditions.

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Scientists Investigate That Which Already Is; Engineers Create That Which Has Never Been.

One Is Born Into A Herd Of Buffaloes And Must Be Glad If One Is Not Trampled Under Foot Before One's Time.

Where You See Difficulty, I See Opportunity.

A Man's Value To The Community Primarily Depends On How Far His Feelings, Thoughts, And Actions Are Directed Towards Promoting The Good Of His Fellows.

Our Death Is Not An End If We Can Live On In Our Children And The Younger Generation. For They Are Us; Our Bodies Are Only Wilted Leaves On The Tree Of Life.

Nature Conceals Her Mystery By Her Essential Grandeur.

This Crippling Of Individuals I Consider The Worst Evil Of Capitalism. Our Whole Educational System Suffers From This Evil. An Exaggerated Competitive Attitude Is Inculcated Into The Student, Who Is Trained To Worship Acquisitive Success As A Preparation For His Future.

Please Explain The Problem To Me Slowly, As I Do Not Understand Things Quickly.

Generations To Come Will Scarce Believe That Such A One As This Ever In Flesh And Blood Walked Upon This Earth. (said Of Mahatma Gandhi)

Don't Listen To Their Words, Fix Your Attention On Their Deeds.

Our Lives Will Be Measured By What We Do For Others

You Are Right In Speaking Of The Moral Foundations Of Science, But You Cannot Turn Around And Speak Of The Scientific Foundations Of Morality.

What Interests Me Most Is Whether God Could Have Made The World Differently.

I Have Firmly Decided To Bite The Dust With A Minimum Of Medical Assistance When My Time Comes, And Up To Then To Sin To My Wicked Heart's Content.

There Is, Fortunately, A Minority Composed Of Those Who Recognize Early In Their Lives That The Most Beautiful And Satisfying Experiences Open To Humankind Are Not Derived From The Outside, But Are Bound Up With The Development Of The Individual's Own Feeling, Thinking And Acting. The Genuine Artists, Investigators And Thinkers Have Always Been Persons Of This Kind. However Inconspicuously The Life Of These Individuals Runs Its Course, None The Less The Fruits Of Their Endeavors Are The Most Valuable Contributions Which One Generation Can Make To Its Successors.

Einstein Was Once Asked How Many Feet Are In A Mile. Einstein's Reply Was "i Don't Know, Why Should I Fill My Brain With Facts I Can Find In Two Minutes In Any Standard Reference Book?

Imagination Is The Most Powerful Force In The Universe.

The High Destiny Of The Individual Is To Serve Rather Than To Rule.

The Only Race I Know Is The Human One.

There Is No Place In This New Kind Of Physics Both For The Field And Matter, For The Field Is The Only Reality.

The Whole Of Science Is Nothing More Than A Refinement Of Everyday Thinking.

Everything You Can Imagine, Nature Has Already Created.

Then There Are The Fanatical Atheists Whose Intolerance Is Of The Same Kind As The Intolerance Of The Religious Fanatics And Comes From The Same Source.

All The Fifty Years Of Conscious Brooding Have Brought Me No Closer To Answer The Question, "what Are Light Quanta?" Of Course Today Every Rascal Thinks He Knows The Answer, But He Is Deluding Himself.

Overemphasis Of The Competitive System And Premature Specialization On The Ground Of Immediate Usefulness Kill The Spirit On Which All Cultural Life Depends, Specialized Knowledge Included.

Small Is The Number Of Them That See With Their Own Eyes And Feel With Their Own Hearts.

I Have No Special Talent. I Am Only Passionately Curious. The Important Thing Is To Not Stop Questioning. Curiousity Has Its Own Reason For Existing.

There Is, However, One Other Human Right Which Is Infrequently Mentioned But Which Seems To Be Destined To Become Very Important: This Is The Right, Or The Duty, Of The Individual To Abstain From Cooperating In Activities Which He Considers Wrong Or Pernicious.

[ernest Rutherford Is]...a Second Newton.

Loving Is Not Just Looking At Each Other, It's Looking In The Same Direction. -antoine De Saint-exupéry, “you Are Blessed Doublee If You Are In Love” - Honeya “gravitation Is Not Responsible For People Falling In Love.

