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Albert Einstein
412 quotes
“During that year in Aarau the question came to me: If one runs after a light wave with [a velocity equal to the] light velocity, then one would encounter a time-independent wavefield. However, something like that does not seem to exist! This was the first juvenile thought experiment which has to do with the special theory of relativity. Invention is not the product of logical thought, even though the final product is tied to a logical structure.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1895 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: From his "Autobiographische Skizze" (18 April 1955), original German version here. Translation from Subtle is the Lord: The Science and the Life of Albert Einstein by Abraham Pais (1982), p. 131. Pais notes that when he…
“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.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: From his "Autobiographische Skizze" (18 April 1955), original German version here. Translation from Einstein from 'B' to 'Z by John J. Stachel (2001), p. 5.
“That is simple my friend: because politics is more difficult than physics.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Times (22 April, 1955) response to being asked why people could discover atomic power, but not the means to control it.
“The conflict that exists today is no more than an old-style struggle for power, once again presented to mankind in semireligious trappings. The difference is that, this time, the development of atomic power has imbued the struggle with a ghostly character; for both parties know and admit that, should the quarrel deteriorate into actual war, mankind is doomed.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: (Apr 1955) unfinished address he was writing prior to death.
“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existence. 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 each day. Never lose a holy curiosity. ... Don't stop to marvel.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Death of a Genius," LIFE magazine (2 May 1955) statement to William Miller, p. 64.
“Try to become not a man of success, but try rather to become a man of value.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted by LIFE magazine (2 May 1955)
“It appears dubious whether a field theory can account for the atomistic structure of matter and radiation as well as of quantum phenomena.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: (1955) as quoted in Some strangeness in the proportion: a centennial symposium to celebrate the achievements of Albert Einstein (1980) Addison-Wesley Pub. Co., Advanced Book Program.
“In matters concerning truth and justice there can be no distinction between big problems and small; for the general principles which determine the conduct of men are indivisible. Whoever is careless with truth in small matters cannot be trusted in important affairs.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: (1955) as quoted in Albert Einstein: Historical and Cultural Perspectives (1997) ed. , , p. 388, from The Centennial Symposium in Jerusalem (1979)
“This is the reason why all attempts to obtain a deeper knowledge of the foundations of physics seem doomed to me unless the basic concepts are in accordance with general relativity from the beginning. This situation makes it difficult to use our empirical knowledge, however comprehensive, in looking for the fundamental concepts and relations of physics, and it forces us to apply free speculation to a much greater extent than is presently assumed by most physicists.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What is significant in one's own existence one is hardly aware, and it certainly should not bother the other fellow. What does a fish know about the water in which he swims all his life?”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1936 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 2 "Self-Portrait" (1936), p. 5
“I live in that solitude which is painful in youth, but delicious in the years of maturity.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1936 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 2 "Self-Portrait" (1936), p. 5
“For scientific endeavor is a natural whole the parts of which mutually support one another in a way which, to be sure, no one can anticipate.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1940 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 6 "On Freedom" (1940), p. 12
“This freedom of communication is indispensable for the development and extension of scientific knowledge, a consideration of much practical import. In the first instance it must be guaranteed by law. But laws alone cannot secure freedom of expression; in order that every man may present his views without penalty there must be a spirit of tolerance in the entire population. Such an ideal of external liberty can never be fully attained but must be sought unremittingly if scientific thought, and philosophical and creative thinking in general, are to be advanced as far as possible.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1940 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 6 "On Freedom" (1940), p. 13
“Intelligence makes clear to us the interrelation 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 perform in the social life of man.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1939 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 8 "Science and Religion" (1939-1941), p. 22
“The highest principles for our aspirations and judgments are given to us in the Jewish-Christian religious tradition. It is a very high goal which, with our weak powers, we can reach only very inadequately, but which gives a sure foundation to our aspirations and valuations.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1939 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 8 "Science and Religion" (1939-1941), p. 23
“Ethical axioms are founded and tested not very differently from the axioms of science. Truth is what stands the test of experience.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1950 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 16 "The Laws of Science and the Laws of Ethics" (1950)
