“Somebody who only reads newspapers and at best books of contemporary authors looks to me like an extremely near-sighted person who scorns eyeglasses. He is completely dependent on the prejudices and fashions of his times, since he never gets to see or hear anything else.”
―
Albert Einstein
“I was made acutely aware how far superior an education that stresses independent action and personal responsibility is to one that relies on drill, external authority and ambition.”
―
Albert Einstein
“I do not at all believe in human freedom in the philosophical sense... Schopenhauer’s saying, ‘A man can do what he wants, but not will what he wants,’ has been a very real inspiration to me since my youth; it has been a continual consolation in the face of life’s hardships, my own and others’, and an unfailing wellspring of tolerance. This realization mercifully mitigates the easily paralyzing sense of responsibility and prevents us from taking ourselves and other people too seriously; it is conducive to a view of life which, in part, gives humour its due.”
―
Albert Einstein
“Organized people are just too lazy to go looking for what they want.”
―
Albert Einstein
“A ship is always safe at the shore - but that is NOT what it is built for.”
―
Albert Einstein
“The generalized theory of relativity has furnished still more remarkable results. This considers not only uniform but also accelerated motion. In particular, it is based on the impossibility of distinguishing an acceleration from the gravitation or other force which produces it. Three consequences of the theory may be mentioned of which two have been confirmed while the third is still on trial: (1) It gives a correct explanation of the residual motion of forty-three seconds of arc per century of the perihelion of Mercury. (2) It predicts the deviation which a ray of light from a star should experience on passing near a large gravitating body, the sun, namely, 1".7. On Newton's corpuscular theory this should be only half as great. As a result of the measurements of the photographs of the eclipse of 1921 the number found was much nearer to the prediction of Einstein, and was inversely proportional to the distance from the center of the sun, in further confirmation of the theory. (3) The theory predicts a displacement of the solar spectral lines, and it seems that this prediction is also verified.”
―
Albert Einstein
“Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”
―
Albert Einstein
“Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one's living at it.”
―
Albert Einstein
“I was originally supposed to become an engineer but the thought of having to expend my creative energy on things that make practical everyday life even more refined, with a loathsome capital gain as the goal, was unbearable to me.”
―
Albert Einstein
“The formulation of the problem is often more essential than its solution, which may be merely a matter of mathematical or experimental skill.”
―
Albert Einstein
“When we first got married, we made a pact. It was this: In our life together, it was decided I would make all of the big decisions and my wife would make all of the little decisions. For fifty years, we have held true to that agreement. I believe that is the reason for the success in our marriage. However, the strange thing is that in fifty years, there hasn’t been one big decision.”
―
Albert Einstein
“L'interesse per l'uomo in se stesso e per il suo destino deve sempre costituire l'obiettivo primario di tutti gli sforzi compiuti in campo tecnologico [...] affinché le creazioni della nostra mente possano rappresentare un bene e non una maledizione per l'umanità. Non scordatevelo mai, mentre siete alle prese con diagrammi ed equazioni."
(dal discorso tenuto nel 1931 agli studenti del California Institute of Technology)”
―
Albert Einstein