Falling In Love

If At First The Idea Is Not Absurd, Then There Is No Hope For It.

I Have Never Belonged Wholeheartedly To A Country, A State, Nor To A Circle Of Friends, Nor Even To My Own Family. When I Was Still A Rather Precocious Young Man, I Already Realized Most Vividly The Futility Of The Hopes And Aspirations That Most Men Pursue Throughout Their Lives. Well-being And Happiness Never Appeared To Me As An Absolute Aim. I Am Even Inclined To Compare Such Moral Aims To The Ambitions Of A Pig.

Life Is Like Riding A Bicycle. If You Want To Stay Balanced You've Got To Keep Moving Forward.

My Relationship To The Jewish People Has Become My Strongest Human Bond, Ever Since I Became Fully Aware Of Our Precarious Situation Among The Nations Of The World.

Genius Is 1% Talent And 99% Percent Hard Work.

One Cannot Help But Be In Awe When [one] Contemplates The Mysteries Of Eternity, Of Life, Of The Marvelous Structure Of Reality.

The Bitter And The Sweet Come From The Outside, The Hard From Within, From One's Own Efforts.

It Would Of Course Be A Great Step Forward If We Succeeded In Combining The Gravitational Field And The Electromagnetic Field Into A Single Structure. Only So Could The Era In Theoretical Physics Inaugurated By Faraday And James Clerk Maxwell Be Brought To A Satisfactory Close.

Theoretical Physics

I Have Never Belonged Wholeheartedly To Country Or State, To My Circle Of Friends Or Even To My Own Family... Such Isolation Is Sometimes Bitter, But I Do Not Regret Being Cut Off From The Understanding And Sympathy Of Other Men. I Lose Something By It,to Be Sure, But I Am Compensated For It In Being Rendered Independent Of The Customs, Opinions And Prejudices Of Others, And Am Not Tempted To Rest My Peace Of Mind Upon Such Shifting Foundations.

I Think And Think For Months And Years. Ninety-nine Times, The Conclusion Is False. The Hundredth Time I Am Right.

The Important Thing Is Not To Stop Questioning. Curiosity Has Its Own Reason For Existing. One Cannot Help But Be In Awe When He Contemplates The Mysteries Of Eternity, Of Life, Of The Marvelous Structure Of Reality. It Is Enough If One Tries Merely To Comprehend A Little Of This Mystery Every Day. Never Lose A Holy Curiosity.

The Relativity Principle In Connection With The Basic Maxwellian Equations Demands That The Mass Should Be A Direct Measure Of The Energy Contained In A Body; Light Transfers Mass. With Radium There Should Be A Noticeable Diminution Of Mass. The Idea Is Amusing And Enticing; But Whether The Almighty Is Laughing At It And Is Leading Me Up The Garden Path -- That I Cannot Know.

Learning Is The Beginning Of Wealth. Searching And Learning Is Where The Miracle Process All Begins. The Great Breakthrough In Your Life Comes When You Realize It That You Can Learn Anything You Need To Learn To Accomplish Any Goal That You Set For Yourself. This Means There Are No Limits On What You Can Be, Have Or Do.

Non-comprehenders Are Often Distressed. Not You, Though-because With Good Humor You're Blessed. After All, Your Thoughts Went Like This, I Dare Say: It Was None But The Lord Who Made Us That Way.

To Sense That Behind Anything That Can Be Experienced There Is A Something That Our Mind Cannot Grasp And Whose Beauty And Sublimity Reaches Us Only Indirectly And As A Feeble Reflection, This Is Religiousness. In This Sense I Am Religious.

But Science Can Only Be Created By Those Who Are Thoroughly Imbued With The Aspiration Toward Truth And Understanding. This Source Of Feeling, However, Springs From The Sphere Of Religion. To This There Also Belongs The Faith In The Possibility That The Regulations Valid For The World Of Existence Are Rational, That Is, Comprehensible To Reason. I Cannot Conceive Of A Genuine Scientist Without That Profound Faith. The Situation May Be Expressed By An Image: Science Without Religion Is Lame, Religion Without Science Is Blind.

Ethical Axioms Are Found And Tested Not Very Differently From The Axioms Of Science. Truth Is What Stands The Test Of Experience.

The Years Of Searching In The Dark For A Truth That One Feels But Cannot Express, The Intense Desire And The Alternations Of Confidence And Misgiving Until One Breaks Through To Clarity And Understanding, Are Known Only To Him Who Has Experienced Them Himself.

I Think That A Particle Must Have A Separate Reality Independent Of The Measurements. That Is An Electron Has Spin, Location And So Forth Even When It Is Not Being Measured. I Like To Think That The Moon Is There Even If I Am Not Looking At It.

In The Past It Never Occurred To Me That Every Casual Remark Of Mine Would Be Snatched Up And Recorded. Otherwise I Would Have Crept Further Into My Shell.

I Believe That Whoever Tries To Think Things Through Honestly Will Soon Recognize How Unworthy And Even Fatal Is The Traditional Bias Against Negroes. What Can The Man Of Good Will Do To Combat This Deeply Rooted Prejudice? He Must Have The Courage To Set An Example By Words And Deed, And Must Watch Lest His Children Become Influenced By Racial Bias.

Unless The Cause Of Peace Based On Law Gathers Behind It The Force And Zeal Of A Religion, It Hardly Can Hope To Succeed.

As An Elderly Man, I Have Remained Estranged From The Society Here.

While It Is True That Science, To The Extent Of Its Grasp Of Causative Connections, May Reach Important Conclusions As To The Compatibility And Incompatibility Of Goals And Evaluations, The Independent And Fundamental Definitions Regarding Goals And Values Remain Beyond Science's Reach.

This Is Too Difficult For A Mathematician. It Takes A Philosopher. The Hardest Thing In The World To Understand Is The Income Tax.

Only A Life Lived For Others Is A Life Worth While . I Have No Special Gift. I Am Only Passionately Curious . I Want To Know God's Thoughts... All The Rest Are Details. Joy In Looking And Comprehending Is Nature's Most Beautiful Gift. It's Not That I'm So Smart , It's Just That I Stay With Problems Longer.

Since Our Inner Experiences Consist Of Reproductions, And Combinations Of Sensory Impressions, The Concept Of A Soul Without A Body Seem To Me To Be Empty And Devoid Of Meaning.

Out Yonder There Is This Huge World, Which Exists Independently Of Us Human Beings And Which Stands Before Us Like A Great, Eternal Riddle, At Least Partially Accessible To Our Inspection And Thinking

It Is High Time The Ideal Of Success Should Be Replaced With The Ideal Of Service.

The Tyranny Of The Ignoramuses Is Insurmountable And Assured For All Time.

Mere Unbelief In A Personal God Is No Philosophy At All.

When I Think Of The Most Able Students I Have Encountered In My Teaching - I Mean Those Who Have Distinguished Themselves Not Only By Skill But By Independence Of Thought - Then I Must Confess That All Have Had A Lively Interest In Epistemology.

I Am Not Only A Pacifist But A Militant Pacifist. I Am Willing To Fight For Peace. Nothing Will End War Unless The People Themselves Refuse To Go To War.

No Amount Of Experimentation Can Ever Prove Me Right; A Single Experiment Can Prove Me Wrong.

The Really Good Music, Whether Of The East Or Of The West, Cannot Be Analyzed.

Time And Space Are Modes By Which We Think And Not Conditions In Which We Live.

The War Is Won, But The Peace Is Not.

A Thousand Things Can Prove Me Right And One Can Prove Me Wrong.

My Scientific Work Is Motivated By An Irresistible Longing To Understand The Secrets Of Nature Not By Other Feelings.

Thus I Came...to A Deep Religiosity, Which, However, Reached An Abrupt End At The Age Of 12. Through The Reading Of Popular Scientific Books I Soon Reached A Conviction That Much In The Stories Of The Bible Could Not Be True....suspicion Against Every Kind Of Authority Grew Out Of This Experience...an Attitude Which Has Never Left Me.