“I advocate world government because I am convinced that there is no other possible way of eliminating the most terrible danger in which man has ever found himself. The objective of avoiding total destruction must have priority over any other objective.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1948 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 27 A reply to the Soviet scientists (1948)
“One strength of the communist system of the East is that it has some of the character of a religion and inspires the emotions of a religion. Unless the concept of peace based on law gathers behind it the force and zeal of a religion, it can hardly hope to succeed.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1947 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 31 "Atomic War or Peace" part II (1947)
“And certainly we should take care not to make the intellect our god; it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality. It cannot lead, it can only serve; and it is not fastidious in its choice of a leader. This characteristic is reflected in the qualities of its priests, the intellectuals. The intellect has a sharp eye for methods and tools, but is blind to ends and values. So it is no wonder that this fatal blindness is handed on from old to young and today involves a whole generation.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1943 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ch. 51 "The Goal of Human Existence" (1943)
“Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Um ein tadelloses Mitglied einer Schafherde sein zu können, muß man vor allem ein Schaf sein.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Hail to the man who went through life always helping others, knowing no fear, and to whom aggressiveness and resentment are alien. Such is the stuff of which the great moral leaders are made.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The attempt to combine wisdom and power has only rarely been successful, and then only for a short while.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions that differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Man usually avoids attributing cleverness to somebody else—unless it is an enemy.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Die Majorität der Dummen ist unüberwindbar und für alle Zeiten gesichert. Der Schrecken ihrer Tyrannei ist indessen gemildert durch Mangel an Konsequenz.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The contrasts and contradictions that can permanently live peacefully side by side in a skull make all the systems of political optimists and pessimists illusory.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Joy in looking and comprehending is nature's most beautiful gift.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Great moral teachers of humanity were, in a certain sense, geniuses in the art of living more than in the art of thinking.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1954 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Albert Einstein, Ideas and Opinions (1954), p. 12.
“I want to go when I want. It is tasteless to prolong life artificially. I have done my share; it is time to go. I will do it elegantly.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Einsteins Legacy: The Final Chapter, Albert Einstein dies soon after a blood vessel bursts near his heart. American Museum of Natural History April 18, 1955
“Here, then, is the problem which we present to you, stark and dreadful and inescapable: Shall we put an end to the human race; or shall mankind renounce war?”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We are speaking on this occasion, not as members of this or that nation, continent, or creed, but as human beings, members of the species Man, whose continued existence is in doubt. The world is full of conflicts; and, overshadowing all minor conflicts, the titanic struggle between Communism and anti-Communism...we want you, if you can, to set aside such feelings and consider yourselves only as members of a biological species which has had a remarkable history, and whose disappearance none of us can desire.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is feared that if many H-bombs are used there will be universal death, sudden only for a minority, but for the majority a slow torture of disease and disintegration.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“God does not care about our mathematical difficulties. He integrates empirically.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1949 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed to Einstein by his colleague Léopold Infeld in his book Quest: An Autobiography (1949), p. 279
“I speak to everyone in the same way, whether he is the garbage man or the president of the university.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1949 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed to Einstein by his colleague Léopold Infeld in his book Quest: An Autobiography (1949), p. 291
“Yes, we now have to divide up our time like that, between politics and our equations. But to me our equations are far more important, for politics are only a matter of present concern. A mathematical equation stands forever.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Earliest source located is the book Brighter than a Thousand Suns: A Personal History of the Atomic Scientists by Robert Jungk (1958), p. 249, which says that Einstein made the comment during "a walk with Ernst Straus, …
“Was mich eigentlich interessiert, ist, ob Gott die Welt hätte anders machen können; das heisst, ob die Forderung der logischen Einfachheit überhaupt eine Freiheit lässt.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1944 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted by Ernst G. Straus, who was Einstein's assistant from 1944 to 1948, in Carl Seelig, Helle Zeit—Dunkle Zeit (Europa Verlag, Zurich, 1956), p. 72
“How it happened that I in particular discovered the relativity theory, it seemed to lie in the following circumstance. The normal adult never bothers his head about space-time problems. Everything there is to be thought about it, in his opinion, has already been done in early childhood. I, on the contrary, developed so slowly that I only began to wonder about space and time when I was already grown up. In consequence I probed deeper into the problem than an ordinary child would have done.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: In Carl Seelig's Albert Einstein: A Documentary Biography (1956), Seelig reports that Einstein said this to James Franck, p. 71.
