Albert Einstein Ideas Quotations

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

The mind that opens to a new idea never returns to its original size

For an idea that does not first seem insane, there is no hope.

If I give you a pfennig, you will be one pfennig richer and I'll be one pfennig poorer. But if I give you an idea, you will have a new idea, but I shall still have it too.

It is this mythical, or rather symbolic, content of the religious traditions which is likely to come into conflict with science. This occurs whenever this religious stock of ideas contains dogmatically fixed statements on subjects which belong in the domain of science.

The idea of a personal God is quite alien to me and seems even naïve.

My position concerning God is that of an agnostic. I am convinced that a vivid consciousness of the primary importance of moral principles for the betterment and ennoblement of life does not need the idea of a law-giver, especially a law-giver who works on the basis of reward and punishment.

It is always delightful when a great and beautiful idea proves to be consonant with reality.

It is important for the common good to foster individuality: for only the individual can produce the new ideas which the community needs for its continuous improvement and requirements - indeed, to avoid sterility and petrification

A new idea comes suddenly and in a rather intuitive way, but intuition is nothing but the outcome of earlier intellectual experience.

Thanks to my fortunate idea of introducing the relativity principle into physics, you (and others) now enormously overrate my scientific abilities, to the point where this makes me quite uncomfortable.

Creativity is contagious. Pass it on.

The ideas that have lighted my way have been kindness, beauty and truth.

An expert is a person who has few new ideas; a beginner is a person with many.

The theoretical idea ... does not arise apart from and independent of experience; nor can it be derived from experience by a purely logical procedure. It is produced by a creative act. Once a theoretical idea has been acquired, one does well to hold fast to it until it leads to an untenable conclusion.

It is important to foster individuality, for only the individual can produce the new ideas.

The relativity principle in connection with the basic Maxwellian equations demands that the mass should be a direct measure of the energy contained in a body; light transfers mass. With radium there should be a noticeable diminution of mass. The idea is amusing and enticing; but whether the Almighty is laughing at it and is leading me up the garden path -- that I cannot know.

No one must think that Newton’s great creation can be overthrown in any real sense by this [Theory of Relativity] or by any other theory. His clear and wide ideas will for ever retain their significance as the foundation on which our modern conceptions of physics have been built.

An important advance in the life of a people is the transformation of the religion of fear into the moral religion. But one must avoid the prejudice that regards the religions of primitive peoples as pure fear religions and those of the civilized races as pure moral religions. All are mixed forms, though the moral element predominates in the higher levels of social life. Common to all these types is the anthropomorphic character of the idea of God.

Everyone sits in the prison of his own ideas; he must burst it open, and that in his youth, and so try to test his ideas on reality.

Genius is when an idea and the execution of that idea are simultaneous.

The idea of a Being who interferes with the sequence of events in the world is absolutely impossible

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

Although words exist for the most part for the transmission of ideas, there are some which produce such violent disturbance in our feelings that the role they play in the transmission of ideas is lost in the background.

Marvellous, what ideas the young people have these days. But I don't believe a word of it.

It is also a natural thing for a serious young man that he should form for himself as precise an idea as possible of the goal of his desires.

Discussion and argument are essential parts of science; the greatest talent is the ability to strip a theory until the simple basic idea emerges with clarity.

No idea is conceived in our mind independent of our five senses [i.e., no idea is divinely inspired].

Why is it I always get my best ideas while shaving?

I owe as much of my success to an uncompromising obstinacy as to any original ideas.

Science is the process of making obviously erroneous ideas less obviously erroneous.

Genius is making complex ideas simple, not making simple ideas complex

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

My God may not be your idea of God, but one thing I know of my God he makes me a humanitarian. I am a proud Jew because we gave the world the Bible and the story of Joseph.

The State idea is not according to my heart. I cannot understand why it is needed. It is connected with narrow-minded and economic obstacles. I believe it is bad. I have always been against it.

If most of us are ashamed of shabby clothes and shoddy furniture, let us be more ashamed of shabby ideas and shoddy philosophies... It would be a sad situation if the wrapper were better than the meat wrapped inside it.

Great ideas often receive violent opposition from mediocre minds.

The ideas that have lighted my way and, time after time, have given me new courage to face life cheerfully have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth.