Concepts that have proven useful in ordering things easily achieve such authority over us that we forget their earthly origins and accept them as unalterable givens.
Albert EinsteinCheck out not to become a man or woman of achievement, but instead seek to become a particular person of price.
Albert EinsteinAs a human being, one has been endowed with just enough intelligence to be able to see clearly how utterly inadequate that intelligence is when confronted with what exists.
Albert EinsteinThe best that Gauss has given us was likewise an exclusive production. If he had not created his geometry of surfaces, which served Riemann as a basis, it is scarcely conceivable that anyone else would have discovered it. I do not hesitate to confess that to a certain extent a similar pleasure may be found by absorbing ourselves in questions of pure geometry.
Albert EinsteinThe history of scientific and technical discovery teaches us that the human race is poor in independent and creative imagination.
Albert EinsteinThe economic anarchy of capitalist society as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evil.
Albert EinsteinWith fame I become more and more stupid, which of course is a very common phenomenon.
Albert EinsteinIf one asks the whence derives the authority of fundamental ends, since they cannot be stated and justified merely by reason, one can only answer: they exist in a healthy society as powerful traditions, which act upon the conduct and aspirations and judgments of the individuals; they are there, that is, as something living, without its being necessary to find justification for their existence.
Albert EinsteinI am content in my later years. I have kept my good humor and take neither myself nor the next person seriously.
Albert EinsteinThe only justification for our concepts and systems of concepts is that they serve to represent the complex of our experiences; beyond this they have not legitimacy.
Albert EinsteinI want to know how God created this world. I am not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know God's thoughts, the rest are details.
Albert EinsteinThe only rational way of educating is to be an example. If one can't help it, a warning example.
Albert EinsteinStriving for peace and preparing for war are incompatible with each other, and in our time more so than ever.
Albert EinsteinThe bigotry of the nonbeliever is for me nearly as funny as the bigotry of the believer.
Albert EinsteinMost mistakes in philosophy and logic occur because the human mind is apt to take the symbol for the reality.
Albert Einstein... 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.
Albert EinsteinThere is a race between mankind and the universe. Mankind is trying to build bigger, better, faster, and more foolproof machines. The universe is trying to build bigger, better, and faster fools. So far the universe is winning.
Albert EinsteinInnovation is not the product of logical thought, even though the final product is tied to a logical structure.
Albert EinsteinVegetarian food leaves a deep impression on our nature. If the whole world adopts vegetarianism, it can change the destiny of humankind.
Albert EinsteinNothing 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.
Albert EinsteinSince 99.362% of women love mustache rides, it seems only a fool would have a bare upper lip.
Albert EinsteinNever lose a holy curiosity. Try not to become a man of success but rather try to become a man of value. He is considered successful in our day who gets more out of life than he puts in. But a man of value will give more than he receives.
Albert EinsteinFormerly, people thought that if matter disappeared from the universe, space and time would remain. Relativity declares that space and time would disappear with matter.
Albert EinsteinAmerica is a large country and its people have so far not shown much interest in great international problems, among which the problem of disarmament occupies first place today. This must be changed, if only in America's own interest. The last war has shown that there are no longer any barriers between the continents and that the destinies of all countries are closely interwoven. The people of this country must realize that they have a great responsibility in the sphere of international politics. The part of passive spectator is unworthy of this country and is bound in the end to lead to disaster all round.
Albert EinsteinNot until the creation and maintenance of decent conditions of life for all men are recognized and accepted as a common obligation of all men and all countries — not until then shall we, with a certain degree of justification, be able to speak of mankind as civilized.
Albert EinsteinThe state exists for man, not man for the state. The same may be said of science. These are old phrases, coined by people who saw in human individuality the highest human value. I would hesitate to repeat them, were it not for the ever recurring danger that they may be forgotten, especially in these days of organization and stereotypes.
Albert EinsteinThere is no logical way to the discovery of these elemental laws. There is only the way of intuition, which is helped by a feeling for the order lying behind the appearance.
Albert EinsteinEver since childhood I have scorned the commonplace limits so often set upon human ambition. Possessions, outward success, publicity, luxury - to me these have always been contemptible. I believe that a simple and unassuming manner of life is best for everyone; best both for the body and the mind
Albert EinsteinIntelligence 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.
Albert EinsteinA man must learn to understand the motives of human beings, their illusions, and their sufferings.
Albert EinsteinEngineering is not only study of 45 subjects but it is moral studies of intellectual life. Make things as simple as possible..but not simpler.
Albert EinsteinKnowledge is realizing that the street is one way; wisdom is looking in both directions anyway.
Albert EinsteinEvery one who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe-a spirit vastly superior to that of man, and one in the face of which we with our modest powers must feel humble.
Albert EinsteinWhile it is true that an inherently free and scrupulous person may be destroyed, such an individual can never be enslaved or used as a blind tool.
Albert EinsteinWhat is the meaning of human life, or, for that matter, of the life of any creature? To know the answer to this question means to be religious. You ask: Does it make any sense, then, to pose this question? I answer: The man who regards his fellow creatures as meaningless is not merely unhappy but hardly fit for life.
Albert EinsteinDevelopment of Western science is based on two great achievements: the invention of the formal logical system (in Euclidean geometry) by the Greek philosophers, and the discovery of the possibility to find out causal relationships by systematic experiment (during the Renaissance). In my opinion, one has not to be astonished that the Chinese sages have not made these steps. The astonishing thing is that these discoveries were made at all.
Albert EinsteinThe distinction between the past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.
Albert EinsteinIt is abhorrent to me when a fine intelligence is paired with an unsavory character.
Albert Einstein