Good Ethical Quotes & Sayings

We all want to live in a world where we can make a difference ... That's why Spider-Man fights the good fight. Or Captain Marvel. Or me. Or ... There are a lot of us. And we don't all wear masks these days. Iron Man went public. So did Captain America. Others. Probably because it's harder to keep secrets in an internet surveillance age. But I think some of it, too, is that the ethical paradox can wear you down. No one on the white-hat side has ever hidden his or her identity with less than noble intent: to make the fight about something bigger than us. To represent a greater justice, where the focus can be on right and wrong ... and not on whether the bad guys will exact reprisal on those close to us. And sometimes you have to lie ... because you can justify a lie if lives are riding on it. Even as you fight for, as the saying goes, truth and justice ... even if you're a lawyer who has sworn to live by the truth ... you willingly bear false witness. — Mark Waid

If it is true that we cannot possess knowledge of what is good in any absolute sense, it is equally true that we have an ethical duty to decide between what is better and what is worse. — Richard Kearney

And yet, in a sense, in choosing to be deprived of the ability to make an ethical choice, you have in a sense really chosen the good. — Anthony Burgess

Secular humanism is avowedly non-religious. It is a eupraxsophy (good practical wisdom), which draws its basic principles and ethical values from science, ethics, and philosophy. — Paul Kurtz

Romantic enthusiasm lifts the good aloft and removes it into the dim distance of the incomparable and unattainable; at the same time it portrays the good in a human countenance out of which it looks at us and we can look back at it, face to face, in admiration and ecstasy, and stretch out our arms towards it. Thus the moral good is represented in human, and at the same time superhuman, form; it is of our own kind, and yet above our kind; it confronts us, but makes no demands. IT is not really a standard and lacks the power to issues commandments. Both are given at once: the ethical which one would like to love; and the passive, the romantic, in which one wants to live. As a substitute for constant activity demanded by the ethical commandment, we have adoration in which the romantic impression of the moment in vented, and yearning which need only admire and enjoy but not achieve anything. — Leo Baeck

I favour humans over ideology, but right now the ideologues are winning, and they're creating a stage for constant artificial high dramas, where everyone is either a magnificent hero or a sickening villain. We can lead good, ethical lives, but some bad phraseology in a Tweet can overwhelm it all - even though we know that's not how we should define our fellow humans. What's true about our fellow humans is that we are clever and stupid. We are grey areas.
And so ... when you see an unfair or an ambiguous shaming unfold, speak up on behalf of the shamed person. A babble of opposing voices - that's democracy.
The great thing about social media was how it gave a voice to voiceless people. Let's not turn it into a world where the smartest way to survive is to go back to being voiceless. — Jon Ronson

Don't make misrepresentations to anyone you deal with. If you believe the other person may have misunderstood you, correct any misunderstanding you find exists. Honesty is integral to ethical behavior, and trustworthiness is essential for good, lasting relationships. — Buck Rodgers

Having kids - the responsibility of rearing good, kind, ethical, responsible human beings - is the biggest job anyone can embark on. As with any risk, you have to take a leap of faith and ask lots of wonderful people for their help and guidance. I thank God every day for giving me the opportunity to parent. — Maria Shriver

I focus on a simple message: when you leave the two-thirds of Americans without college degrees out of your vision of the good life, they notice. And when elites commit to equality for many different groups but arrogantly dismiss "the dark rigidity of fundamentalist rural America,"6 this is a recipe for extreme alienation among working-class whites. Deriding "political correctness" becomes a way for less-privileged whites to express their fury at the snobbery of more-privileged whites. I don't like what this dynamic is doing to America. There are two reasons I think we have to try to replace it with a healthier one. The first is ethical: I am committed to social equality, not for some groups but for all groups. The second is strategic: the hidden injuries of class7 now have become visible in politics so polarized that our democracy is threatened. A few words — Joan C. Williams