The Contemplation Of This World Beckoned As A Liberation (...)the Road To This Paradise Was Not As Comfortable And Alluring As The Road To The Religious Paradise; But It Has Shown Itself Reliable, And I Have Never Regretted Having Chosen It.

At Present Every Coachman And Every Waiter Argues About Whether Or Not The Relativity Theory Is Correct.

The Rest Of My Life (as A 39 Year Old) I Want To Reflect On What Life Is.

A Problem Cannot Be Solved At The Level Of Consciousness In Which It Occurs.

The Mere Formulation Of A Problem Is Far More Essential Than Its Solution, Which May Be Merely A Matter Of Mathematical Or Experimental Skills. To Raise New Questions, New Possibilities, To Regard Old Problems From A New Angle Requires Creative Imagination And Marks Real Advances In Science.

I Believe, Indeed, That Overemphasis On The Purely Intellectual Attitude, Often Directed Solely To The Practical And Factual, In Our Education, Has Led Directly To The Impairment Of Ethical Values. I Am Not Thinking So Much Of The Dangers With Which Technical Progress Has Directly Confronted Mankind, As Of The Stifling Of Mutual Human Considerations By A 'matter-of-fact' Habit Of Thought Which Has Come To Lie Like A Killing Frost Upon Human Relations. Without 'ethical Culture' There Is No Salvation For Humanity.

The Single Most Important Decision Any Of Us Will Ever Make Is Whether Or Not To Believe The Universe Is Friendly.

I Prefer To Make Up My Own Quotes And Attribute Them To Very Smart People, So That I Can Use Them To Win Arguments

The Bigotry Of The Nonbeliever Is For Me Nearly As Funny As The Bigotry Of The Believer.

Matter Is Real To My Senses, But They Aren't Trustworthy. If Galileo Or Copernicus Had Accepted What They Saw, They Would Never Have Discovered The Movement Of The Earth And Planets.

My Feeling Is Religious Insofar As I Am Imbued With The Consciousness Of The Insufficiency Of The Human Mind To Understand More Deeply The Harmony Of The Universe Which We Try To Formulate As "laws Of Nature".

Memory Is Deceptive Because It Is Colored By Today's Events.

E=mc2. Energy Equals Mass Times The Speed Of Light Squared. The Original Statement Is: If A Body Gives Off The Energy L In The Form Of Radiation, Its Mass Diminishes By L/c2. Ist Die Tragheit Eines Korpers Von Seinem Energieghalt Abhangig? 1905

A Mathematical Equation Stands Forever.

Mathematical Equations

If They Want To See Me, Here I Am. If They Want To See My Clothes, Open My Closet And Show Them My Suits.

A Man Should Look For What Is, And Not For What He Thinks Should Be.

In The Middle Of Every Difficulty Lies Opportunity.

Had I Known That The Germans Would Not Succeed In Producing An Atomic Bomb, I Would Not Have Lifted A Finger.

Nothing Happens Til Something Moves.

It Is My Conviction That Killing Under The Cloak Of War Is Nothing But An Act Of Murder.

Killing Someone

You Teach Me Baseball And I'll Teach You Relativity...no We Must Not. You Will Learn About Relativity Faster Than I Learn Baseball.

There Is Nothing Divine About Morality; It Is A Purely Human Affair. If People Are Good Only Because They Fear Punishment, And Hope For Reward, Then We Are A Sorry Lot Indeed. What The Individual Can Do Is To Give A Fine Example, And To Have The Courage To Uphold Ethical Values .. In A Society Of Cynics.

Overpopulation In Various Countries Has Become A Serious Threat To The Health Of People And A Grave Obstacle To Any Attempt To Organise Peace On This Planet

Enough For Me Is The Mystery Of The Eternity Of Life, And The Inkling Of The Marvelous Structure Of Reality. There Is In This Neither A Will Nor A Goal, Nor A Must, But Only Sheer Being.

Eternity Of Life

Human Knowledge And Skills Alone Cannot Lead Humanity To A Happy And Dignified Life. Humanity Has Every Reason To Place The Proclaimers Of High Moral Standards And Values Above The Discoverers Of Objective Truth.

