Quotes & Sayings About Einstein

Honestly, I cannot understand what people mean when they talk about the freedom of the human will. I have a feeling, for instance, that I will something or other; but what relation this has with freedom I cannot understand at all. I feel that I will to light my pipe and I do it; but how can I connect this up with the idea of freedom? What is behind the act of willing to light the pipe? Another act of willing? Schopenhauer once said: Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will (Man can do what he will but he cannot will what he wills). — Albert Einstein

What a person thinks on his own without being stimulated by the thoughts and experiences of the other people is even in the best case rather paltry and monotonous. — Albert Einstein

The uncreative will always waste their energies on the impossible. Be unable to recognize the boundaries, how much of the spiritual the objects can bear and assume. — Carl Einstein

Life isn't worth living, unless it is lived for someone else. — Albert Einstein

The difference between the amoeba and Einstein is that, although both make use of the method of trial and error elimination, the amoeba dislikes erring while Einstein is intrigued by it. — Karl Popper

I wish I were a poet. I've never confessed that to anyone, and I'm confessing it to you, because you've given me reason to feel that I can trust you. I've spent my life observing the universe, mostly in my mind's eye. It's been a tremendously rewarding life, a wonderful life. I've been able to explore the origins of time and space with some of the great living thinkers. But I wish I were a poet.
Albert Einstein, a hero of mine, once wrote, 'Our situation is the following. We are standing in front of a closed box which we cannot open.'
I'm sure I don't have to tell you that the vast majority of the universe is composed of dark matter. The fragile balance depends on things we'll never be able to see, hear, smell, taste, or touch. Life itself depends on them. What's real? What isn't real? Maybe those aren't the right questions to be asking. What does life depend on?
I wish I had made things for life to depend on. — Jonathan Safran Foer

Anybody who really wants to abolish war must resolutely declare himself in favor of his own country's resigning a portion of sovereignty in place of international institutions. — Albert Einstein

Experience alone can decide on truth. — Albert Einstein

I don't care what Einstein said about God not playing dice; If he exists, he's addicted to craps. — Henry Mosquera

It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs. — Albert Einstein

We must not only learn to tolerate our differences. We must welcome them as the richness and diversity which can lead to true intelligence. — Albert Einstein

For an idea which, at first, does not seem absurd, there is no hope. — Albert Einstein

If this conviction had not been a strongly emotional one and if those searching for knowledge had not been inspired by Spinoza's Amor Dei Intellectualis, they would hardly have been capable of that untiring devotion which alone enables man to attain his greatest achievements. — Albert Einstein

The ancients knew something, which we seem to have forgotten. — Albert Einstein

If you could buckle your Bugs Bunny wristwatch to a ray of light, your watch would continue ticking but the hands wouldn't move. That's because at the speed of light there is no time. Time is relative to velocity. At high speeds, time is literally stretched. Since light is the ultimate in velocity, at light-speed time is stretched to its absolute and becomes static. Albert Einstein figured that one out. — Tom Robbins

For human community life cannot long endure on a basis of crude force, brutality, terror, and hate. — Albert Einstein

Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. — Albert Einstein

It is our American habit if we find the foundations of our educational structure unsatisfactory to add another story or wing. — Albert Einstein

It is impossible to solve significant problems using the same knowledge that created them. — Albert Einstein

I am exclusively occupied with the problem of gravitation and hope with the help of a local mathematician friend [Marcel Grossman] to overcome all the difficulties. One thing is certain, however, that never in life have I been quite so tormented. A great respect for mathematics has been instilled within me, the subtler aspects of which, in my stupidity, I regarded until now as pure luxury. — Albert Einstein

Would the Judeo-Christian-Islamic God have sent his only-begotten son to save those beetles and their household mites, Jared?" "No." "But the god of this place has as great a care for them as for any other creature in the world. This is why I knew you could benefit from seeing those beetles yesterday. Those beetles are a manifestation of the gods' unending abundance and a sign to be read by those who have eyes to read. I wanted you to see how the gods lavish care without stint on every thing: no less upon a beetle whose supreme achievement is burying a mouse than upon the brain of Einstein, no less upon a mite whose favorite dish is a fly's egg than upon the eye of Michelangelo. — Daniel Quinn

Work is the only thing that gives substance to life. — Albert Einstein

The special theory of relativity owes its origins to Maxwell's equations of the electromagnetic field. — Albert Einstein

[There is] a duty in refusing to cooperate in any undertaking that violates the Constitutional rights of the individual. This holds in particular for all inquisitions that are concerned with the private life and the political affiliations of the citizens. — Albert Einstein

As Einstein famously said, "Problems cannot be solved at the same level of awareness that created them. — Jack Forem

Einstein once wrote, The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. — Alan Lightman

When the poet Paul Valery once asked Albert Einstein if he kept a notebook to record his ideas, Einstein looked at him with mild but genuine surprise. "Oh, that's not necessary," he replied . "It's so seldom I have one. — Bill Bryson

A single bomb of this type, carried by boat and exploded in a port, might very well destroy the whole port, together with some of the surrounding territory. — Albert Einstein

The cult of individuals is always, in my view, unjustified. To be sure, nature distributes her gifts unevenly among her children. But there are plenty of the well-endowed, thank God, and I am firmly convinced that most of them live quiet, unobtrusive lives. It strikes me as unfair, and even in bad taste, to select a few of them for boundless admiration, attributing superhuman powers of mind and character to them. This has been my fate, and the contrast between the popular estimate of my powers and achievements and the reality is simply grotesque. — Albert Einstein

My life is a simple thing that would interest no one. It is a known fact that I was born, and that is all that is necessary. — Albert Einstein

Don't let your brain interfere with your heart. — Albert Einstein

If I were not a Jew I would be a Quaker. — Albert Einstein

Not all that counts, can be counted — Albert Einstein

Compound interest is the eighth natural wonder of the world and the most powerful thing I have ever encountered. — Albert Einstein

Logic will get you from A to Z; imagination will get you everywhere. — Albert Einstein

Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it ... he who doesn't ... pays it. — Albert Einstein

Man can find meaning in life, short and perilous as it is, only through devoting himself to society. — Albert Einstein

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. — George Gamow

Relativity is a purely scientific matter and has nothing to do with religion. — Albert Einstein

He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed. — Albert Einstein

I wouldn't want to live if I did not have my work. In any case, it's good that I'm already old and personally don't have to count on a prolonged future. — Albert Einstein

You know, sometimes kids get bad grades in school because the class moves too slow for them. Einstein got D's in school. Well guess what, I get F's!!! — Bill Watterson

God is clever, but not dishonest. — Albert Einstein

In my personal experience I have hardly come to know the wretchedness of mankind better than as a result of the general theory of relativity and everything connected to it. But it doesn't bother me. — Albert Einstein

I believe that we don't need to worry about what happens after this life, as long as we do our duty here-to love and to serve. — Albert Einstein

Yet, emotionally I could not bring myself to accept either his presence, or his reality. My problem was not a religious problem. God could certainly create as many variations of intelligent humans as he wanted. Presumably God put humans here on this earth, and all non-humans on some other far-away planet orbiting some other far-away star. My problem was a scientific problem. For the Tall White guard to be standing there in the hot sun, for real, would mean that everything I had been taught about Einstein and the Theory of Relativity was simply incorrect. — Charles James Hall

I hate crowds and making speeches. I hate facing cameras and having to answer to a crossfire of questions. Why popular fancy should seize upon me, a scientist, dealing in abstract things and happy if left alone, is a manifestation of mass psychology that is beyond me. — Albert Einstein

Setting an example is not the main means of influencing others, it is the only means. — Albert Einstein

Working on the final formulation of technological patents was a veritable blessing for me. It enforced many-sided thinking and also provided important stimuli to physical thought. [Academia] places a young person under a kind of compulsion to produce impressive quantities of scientific publications; a temptation to superficiality. — Albert Einstein

[On Einstein:] You cannot analyze him, otherwise you will misjudge him. Such a genius should be irreproachable in every respect. But no, nature doesn't behave like this. Where she gives extravagantly, she takes away extravagantly. — Elsa Einstein

As a child I received instruction in both the Bible and in the Talmud. I am a Jew, but I am enthralled by the luminous figure of the Nazarene. — Albert Einstein

Thomas Pynchon looks exactly like Thomas Pynchon should look. He is tall, he wears lumberjack shirts and blue jeans. He has Albert Einstein white hair and Bugs Bunny front teeth. — Salman Rushdie

With fame I become more and more stupid, which of course is a very common phenomenon. — Albert Einstein

There is nothing divine about morality, it is a purely human affair. — Albert Einstein

It is impossible to get anywhere without sinning against reason. — Albert Einstein

If one looks at the works of Newton to Einstein, they were never scientists in the way modernity understands the term. — Bruno Latour

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 for both the body and the mind. — Albert Einstein

I would say in one sentence my goal is to at least be part of the journey to find the unified theory that Einstein himself was really the first to look for. He didn't find it, but we think we're hot on the trail. — Brian Greene

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 ... — Albert Einstein

I've learned to distinguish between the greatness of God and the inexcusable evil that has been done by those professing his name. And so I do not deduce [as Christopher Hitchens does] that God is not great, and that religion poisons everything. After all, if I failed to distinguish between the genius of Einstein and the abuse of his science to create weapons of mass destruction, I might be tempted to say science is not great, and technology poisons everything. — John Lennox

A true genius admits that he/she knows nothing. — Albert Einstein

Everything has changed except the way man thinks (when the hydrogen bomb was exploded) — Albert Einstein

The ability to portray people in still life and in motion requires the highest measure of intuition and talent. — Albert Einstein

It would be possible to describe everything scientifically, but it would make no sense; it would be without meaning, as if you described a Beethoven symphony as a variation of wave pressure. — Albert Einstein

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

By academic freedom I understand the right to search for truth and to publish and teach what one holds to be true. This right implies also a duty: one must not conceal any part of what on has recognized to be true. It is evident that any restriction on academic freedom acts in such a way as to hamper the dissemination of knowledge among the people and thereby impedes national judgment and action. — Albert Einstein

Condemnation before investigation, is the highest form of ignorance. — Albert Einstein

Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe. — Albert Einstein

Einstein explained his theory to me every day, and on my arrival I was fully convinced that he understood it. — Chaim Weizmann

I see a pattern, but my imagination cannot picture the maker of that pattern. I see a clock, but I cannot envision the clockmaker. The human mind is unable to conceive of the four dimensions, so how can it conceive of a God, before whom a thousand years and a thousand dimensions are as one? — Albert Einstein

Einstein's secretary once said that if Einstein were born among the polar bears, he would still be Einstein. But unless polar bears were well versed in theoretical physics, that is not true. Einstein would not be Einstein. Which is not to take anything away from Einstein, or the polar bears, but simply to point out that he was part of a creative ecology, and trying to isolate him from it is not only silly but futile. — Eric Weiner

People love chopping wood. In this activity one immediately sees results. — Albert Einstein

Toreador pants make your feet look big too — Albert Einstein

ACADEMIC CHAIRS ARE MANY, but wise and noble teachers are few; lecture-rooms are numerous and large, but the number of young people who genuinely thirst after truth and justice is small. — Albert Einstein

In Einstein's equation, time is a river. It speeds up, meanders, and slows down. The new wrinkle is that it can have whirlpools and fork into two rivers. So, if the river of time can be bent into a pretzel, create whirlpools and fork into two rivers, then time travel cannot be ruled out. — Michio Kaku

The world we have created is a product of our thinking; it cannot be changed without changing our thinking. If we want to change the world we have to change our thinking ... no problem can be solved from the same consciousness that created it. We must learn to see the world anew. — Albert Einstein

But I don't think Art's an Einstein - he likes tugging ears, biting people and burping too much to be a genius. — Darren Shan

Insofar as we may at all claim that slavery has been abolished today, we owe its abolition to the practical consequences of science — Albert Einstein

I know quite certainly that I myself have no special talent; curiosity, obsession and dogged endurance, combined with self-criticism, have brought me to my ideas. — Albert Einstein

I was supposed to choose apractical profession, but this was simply unbearable to me. — Albert Einstein

I never thought that others would take my theories so much more seriously than I did. — Albert Einstein

Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character. — Albert Einstein

Einstein himself said, You can speak of the ethical foundations of science, but you cannot speak of the scientific foundations of ethics. — Eric Metaxas

I was never top of the class at school, but my classmates must have seen potential in me, because my nickname was Einstein. — Lucy Hawking

The idea of achieving security through national armament is, at the present state of military technique, a disastrous illusion. — Albert Einstein

Working with Adrien Brody was like going to Julliard, but instead of four years, I went for four weeks. He was like the Albert Einstein of professors, it was just the best experience of my life. Adrien was the most influential mentor in my acting career thus far, and even after the movie he continues to mentor me. — Sami Gayle

What can the schools do to defend democracy? Should they preach a specific political doctrine? I believe they should not. If they are able to teach young people to have a critical mind and a socially oriented attitude, they will have done all that is necessary. — Albert Einstein

After a certain high level of technical skill is achieved, science and art tend to coalesce in esthetics, plasticity, and form. The greatest scientists are artists as well. Remark — Albert Einstein

We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive. — Albert Einstein

I have become rather like King Midas, except that everything turns not into gold but into a circus. — Albert Einstein

I love to read, and so I've been reading everything I can, not intensely, but I love to read so I read "Origin of Species" by Darwin and I can't make head or tail of E=MC squared by Einstein, but I try to baffle my way through that. — Anthony Hopkins

The traditional religions worry me. Their long history proves that they have not understood the meaning of the commandment: Thou shalt not kill. If we want to save this world from unimaginable destruction we should concentrate not on the faraway God , but on the heart of the individual. — Albert Einstein

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. — Albert Einstein

When physicists create a mathematical model of a physical process, they rely on the mathematical framework that can represent that process as closely as possible. When Newton developed a model of forces and motion, the appropriate mathematical framework was calculus. When Einstein developed a model of wave-particle motion, he relied on the mathematics of wave equations and eigenvalues. For many models in scientific computation, the computational framework that best aligns with our need is object orientation. — Anthony Scopatz

Peace comes through understanding — Albert Einstein

It did not last: the Devil howling 'Ho, Let Einstein be,' restored the status quo. — John Collings Squire

Once again, my colleague Stephen Hawking has upset the apple cart. The event horizon surrounding a black hole was once though to be an imaginary sphere. But recent theories indicate that it may actually be physical, maybe even a sphere of fire. But I don't trust any of these calculations until we have a full-blown string theory calculation, since Einstein's theory by itself is incomplete. — Michio Kaku

I regard class differences as contrary to justice and, in the last resort, based on force. — Albert Einstein

Nature hides her secrets because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse. — Albert Einstein

I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal God is a childlike one. — Albert Einstein