War as a moral metaphor is limited, limiting, and dangerous. By reducing the choices of action to "a war against" whatever-it-is, you divide the world into Me or Us (good) and Them or It (bad) and reduce the ethical complexity and moral richness of our life to Yes/No, On/Off. This is puerile, misleading, and degrading. In stories, it evades any solution but violence and offers the reader mere infantile reassurance. All too often the heroes of such fantasies behave exactly as the villains do, acting with mindless violence, but the hero is on the "right" side and therefore will win. Right makes might. — Ursula K. Le Guin

Perhaps we still have a basically superstitious tendency to associate failure with dishonesty and guilt - failure being interpreted as "punishment." Even if a man starts out with good intentions, if he fails we tend to think he was somehow "at fault." If he was not guilty, he was at least "wrong." And "being wrong" is something we have not yet learned to face with equanimity and understanding. We either condemn it with god-like disdain or forgive it with god-like condescension. We do not manage to accept it with human compassion, humility and identification. Thus we never see the one truth that would help us begin to solve our ethical and political problems: that we are all more or less wrong, that we are all at fault, all limited and obstructed by our mixed motives, our self-deception, our greed, our self-righteousness and our tendency to aggressivity and hypocrisy. — Thomas Merton

Words like "Society" and "State" are so concretized that they are almost personified. In the opinion of the man in the street, the "State," far more than any king in history, is the inexhaustible giver of all good; the "State" is invoked, made responsible, grumbled at, and so on and so forth. Society is elevated to the rank of a supreme ethical principle; indeed, it is even credited with positively creative capacities. — C. G. Jung

Like the good ape he is, man is a social animal, characterized by cronyism, nepotism, corruption, and gossip. That's the intrinsic blueprint for our 'ethical behavior,'" he argued. "It's pure biology. — Carlos Ruiz Zafon

A person is said to have good character when their habits, dispositions and conduct reflect a deep commitment to ethical virtues and moral principles. — Michael Josephson

Do you mean good as in ethical or good as in capable, Dairy? — Patrick Weekes

Not only is there often a right and wrong, but what goes around does come around, Karma exists, chickens do come home to roost, and as my mother, Phyllis, liked to say, "There is always a day of reckoning." The good among the great understand that every choice we make adds to the strength or weakness of our spirits - ourselves, or to use an old fashioned word for the same idea, our souls. That is every human's life work: to construct an identity bit by bit, to walk a path step by step, to live a life that is worthy of something higher, lighter, more fulfilling, and maybe even everlasting. — Donald Van De Mark

The legal system doesn't always serve as a good guide for your conscience. You can step way over the ethical line and still be inside the law. The same thing goes for rules, policies and procedures - you know, the organization's "internal laws." You can "go by the book" and still behave unethically. Still not move beyond mediocrity. High standards-the ethics of excellence-come to life through your basic values, your character, integrity and honesty. Obeying the law is the bare minimum. — Price Pritchett

The dualistic presuppositions of the revisionist position are fully on display in the frequent references by Macedo and others to sexual organs as "equipment." 60 Neither sperm nor eggs, neither penises nor vaginas, are properly discussed in ethical discourse in such terms. Nor are reproductive and other bodily organs "used" by persons considered as somehow standing over and apart from these and other aspects of their personal reality. In fact, where a person treats his body as mere equipment, a mere means to extrinsic ends, the existential sundering of the bodily and conscious dimensions of the self that he effects by his choices and actions brings with it a certain self-alienation, a damaging of the good of personal self-integration. — Jean Bethke Elshtain

Having children-the responsibility of rearing good, kind, ethical, responsible human beings-is the biggest job anyone can embark on. You have to take a leap of faith and ask lots of people for their help and guidance. — Maria Shriver

The feeling for what ought and ought not to be grows and dies like a tree, and no fertilizer of any kind will do much good. What the individual can do is give a fine example, and have the courage to firmly uphold ethical convictions in a society of cynics. I have for a long time tried to conduct myself this way, with varying success. — Albert Einstein

We believe that business is good because it creates value. It is ethical because it is based on voluntary exchange; it is noble because it can elevate our existence, and it is heroic because it lifts people out of poverty and creates prosperity. — John Mackey