Opening Your Mind

I Believe In Intuition And Inspiration...at Times I Feel Certain I Am Right While Not Knowing The Reason.

Man, Surrounded By Facts, Permitting Himself No Surprise, No Intuitive Flash, No Great Hypothesis, No Risk, Is In A Locked Cell. Ignorance Cannot Seal The Mind And Imagination More Securely.

The Greatest Scientists Are Artists As Well.

Don't Let Your Brain Interfere With Your Heart.

All Conditions And All Circumstances In Our Lives Are A Result Of A Certain Level Of Thinking. If We Want To Change The Conditions And Circumstances, We Have To Change The Level Of Thinking That Is Responsible For It.

Intelligence Makes Clear To Us The Interrelationship Of Means And Ends. But Mere Thinking Cannot Give Us A Sense Of The Ultimate And Fundamental Ends. To Make Clear These Fundamental Ends And Valuations And To Set Them Fast In The Emotional Life Of The Individual, Seems To Me Precisely The Most Important Function Which Religion Has To Form In The Social Life Of Man.

You Cannot Beat A Roulette Table Unless You Steal Money From It.

I Believe, Indeed, That Overemphasis On The Purely Intellectual Attitude, Often Directed Solely To The Practical And Factual, In Our Education, Has Led Directly To The Impairment Of Ethical Values.

If The Believers Of The Present-day Religions Would Earnestly Try To Think And Act In The Spirit Of The Founders Of These Religions Then No Hostility On The Basis Of Religion Would Exist Among The Followers Of The Different Faiths. Even The Conflicts And The Realm Of Religion Would Be Exposed As Insignificant.

Philosophy Is Empty If It Isn't Based On Science. Science Discovers, Philosophy Interprets.

Every Thoughtful, Well-meaning And Conscientious Human Being Should Assume In Time Of Peace, The Solemn And Unconditional Obligation Not To Participate In Any War, For Any Reason Or To Lend Support Of Any Kind, Whether Direct Or Indirect.

I Do Not Believe That Civilization Will Be Wiped Out In A War Fought With The Atomic Bomb. Perhaps Two-thirds Of The People Of The Earth Will Be Killed.

I Believe In Standardizing Automobiles, Not Human Beings.

Why Do People Speak Of Great Men In Terms Of Nationality? Great Germans, Great Englishmen? Goethe Always Protested Against Being Called A German Poet. Great Men Are Simply Men And Are Not To Be Considered From The Point Of View Of Nationality, Nor Should The Environment In Which They Were Brought Up Be Taken Into Account.

Without Deep Reflection One Knows From Daily Life That One Exists For Other People.

I Want To Know All Gods Thoughts; All The Rest Are Just Details.

The Work On Satisfactory Formulation Of Technical Patents Was A True Blessing For Me. It Compelled Me To Be Many-sided In Thought, And Also Offered Important Stimulation For Thought About Physics. Following A Practical Profession Is A Blessing For People Of My Type. Because The Academic Career Puts A Young Person In A Sort Of Compulsory Situation To Produce Scientific Papers In Impressive Quantity, A Temptation To Superficiality Arises That Only Strong Characters Are Able To Resist.

The Difference Between What The Most And The Least Learned People Know Is Inexpressibly Trivial In Relation To That Which Is Unknown.

Creativity Is Seeing What Others See And Thinking What No One Else Has Ever Thought.

It Would Seem That Men Always Need Some Idiotic Fiction In The Name Of Which They Can Hate One Another. Once It Was Religion. Now It Is The State.

The Ideals Which Have Lighted My Way, And Time After Time Have Given Me New Courage To Face Life Cheerfully, Have Been Kindness, Beauty, And Truth. Without The Sense Of Kinship With Men Of Like Mind, Without The Occupation With The Objective World, The Eternally Unattainable In The Field Of Art And Scientific Endeavors, Life Would Have Seemed To The Empty. The Trite Objects Of Human Efforts — Possessions, Outward Success, Luxury—have Always Seemed To Me Contemptible.

One Should Never Impose One's Views On A Problem; One Should Rather Study It, And In Time A Solution Will Reveal Itself.