“You see, when a blind beetle crawls over the surface of a globe he doesn't notice that the track he has covered is curved. I was lucky enough to have spotted it.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed to Einstein in Carl Seelig's Albert Einstein: A Documentary Biography (1956), p. 80. Said to have been a comment he made to his son Eduard when Eduard asked him, at age 9, "Why are you actually so famous, pap…
“No, this trick won't work. The same trick does not work twice. How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love?”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A comment to T. H. Morgan, as recalled by Henry Borsook. Einstein was visiting Cal Tech where Morgan and Borsook worked, and Morgan explained to Einstein that he was trying to bring physics and chemistry to bear on the …
“As far as I'm concerned I prefer silent vice to ostentatious virtue.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed to Einstein in Albert Einstein: A Documentary Biography by Carl Seelig (1956), p. 114. Einstein is said to have made this remark "when someone in his company grew angry about a mutual acquaintance's moral dec…
“The hardest thing in the world to understand is income taxes.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed by his friend Leo Mattersdorf, who also said that "From the time Professor Einstein came to this country until his death, I prepared his income tax returns and advised him on his tax problems." In a letter to…
“In the matter of physics, the first lessons should contain nothing but what is experimental and interesting to see. A pretty experiment is in itself often more valuable than twenty formulae extracted from our minds.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1922 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Conversations with Einstein by Alexander Moszkowski (1971), p. 69. This is just Moszkowski's English translation of a statement he attributed to Einstein in his 1922 book Einstein, Einblicke in seine Gedankenwelt, p. 77…
“The devil has put a penalty on all things we enjoy in life. Either we suffer in our health, or we suffer in our soul, or we get fat.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed in Einstein: The Life and Times by Ronald W. Clark (1971), p. 737. The only source given in the end notes is "personal information". Einstein is said to have made this comment when a box of candy was being pa…
“I love to travel, but I hate to arrive.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A comment of Einstein's recalled by John Wheeler in Albert Einstein: His influence on physics, philosophy and politics edited by Peter C. Aichelburg, Roman Ulrich Sexl, and Peter Gabriel Bergmann (1979), p. 202
“When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute. But let him sit on a hot stove for a minute and it's longer than any hour. That's relativity.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1929 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: This variation was first promulgated in The New York Times in 1929 and attributed to Einstein's secretary: “When you sit with a nice girl for two hours you think it’s only a minute, but when you sit on a hot stove for a…
“On quantum theory I use up more brain grease (rough translation of German idiom) than on relativity.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1912 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted by Otto Stern, a colleague of Einstein in Zurich from 1912 to 1914, in a 1962 oral history interview with Thomas S. Kuhn
“In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am able to recognise, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what makes me really angry is that they quote me for support of such views.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1941 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Statement to German anti-Nazi diplomat and author Prince Hubertus zu Lowenstein around 1941, as quoted in his book Towards the Further Shore : An Autobiography (1968)
“Much later, when I was discussing cosmological problems with Einstein, he remarked that the introduction of the cosmological term was the biggest blunder he ever made in his life.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: George Gamow, in his autobiography My World Line: An Informal Autobiography (1970), p. 44. Here the "cosmological term" refers to the cosmological constant in the equations of general relativity, whose value Einstein in…
“We often discussed his notions on objective reality. I recall that during one walk Einstein suddenly stopped, turned to me and asked whether I really believed that the moon exists only when I look at it.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) said by 1955 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As recalled by his biographer Abraham Pais in Reviews of Modern Physics, 51, 863 (1979): 907. Cited in Boojums All The Way Through by N. David Mermin (1990), p. 81