In their struggle for the ethical good, teachers of religion must have the stature to give up the doctrine of a personal god, that is, give up that source of fear and hope which in the past placed such vast power in the hands of priests. In their labors they will have to avail themselves of those forces which are capable of cultivating the Good, the True, and the Beautiful in humanity itself. This is, to be sure, a more difficult but an incomparably more worthy task ... — Albert Einstein

As for "Don't be evil," we have tried to define precisely what it means to be a force for good-always do the right, ethical thing. Ultimately, "Don't be evil" seems the easiest way to summarize it." — Sergey Brin

To have a sense of sin means to feel guilty at there being an ethical choice to make, a guilt which, however "good" I may become, remains unchanged. — W. H. Auden

The biggest difference between Jesus Christ and ethical and moral teachers who have been deified by man. Is that these moralists came to make bad people good. Jesus came to make dead people live! — Ravi Zacharias

I advocate giving full attention to the pain that arises with the breakdown of an addiction and the story that embeds it. (The "addiction" can be something subtle, a self-image, for example, or thoughts about how ethical or successful one is.) Just as it feels good to meet a need, an unmet need hurts. Pain is its call for attention. When all the substitutes for meeting that need are exhausted, when all the palliatives stop working, finally the pain that had been diffuse and latent leads us to the need. — Charles Eisenstein

There is a strange duality in the human which makes for an ethical paradox. We have definitions of good qualities and of bad; not changing things, but generally considered good and bad throughout the ages and throughout the species. Of the good, we think always of wisdom, tolerance, kindliness, generosity, humility; and the qualities of cruelty, greed, self-interest, graspingness, and rapacity are universally considered undesirable. And yet in our structure of society, the so-called and considered good qualities are invariable concomitants of failure, while the bad ones are the cornerstones of success ... Perhaps no other animal is so torn between alternatives. Man might be described fairly adequately, if simply, as a two-legged paradox. — John Steinbeck

There is nothing inherently metaphoric about such claims of basic experiential morality as "Health is good," "It is better to be cared for than uncared for," "Everyone ought to be protected from physical harm," and "It is good to be loved."
However, as soon as we develop such claims into a full-fledged human morality, we find that virtually all of our abstract moral concepts-justice, rights, empathy, nurturance, strength, uprightness, and so forth-are defined by metaphors. That is why there is no ethical system that is not metaphorical. We understand our experience via these conceptual metaphors, we reason according to their metaphorical logic, and we make judgments on the basis of the metaphors. This is what we mean when we say that morality is metaphoric. — George Lakoff

There are two kinds of liberalism. A liberalism which is always, subterraneously authoritative and paternalistic, on the side of one's good conscience. And then there is a liberalism which is more ethical than political; one would have to find another name for this. Something like a profound suspension of judgment. — Roland Barthes

Olympism is a philosophy which, by blending sport with culture, seeks to create a way of life based on the joy found in effort, the educational value of good example and respect for universal ethical principles. — Juan Antonio Samaranch

Pointed out that the corporation enjoys the same rights as a living person under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. This concept was upheld in 1886 by the Supreme Court in 'Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company' and has been a fact of law ever since. I emphasized to those executives that the corporation should also be required to accept the same responsibilities as those expected of a person; it too should be a good citizen, an honorable, ethical member of the community. In the case of international corporations, that community has to be defined as the world. — John Perkins

Sportsmanship is the ethical and moral dimension of sports. It is demonstrated by a number of attributes and attitudes such as fair play, respect for the rules and traditions of the sport and various traits of good character including integrity (abiding by the letter and spirit of the rules and concepts of honor); demonstrated respect for others including teammates, opponents, officials and spectators; accountability, self-control, and graciousness in victory and defeat. — Michael Josephson

He has no interest in pursuing an abstract argument to demonstrate a purely theoretical truth. His practical reason is ethical. Its first principle could be stated thus: Do no evil, Take up what is good, Purify the mind - This is the teaching of buddhas.11 In seeing conditioned arising as a "ground," Gotama implies that insight into conditionality provides "grounds" on which to act. — Stephen Batchelor

Philosophy which does not seek to impose upon the world its own conceptions of good and evil is not only more likely to achieve truth, but is also the outcome of a higher ethical standpoint than one which, like evolutionism and most traditional systems, is perpetually appraising the universe and seeking to find in it an embodiment of present ideals. — Bertrand Russell

Countries are rarely governed by the ethical and good people. — Mehmet Murat Ildan

To be a good human being is to have a kind of openness to the world, an ability to trust uncertain things beyond your own control, that can lead you to be shattered in very extreme circumstances for which you were not to blame. That says something very important about the condition of the ethical life: that it is based on a trust in the uncertain and on a willingness to be exposed; it's based on being more like a plant than like a jewel, something rather fragile, but whose very particular beauty is inseparable from that fragility. — Martha C. Nussbaum

The essence of kitsch is the confusion of ethical and esthetic categories; kitsch wants to produce not the "good" but the "beautiful." — Hermann Broch

As part of "moral philosophy," the concept of "natural liberty" clicks easily into place. Man, as an ethical integer, is either free to choose between good and bad courses within the
limits of his circumstances, or he is not. If he is not free, if he can
only accept what is handed to him from above (by fate, or by decree of the human agents of fate), then there is not much use in talking about morality or ethics. To make any sense of the idea
of morality, it must be presumed that the human being is responsible for his actions-and responsibility cannot be understood apart from the presumption of freedom of choice. — John Chamberlain

Ethical religion affirms the continuity of progress toward moral perfection. It affirms that the spiritual development of the human race cannot be prematurely cut off, either gradually or suddenly; that every stone of offence against which we stumble is a stepping-stone to some greater good:;; that, at the end of days, if we choose to put it so, or, rather, in some sphere beyond the world of space and time, all the rays of progress will be summed and centred in a transcendent focus. — Felix Adler

Today we often assume that before undertaking a religious lifestyle, we must prove to our own satisfaction that "God" or the "Absolute" exists. This is good scientific practice: first you establish a principle; only then can you apply it. But the Axial sages would say that this was to put the cart before the horse. First you must commit yourself to the ethical life; then disciplined and habitual benevolence, not metaphysical conviction, would give you intimations of the transcendence you sought. — Karen Armstrong

Ethical systems and practices need to look good. They have to be desirable, well-designed and work well. — Adrian Grenier

For a good part of my life, I had a share in this idea that I have not yet quite abandoned. But there came a time when I could not protect myself, and indeed did not wish to protect myself, from the onslaught of reality. Marxism, I conceded, had its intellectual and philosophical and ethical glories, but they were in the past. Something of the heroic period might perhaps be retained, but the fact had to be faced: there was no longer any guide to the future. In addition, the very concept of a total solution had led to the most appalling human sacrifices, and to the invention of excuses for them. Those of us who had sought a rational alternative to religion had reached a terminus that was comparably dogmatic. What else was to be expected of something that was produced by the close cousins of chimpanzees? Infallibility? Thus, dear reader, if you have come this far and found your own faith undermined - as I hope - I am willing to say that to some extent I know what you are going through. — Christopher Hitchens

If you wish to take shamatha all the way to its ground, however, it requires a supportive, serene environment, good diet, proper exercise, and very few preoccupations. The necessary internal conditions are minimal desires, few activities and concerns, contentment, pure ethical discipline, and freedom from obsessive, compulsive thinking. It is my feeling that the achievement of shamatha is so rare today because those circumstances are so rare. It is difficult to find a conducive environment in which to practice at length and without interference - even more so to have that and access to suitable spiritual friends for support and guidance. Therefore, if the causes are difficult to bring together, the result - shamatha - is also necessarily rare. — B. Alan Wallace

You might hold an ethical position that it's wrong to lie, but if you have plans for a war in Iraq, and you want to keep them secret for practical reasons - to reduce casualties, perhaps - and someone asks you about those plans, you may need to lie for a 'good' outcome. — Peter Singer

I ask that all Americans demonstrate in their personal and public lives ... the high ethical standards that are essential to good character and to the continued success of our Nation. — William J. Clinton

