Quotes About Morality

Times are horrible. Nobody has any money and there is an immoral spirit in the air — just as you're getting ready to hit on someone for some cash, they're already hitting on you!

But I could just as well turn into a Hulla--and if I became a star, I might actually be a worse person than a Hulla, who was good. Perhaps glamour isn't all that important after all.

The true humanist maintains a just balance between sympathy and selection.

A man needs to look, not down, but up to standards set so much above his ordinary self as to make him feel that he is himself "spiritually" the underdog. Anyone who thus looks up has some chance of becoming worthy to be looked up to in turn.

The world, or at least a few decent portions of it, could still be moved by the sight of thousands of victims, perhaps because it had not yet become hardened to the sight of millions.

People need religion. It's a vehicle for a moral tradition. A crucial role. Nothing can take its place.

If you believe that no one was ever corrupted by a book, you have also to believe that no one was ever improved by a book.

Certainly he is not of the generation that regards honesty as the best policy. However, he does regard it as a policy. (On President Richard M Nixon)

The famous and rich, even the learned and wise, Singly or in pairs went to her dwelling To press their civilized lips to her thighs Or learn at first hand her buttocks' swelling "Old nicoise whore

Art is amoral; so is life. For me there are no obscene pictures or books; there are only poorly conceived and poorly executed ones.

The abuse of alcohol," Mr. Parrish said in a solemn, preacher-like voice, as he reached for his glass, "is the one thing that puts Man above the animal.

A robot may not injure humanity, or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.

Let's start with the three fundamental Rules of Robotics.... We have: one, a robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. Two, a robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. And three, a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.

If we only obey those rules that we think are just and reasonable, then no rule will stand, for there is no rule that some will not think is unjust and unreasonable.

Considering what human beings do and have done to human beings (and to other living things as well) ... I can never imagine what the devil people think computers can add to the horrors.

Society is much more easily soothed than one's own conscience.

The three fundamental Rules of Robotics...One: a robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm...Two:..a robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law...Three: a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First and Second Laws.

Even private persons in due season, with discretion and temper, may reprove others, whom they observe to commit sin, or follow bad courses, out of charitable design, and with hope to reclaim them.

There will be no justice as long as man will stand with a knife or with a gun and destroy those who are weaker than he is.

People often say that humans have always eaten animals, as if this is a justification for continuing the practice. According to this logic, we should not try to prevent people from murdering other people, since this has also been done since the earliest of times.

To be a vegetarian is to disagree - to disagree with the course of things today... starvation, cruelty - we must make a statement against these things. Vegetarianism is my statement. And I think it's a strong one.

What do they know-all these scholars, all these philosophers, all the leaders of the world - about such as you? They have convinced themselves that man, the worst transgressor of all the species, is the crown of creation. All other creatures were created merely to provide him with food, pelts, to be tormented, exterminated. In relation to them, all people are Nazis; for the animals it is an eternal Treblinka.

Honour, not honours.

Virtuous people are simply those who have not been tempted sufficiently, because they live in a vegetative state, or because their purposes are so concentrated in one direction that they have not had the leisure to glance around them.