Quotes About Ethics

Only a man's character is the real criterion of worth.

The first ultraintelligent machine is the last invention that man need ever make, provided that the machine is docile enough to tell us how to keep it under control.

Men who are ruled by reason desire nothing for themselves which they would not wish for all mankind.

An honest man is in Hell when he is in debt.

Any gun in the hands of a bad man is a bad thing. Any gun in the hands of a decent person is no threat to anybody — except bad people.

The superior man loves his soul; the inferior man loves his property.

The real problem is in the hearts and minds of men. It is not a problem of physics but of ethics. It is easier to denature plutonium than to denature the evil spirit of man.

He who has renounced all violence towards all living beings, weak or strong, who neither kills nor causes others to kill - him I do call a holy man.

I don't think the robots are taking over. I think the men who play with toys have taken over. And if we don't take the toys out of their hands, we're fools.

If a man's handshake is no good all the {legal} paper in the world won't make it good.

I am a conscientious man, when I throw rocks at seabirds I leave no tern unstoned.

Better a man honor his profession than be honored by it.

Maybe a man has to sell his soul to get the power to do good.

Honour is that which no man can give you and no man can take away.

That man is the most loyal who aims at the noblest motive, and that motive the public good.

Who is wiser: the man who plants flowers along life's way or the man who makes it bristle with thorns?

Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered as long as possible with the trousers of decorum.

There is much difference between imitating a good man and counterfeiting him.

It is not permissible to add to one's possesions if these things can only be done at the cost of other men. Such development has only one true name, and that is exploitation.

No evil can happen to a good man either in life or after death.

I will not yield to any man contrary to what is right, for fear of death, even if I should die at once for not yielding.

The best state is that in which bad men are not allowed to hold office, and good men are not allowed to refuse office.

A man's vanity tells him what is honor, a man's conscience what is justice.

I have killed no men, that, in the first place, didn't deserve killing