The core symbols we use for God represent what we take to be the highest good ... These symbols or images shape our worldview, our ethical system, and our social practice
how we relate to one another.
For instance, [Elizabeth A.] Johnson suggests that if a religion speaks about God as warrior, using militaristic language such as how "he crushes his enemies" and summoning people to become soldiers in God's army, then the people tend to become militaristic and aggressive.
Likewise, if the key symbol of God is that of a male king (without any balancing feminine imagery), we become a culture that values and enthrones men and masculinity. — Sue Monk Kidd

Epicureanism was a philosophy that brought peace and quiet rather than inspiration and exhilaration; based on a theory of the exclusive validity of sense perception and on an ethical doctrine that pleasure was the criterion of the good, it lent itself not only to a dull and flat dialectic but also to gross misinterpretation. Although, — Titus Lucretius Carus

The Bible improved my ethical IQ. I started to act like a good person. I tried not to gossip, and lie, and covet, and just by pretending I was a good person, I think I actually became a little bit better of a person. I'm not Gandhi or Angelina Jolie, but it was a baby step. — A. J. Jacobs

Good is a product of the ethical and spiritual artistry of individuals; it cannot be mass-produced. — Aldous Huxley

I got an abortion and learned how to make dehydrated tuna flakes and turkey jerky and took a refresher course on basic first aid and practiced using my water purifier in my kitchen sink. I had to change. I had to change was the thought that drove me in those months of planning. Not into a different person, but back to the person I used to be
strong and responsible, clear-eyed and driven, ethical and good. And the PCT would make me that way. There, I'd walk and think about my entire life. I'd find my strength again, far from everything that had made my life ridiculous. — Cheryl Strayed

While boys are taught that the things that make them men
good men
are universally accepted ethical ideals, women are led to believe that our moral compass lies somewhere between our legs. Literally. — Jessica Valenti

One of the good things about the public Human Genome Project is that the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Institutes of Health spent a part of their budget on the ethical, legal, and social implications of their research. — Juan Enriquez

Doing good business - being ethical, being transparent, being caring, implementing values in your business - makes a difference, and you make money at the same time. — Shari Arison

When a father inquired about the best method of educating his son in ethical conduct, a Pythagorean replied: Make him a citizen of a state with good laws — Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

[L]ike it or not, the right timing is an inescapable part of human endeavor and thus of politics. . . . But some activists suggest that "timing" is irrelevant in public policy and politics. In their view, it's just another "excuse" by "incrementalists," another example of their traitorous cowardice, another reason why they should be condemned and purged. . . . There is a fundamental ethical and practical difference between compromise and prudently fighting for the most good that can be gained in the face of overwhelming odds. . . . Realizing the constraints and limits of this world should guard us against unrealistic expectations of what politics can or should achieve. And yet, the examples of Wilberforce and Lincoln, among many others, demonstrate that moral purpose can be successfully pursued in politics with prudence. — Clarke D. Forsythe

Had to change. I had to change was the thought that drove me in those months of planning. Not into a different person, but back to the person I used to be - strong and responsible, clear-eyed and driven, ethical and good. — Cheryl Strayed

The choice between the ethical and the aesthetic is not the choice between good and evil, it is the choice whether or not to choose in terms of good and evil. — Alasdair MacIntyre

A big ethical question is what happens after people stop using the device. Does it degrade the environment? Could it have been designed so it would actually be good for the environment? — Donald Norman

All knowledge attains its ethical value and its human significance only by the human sense with which it is employed. Only a good man can be a great physician. — Hermann Nothnagel

It's interesting that we can always find someone who will give an articulate and persuasive defense for the ethical legitimacy of some of the activities that God has judged to be an outrage to Him. As humans, our ability to defend ourselves from moral culpability is quite developed and nuanced. We become a culture in trouble when we begin to call evil good and good evil. To do that, we must distort the conscience, and, in essence, make man the final authority in life. All one has to do is to adjust his conscience to suit his ethic. Then we can live life with peace of mind, thinking that we are living in a state of righteousness. — R.C. Sproul

Jesus would make available to the world the great teaching of Israel: ethical monotheism. There is one God, and he is the source and judge of all that is good. This — John Ortberg

The civil magistrate cannot function without some ethical guidance, without some standard of good and evil. If that standard is not to be the revealed law of God ... then what will it be? In some form or expression it will have to be the law of man (or men) - the standard of self-law or autonomy. And when autonomous laws come to govern a commonwealth, the sword is certainly wielded in vain, for it represents simply the brute force of some men's will against the will of other men. — Greg L. Bahnsen

When a doctor refuses money, even the most ethical ones, you usually start driving a good bargain with the undertaker. — Sue Sanders

Humans all have the instinct to determine right from wrong and wrong from right. Religion plays no factor in morals and ethical motive. Did your instinct never tell you that you were doing something wrong when you did? Did your heart never feel the warmth of a good deed? Instinct gave you morals. You gave yourself morals. The whole argument that religion helps us distinguish the difference between right and wrong is buncombe. — J.C. Wickhart

That is why no amount of cajolery, and no attempts at ethical or social seduction, can eradicate from my heart a deep burning hatred for the Tory Party that inflicted those bitter experiences on me. So far as I am concerned they are lower than vermin. They condemned millions of first-class people to semi-starvation. Now the Tories are pouring out money in propaganda of all sorts and are hoping by this organised sustained mass suggestion to eradicate from our minds all memory of what we went through. But, I warn you young men and women, do not listen to what they are saying now. Do not listen to the seductions of Lord Woolton. He is a very good salesman. If you are selling shoddy stuff you have to be a good salesman. But I warn you they have not changed, or if they have they are slightly worse than they were. — Aneurin Bevan

Make ethical choices in what we buy, do, and watch. In a consumer-driven society our individual choices, used collectively for the good of animals and nature, can change the world faster than laws. — Marc Bekoff

Forget your environmental footprint. Think about your ethical footprint. What good is it to build a zero-carbon, energy efficient complex, when the labor producing this architectural gem is unethical at best? — Cameron Sinclair

Notwithstanding his somewhat dodgy family values, Jesus' ethical teachings were - at least by comparison with the ethical disaster area that is the Old Testament - admirable; but there are other teachings in the New Testament that no good person should support. I refer especially to the central doctrine of Christianity: that of 'atonement' for 'original sin'. This — Richard Dawkins

I only share when I have no unmet needs that I'm trying to fill. I firmly believe that being vulnerable with a larger audience is only a good idea if the healing is tied to the sharing, not to the expectations I might have for the response I get. — Brene Brown

I have found little that is 'good' about human beings on the whole. In my experience most of them are trash, no matter whether they publicly subscribe to this or that ethical doctrine or to none at all. — Sigmund Freud

A good basic guideline for our speech (in relation to Ethical Conduct) is to reflect whether what we are saying is both true and useful. There may be times when we are honest in what we say, but our words are too brutal or harsh. And there may be other times when we are deliberately being kind with the words we choose, but what we are saying is not totally true. — Noah Levine

Assume that your drive to experience pleasure isn't a barrier to your spiritual growth, but is in fact essential to it. Proceed on the hypothesis that cultivating joy can make you a more ethical and compassionate person. Imagine that feeling good has something important to teach you every day. What might you do differently from what you do now? — Rob Brezsny

I will call no being good who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow creatures; and if such a creature can sentence me to hell for not so calling him, to hell I will go . — John Stuart Mill

I have been in Wall Street all of my life. I love it. It has been good to me. I know many wonderful, decent, honorable, ethical, hard-working people that were in Wall Street with me. — Kenneth Langone

Effective altruism is an advance in ethical behavior as well as in the practical application of our ability to reason. I have described it as an emerging movement, and that term suggests that it will continue to develop and spread. If it does, then once there is a critical mass of effective altruists, it will no longer seem odd for anyone to regard bringing about "the most good I can do" as an important life goal. If effective altruism does become mainstream, I would expect it to spread more rapidly, for then it will be apparent that it is easy to do a great deal of good and feel better about your life as a result. — Peter Singer

Those who wish even to focus on the problem of a Christian ethic are faced with an outrageous demand-from the outset they must give up, as inappropriate to this topic, the very two questions that led them to deal with the ethical problem: 'How can I be good?' and 'How can I do something good?' Instead they must ask the wholly other, completely different question: 'What is the will of God? — Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Today, more than ever, citizens demand with good reason that moral and ethical principles be upheld and that exemplariness preside over our public life. And the king, as the head of state, must not only be an example but also a servant to that just and legitimate demand of the citizens. — King Felipe VI

I regard monotheism as the greatest disaster ever to befall the human race. I see no good in Judaism, Christianity, or Islam
good people, yes, but any religion based on a single, well, frenzied and virulent god, is not as useful to the human race as, say, Confucianism, which is not a religion but an ethical and educational system. — Gore Vidal

The image of evolution as a process that reliably produces benign effects is difficult to reconcile with the enormous suffering that we see in both the human and the natural world. Those who cherish evolution's achievements may do so more from an aesthetic than an ethical perspective. Yet the pertinent question is not what kind of future it would be fascinating to read about in a science fiction novel or to see depicted in a nature documentary, but what kind of future it would be good to live in: two very different matters. — Nick Bostrom

What is so 'only' about 'yourself'? Is not the first thing one has to learn in this respect that to do something for yourself--I mean, the right kind of thing--is just as valuable and ethical than to do it for somebody else? Wouldn't you say that the good feeling we get simply because we did 'it' (whatever) for somebody else is cheating, in that it postpones the question: what is it good for? — Rudolf Arnheim

A good many of our higher-bracket businessmen might have been just as rich, just as powerful, but more respected and infinitely happier, if they had taken the slower and longer road of absolute ethical integrity and moral decency. — Og Mandino

He said that knowledge was of little use without wisdom, and that there was no wisdom without spirituality, and that true spirituality always included service to others. As he explained many times, the essence of a good physician consisted of a capacity for compassion and a sense of the ethical, without which qualities the sacred art of healing degenerated into simple charlatanism. — Isabel Allende

Most effective altruists are not saints but ordinary people like you and me, so very few effective altruists claim to live a fully ethical life. Most of them are somewhere on the continuum between a minimally acceptable ethical life and a fully ethical life. That doesn't mean that they are constantly feeling guilty about not being morally perfect. Effective altruists don't see a lot of point in feeling guilty. They prefer to focus on the good they are doing. Some of them are content to know they are doing something significant to make the world a better place. Many of them like to challenge themselves, to do a little better this year than last year. — Peter Singer

We should aim for our children to be good people, and to live ethical lives that manifest concern for others as well as for themselves. — Peter Singer

The most pressing ethical question is to make sure that everything you do from a scientific standpoint is done for the ultimate good and positive issue for the people that you're caring about. — Anthony Fauci

Evolution throws a wonderful light on all the struggles, eccentricities, tortuous developments of the human conscience in the past. It is the only theory of morals that does. And evolution throws just as much light on the ethical and social struggle today; and it is the only theory that does. What a strange age ours is from the religious point of view! What a hopeless age from the philosopher's point of view! Yet it is a very good age, the best that ever was. No evolutionist is a pessimist. — Joseph McCabe

You can't deny that religion has done some good. It organizes lots of anti-poverty programs and soup kitchens and missionary work. But I would say that, first of all, all those things can be accomplished without religion. You can be ethical, somebody who does the right thing without feeling that he has to in order to get his ass saved in the next life. — Bill Maher

Courtesy, modesty, good manners, conformity to definite ethical standards are universal, but what constitutes courtesy, modesty, good manners, and definite ethical standards is not universal. It is instructive to know that standards differ in the most unexpected ways — Franz Boas

A good-looking piece of scenery anywhere delights the eye and elevates the spirits. Some of us, crude creatures that we are, are merely excited; finer souls draw ethical and spiritual nutrients from the sight. — Barbara Holland

A good lawyer is part con man, part priest
promising riches, threatening hell. My ethical rules are simple. I won't lie to the court or let a client do it. But I've never been in this position. How far would I go for a woman who mattered? Is there anything I wouldn't do to win? — Paul Levine

When the ethical problem presents itself essentially as the question of my own being good and doing good, the decision has already been made that the self and the world are the ultimate realities. All ethical reflection then has the goal that I be good, and that the world - by my action - becomes good. If it turns out, however, that these realities, myself and the world, are themselves embedded in a wholly other ultimate reality, namely, the reality of God the Creator, Reconciler, and Redeemer,[5] then the ethical problem takes on a whole new aspect. Of ultimate importance, then, is not that I become good, or that the condition of the world be improved by my efforts, but that the reality of God show itself everywhere to be the ultimate reality. — Dietrich Bonhoeffer

This isn't animal experimentation, where you an imagine some proportionate good at the other end of the suffering. This is what we feel like eating. Tell me something: Why is taste, the crudest of our sense, exempted from the ethical rules that govern our other sense? If you stop and think about it, it's crazy. Why doesn't a horny person has as strong a claim to raping an animal as a hungry one does to killing and eating it? — Jonathan Safran Foer

Humanism is a philosophy that is primarily focused on how we as individuals can be good human beings. We seek to be ethical, moral and compassionate people in all that we do. However, we also understand that good moral reasoning requires us to think clearly and rationally about the problems we face. So Humanists are as much concerned with how we think, as we are concerned with what we think about. To that end we practice the related skills of freethought, critical thinking and logic. — Jennifer Hancock

Ruggles told my father what he did because it is not a good thing to belong to the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries in the twentieth. Or really, because it is not good to have taken one's public-school's ethical system seriously. I am really, sir, the English public schoolboy. That's an eighteenth-century product. What with — Ford Madox Ford

There is also the professional mentor, a person whose success in his or her career can be a source of practical wisdom and inspiration. This success might be mea sured in material gain or far-reaching influence, or in lives touched and relationships fostered. These mentors can offer a model for good business, ethical practices, and effective work habits, and they often provide the motivation we need to seize whatever opportunities come our way. — John Wooden

The essence of the spiritual process needs to be understood as a means to generate the necessary intensity to break the bubble, so that you are out of your individual nature. It is not about being good, it is not about being ethical, it is not about being moral. These things may all happen as a result, as a consequence. Once you have broken the bubble and known the freedom of experiencing everything as yourself, as a consequence you may function as a good person in society. But you have no particular intention of being good! — Jaggi Vasudev

It cannot be denied that as institutions, churches do good work. They operate schools and hospitals. Their charity outreaches, which take care of the homeless, sick, and hungry, have real impacts on communities. And while there are certainly hellfire-and-brimstone preachers around, there is counterweight in Presbyterian and Methodist ministers, who are grounded in a modicum of rationality, using Biblical stories as fables to teach psychological and ethical principles. — Gudjon Bergmann

If you're an Orthodox believer, then what sustains this framework is the obligation that you follow. But if you live in a democratic, liberal world whose motto is: "Make choices and manage your choices according to what is good for you," then there is a built-in tension between that which connects and that which divides. Between the material and the intellectual or ethical. Materialism is not a dirty word, but in this tension between the individual and the material on the one hand, and the communal and the ethical on the other, we are at the end of an age in which the material and the individual are triumphing. — Kalid Gilad

Lewis Richardson wrote that his quest to analyze peace with numbers sprang from two prejudices. As a Quaker, he believed that "the moral evil in war outweighs the moral good, although the latter is conspicuous." As a scientist, he thought there was too much moralizing about war and not enough knowledge. "For indignation is so easy and satisfying a mood that it is apt to prevent one from attending to any facts that oppose it. If the reader should object that I have abandoned ethics for the false doctrine that 'tout comprendre c'est tout pardonner' [to understand all is to forgive all], I can reply that it is only a temporary suspense of ethical judgment, made because 'beaucoup condamner c'est peu comprendre' [to condemn much is to understand little]." (p. 200) — Steven Pinker

At the center of Zoroastrian theology was a unique monotheistic system based on the sole god, Ahura Mazda ("the Wise Lord"). Like most ancients, Zarathustra could not easily conceive of his god as being the source of both good and evil. He therefore developed an ethical dualism in which two opposing spirits, Spenta Mainyu ("the beneficent spirit") and Angra Mainyu ("the hostile spirit"), were responsible for good and evil, respectively. — Reza Aslan