Creative Solutions

My Only Refuge, As A Serious Young Man, From The Despair Of My Financial Burden To My Family, Is That I Did Everything I Could To Never Permit Myself Any Amusements Or Diversions Except Those Afforded By My Studies.

Generations To Come Will Find It Difficult To Believe That A Man Such As Gandhi Ever Walked The Face Of This Earth.

If The Rabble Continues To Occupy Itself With You, Then Simply Don't Read That Hogwash, But Rather Leave It For The Reptile From Whom It Has Been Fabricated.

If I Were Wrong, Wouldn't One Be Enough?

I Am Happy Because I Want Nothing From Anyone. I Do Not Care For Money. Decorations, Titles Or Distinctions Mean Nothing To Me. I Do Not Crave Praise. The Only Thing That Gives Me Pleasure, Apart From My Work, My Violin And My Sailboat, Is The Appreciation Of My Fellow Workers.

How Can It Be That Mathematics, Being After All A Product Of Human Thought Which Is Independent Of Experience, Is So Admirably Appropriate To The Objects Of Reality?

To A Student: Dear Miss - I Have Read About Sixteen Pages Of Your Manuscript . . . I Suffered Exactly The Same Treatment At The Hands Of My Teachers Who Disliked Me For My Independence And Passed Over Me When They Wanted Assistants. . . . Keep Your Manuscript For Your Sons And Daughters, In Order That They May Derive Consolation From It And Not Give A Damn For What Their Teachers Tell Them Or Think Of Them. . . . There Is Too Much Education Altogether.

Marie Curie Is, Of All Celebrated Beings, The Only One Whom Fame Has Not Corrupted.

About Newton: Nature To Him Was An Open Book, Whose Letters He Could Read Without Effort.

The More I Learn, The More I Realize I Don't Know.

Nothing Truly Valuable Arises From Ambition Or From A Mere Sense Of Duty; It Stems Rather From Love And Devotion Towards Men And Towards Objective Things.

It Is Our American Habit If We Find The Foundations Of Our Educational Structure Unsatisfactory To Add Another Story Or Wing. We Find It Easier To Add A New Study Or Course Or Kind Of School Than To Recognize Existing Conditions So As To Meet The Need. Strangled The Holy Curious Of Inquiry. It Is A Very Grave Mistake To Think That The Enjoyment Of Seeing And Searching Can Be Promoted By Means Of Coercion And A Sense Of Duty.

We Owe A Lot To The Indians, Who Taught Us How To Count, Without Which No Worthwhile Scientific Discovery Could Have Been Made.

Man Like Every Other Animal Is By Nature Indolent. If Nothing Spurs Him On, Then He Will Hardly Think, And Will Behave From Habit Like An Automaton.

Dear Habicht, / Such A Solemn Air Of Silence Has Descended Between Us That I Almost Feel As If I Am Committing A Sacrilege When I Break It Now With Some Inconsequential Babble... / What Are You Up To, You Frozen Whale, You Smoked, Dried, Canned Piece Of Soul...?

The Words Of Language, As They Are Written Or Spoken, Do Not Seem To Play Any Role In My Mechanism Of Thought. The Physical Entities Which Seem To Serve As Elements In Thought Are Certain Signs And More Or Less Clear Images.

To Me It Is Enough To Wonder At The Secrets

The Fear Of Death Is The Most Unjustified Of All Fears, For There's No Risk Of Accident For Someone Who's Dead.

Never Underestimate Your Own Ignorance.

If The Bee Disappeared Off The Surface Of The Globe, Then Man Would Have Only Four Years Of Life Left. No More Bees, No More Pollination, No More Plants, No More Animals, No More Man.

During The Youthful Period Of Mankind's Spiritual Evolution Human Fantasy Created Gods In Man's Own Image, Who, By The Operations Of Their Will Were Supposed To Determine, Or At Any Rate To Influence, The Phenomenal World. Man Sought To Alter The Disposition Of These Gods In His Own Favour By Means Of Magic And Prayer.

Every Reminiscence Is Colored By The Way Things Are Today, And Therefore By A Delusive Point Of View.

The Equation For Ego Is: One Over Knowledge.

