Society and the World

If I would be a young man again and had to decide how to make my living, I would not try to become a scientist or scholar or teacher. I would rather choose to be a plumber or a peddler in the hope to find that modest degree of independence still available under present circumstances.

Common sense is nothing more than a deposit of prejudices laid down in the mind before you reach eighteen.

If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z . Work is x ; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut.

The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.

Some recent work by E. Fermi and L. Szilard, which has been communicated to me in manuscript, leads me to expect that the element uranium may be turned into a new and important source of energy in the immediate future. Certain aspects of the situation which has arisen seem to call for watchfulness and, if necessary, quick action on the part of the Administration.

The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility … The fact that it is comprehensible is a miracle.

I am convinced that He [God] does not play dice.

God is subtle but he is not malicious.

E = mc 2 .

Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.

Genius is one per cent inspiration, ninety-nine per cent perspiration.

For most of my life I refused to work at any problem unless its solution seemed to be capable of being put to commercial use.

All that foreign oil controlling American soil.

All that foreign oil controlling American soil.

Señor, señor, do you know where we’re headin’?

She knows there’s no success like failure

She takes just like a woman, yes, she does

Fairest Isle, all isles excelling.

War is the trade of kings.

War is the trade of kings.

I am as free as nature first made man,

Nor is the people’s judgement always true:

A man so various that he seemed to be