Insofar As Mathematics Is True, It Does Not Describe The Real World. Insofar As It Describes The Real World, It Is Not True.

I Do Know That Kind Fate Allowed Me To Find A Couple Of Nice Ideas After Many Years Of Feverish Labor.

The Environment Is Everything That Isn't Me.

If People Are Good Because They Fear Punishment, And Hope For Reward, Then We Are A Sorry Lot Indeed.

To Be Sure, The Doctrine Of A Personal God Interfering With Natural Events Could Never Be Refuted, In The Real Sense, By Science, For This Doctrine Can Always Take Refuge In Those Domains In Which Scientific Knowledge Has Not Yet Been Able To Set Foot.

If You Took Half Of Something And Continued To Take Half Of That Half And So On, You Would Never Reach An End.

Hope That Justice Will Be Done To Those Brave Men Who Stood Up For Their Convictions.

The Release Of Atomic Power Has Changed Everything Except Our Way Of Thinking ... The Solution To This Problem Lies In The Heart Of Mankind. If Only I Had Known, I Should Have Become A Watchmaker. (1945)

Matter Is Spirit Reduced To Point Of Visibility.

Scientific Greatness Is Less A Matter Of Intelligence Than Character; If The Scientist Refuses To Compromise Or Accept Incomplete Answers And Persists In Grappling The Most Basic And Difficult Questions.

Difficult Questions

Coincidences Are God's Way Of Staying Anonymous.

I Believe That The Horrifying Deterioration In The Ethical Conduct Of People Today Stems From The Mechanization And Dehumanization Of Our Lives. A Disastrous By-product Of The Development Of The Scientific And Technical Mentality. We Are Guilty. Man Grows Cold Faster Than The Planet He Inhabits.

This Is A Time, When There Seems To Be A Particular Need For Friends Of Wisdom And Truth To Join Together.

Common Sense Is The Collection Of Prejudices Acquired By Age Eighteen.

You Think You Have Troubles With Mathematics . . . I Assure You Mine Are Still Bigger.

Compound Interest Is The Eighth Wonder Of The World. He Who Understands It, Earns It ... He Who Doesn't ... Pays It.

I Believe In Mystery And, Frankly, I Sometimes Face This Mystery With Great Fear. In Other Words, I Think That There Are Many Things In The Universe That We Cannot Perceive Or Penetrate, And That Also We Experience Some Of The Most Beautiful Things In Life Only In A Very Primitive Form. Only In Relation To These Mysteries Do I Consider Myself To Be A Religious Man.

No One Must Think That Newton’s Great Creation Can Be Overthrown In Any Real Sense By This [theory Of Relativity] Or By Any Other Theory. His Clear And Wide Ideas Will For Ever Retain Their Significance As The Foundation On Which Our Modern Conceptions Of Physics Have Been Built.

Creative Energy Is More Critical Than Learning.

The Only Thing More Dangerous Than Ignorance Is Arrogance

All These Constructions And The Laws Connecting Them Can Be Arrived At By The Principle Of Looking For The Mathematically Simplest Concepts And The Link Between Them.

... On Principle, It Is Quite Wrong To Try Founding A Theory On Observable Magnitudes Alone. In Reality The Very Opposite Happens. It Is The Theory Which Decides What We Can Observe.

The World Is A Dangerous Place To Live

Dangerous World

Time And Space Are Not Conditions Of Existence, Time And Space Is A Model For Thinking

We Must Learn To See The World Anew.

It Is The Supreme Art Of The Teacher To Awaken Joy In Creative Expression And Knowledge.

Energy Cannot Be Created Or Destroyed, It Can Only Be Changed From One Form To Another.

Don't Become A Seeker Of Success. Become A Person Of Value.

How I Wish That Somewhere There Existed An Island For Those Who Are Wise And Of Good Will.

Not All Things Worth Counting Are Countable And Not All Things That Count Are Worth Counting.

You Never Fail Until You Stop Trying.

We Scientists, Whose Tragic Destination Has Been To Help In Making The Methods Of Annihilation More Gruesome And More Effective, Must Consider It Our Solemn And Transcendent Duty To Do All In Our Power In Preventing These Weapons From Being Used For The Brutal Purpose For Which They Were Invented.

I Asked Myself Childish Questions And Proceeded To Answer Them.

If I Would Be A Young Man Again And Had To Decide How To Make My Living, I Would Not Try To Become A Scientist Or Scholar Or Teacher. I Would Rather Choose To Be A Plumber Or A Peddler In Hope To Find That Modest Degree Of Independence Still Available Under Present Circumstances.

Since Others Have Explained My Theory, I Can No Longer Understand It Myself.

Any Power Must Be An Enemy Of Mankind Which Enslaves The Individual By Power And By Force, Whether It Arises Under The Fascist Or The Communist Flag. All That Is Valuable In Human Society Depends Upon The Opportunity For Development Accorded To The Individual.

The Future Is Not A Gift-it Is An Achievement.

I Now See The Necessity Of A Beginning.

Weak People Revenge. Strong People Forgive. Intelligent People Ignore.

All I Want To Do Is Learn To Think Like God. All The Rest Is Just Details.

Compounding Is The 8th Wonder Of The World.

Wonder Of The World

Never Memorize Something That You Can Look Up.

Germany Had The Misfortune Of Becoming Poisoned, First Because Of Plenty, And Then Because Of Want.

Don't Listen To The Person Who Has The Answers; Listen To The Person Who Has The Questions.

There Is, However, A Somber Point In The Social Outlook Of Americans. Their Sense Of Equality And Human Dignity Is Mainly Limited To People Of White Skin.... The More I Feel Like An American, The More The Situation Pains Me.

If I Had 20 Days To Solve A Problem, I Would Take 19 Days To Define It

Hitler Appeared, A Man With Limited Intellectual Abilities And Unfit For Any Useful Work, Bursting With Envy And Bitterness Against All Whom Circumstance And Nature Had Favored Over Him....in His Desperate Ambition For Power He Discovered That His Speeches, Confused And Pervaded With Hate As They Were, Received Wild Acclaim By Those Whose Situation And Orientation Resembled His Own. He Picked Up This Human Flotsam On The Streets And In The Taverns And Organized Them Around Himself. This Is The Way He Launched His Political Career.

People Will Not Disarm Step By Step; They Will Disarm At One Blow Or Not At All.

... We Will Hope That Future Historians Will Explain The Morbid Symptoms Of Present-day Society As The Childhood Ailments Of An Aspiring Humanity, Due Entirely To The Excessive Speed At Which Civilization Was Advancing.

A Happy Man Is Too Satisfied With The Present To Dwell Too Much On The Future.

Life Isn't Worth Living, Unless It Is Lived For Someone Else.

Nature Shows Us Only The Tail Of The Lion. But There Is No Doubt In My Mind That The Lion Belongs With It Even If He Cannot Reveal Himself To The Eye All At Once Because Of His Huge Dimension.

Women Always Worry About Things That Men Forget; Men Always Worry About Things Women Remember.

Everybody Felt His Superiority, But Nobody Felt Oppressed By It. Though He Had No Illusions About People And Human Affairs, He Was Full Of Kindness Toward Everybody And Everything. Never Did He Give The Impression Of Domineering, Always Of Serving And Helping. He Was Extremely Conscientious, Without Allowing Anything To Assume Undue Importance; A Subtle Humor Guarded Him, Which Was Reflected In His Eyes And In His Smile.

We Shall Require A Substantially New Manner Of Thinking If Mankind Is To Survive.

Mere Praise Of Peace Is Easy And Ineffective. What Is Needed Is Acitve Participation In The Fight Against War And Everything Which Leads To It.

Even If You Have To Go Through Hell - Go Without Hesitation.

The Mind That Opens To A New Idea Never Returns To Its Original Size

Infinite Striving To Be The Best Is Man's Duty; It Is Its Own Reward. Everything Else Is In God's Hands. It's Not That I'm So Smart, It's Just That I Stay With Problems Longer.

Not Until We Dare To Regard Ourselves As A Nation, Not Until We Respect Ourselves, Can We Gain The Esteem Of Others, Or Rather Only Then Will It Come Of Its Own Accord

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Eduard Shevardnadze

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