Quotes about Ethics

Edmund Way Teale in his 1950 book Circle of the Seasons understood the dilemma better: It is morally as bad not to care whether a thing is true or not, so long as it makes you feel good, as it is not to care how you got your money as long as you have got it.

TABLE OF PROPOSED RULES TO LIVE BY The Golden Rule Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. The Silver Rule Do not do unto others what you would not have them do unto you. The Brazen (Brass) Rule Do unto others as they do unto you. The Iron Rule Do unto others as you like, before they do it unto you. The Tit-for-Tat Rule Cooperate with others first, then do unto them as they do unto you.

Tom Paine wrote in The Age of Reason: Infidelity does not consist in believing, or in disbelieving; it consists in professing to believe what one does not believe. It is impossible to calculate the moral mischief, if I may so express it, that mental lying has produced in society. When man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind, as to subscribe his professional belief to things he does not believe, he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime.

The unprecedented powers that science now makes available must be accompanied by unprecedented levels of ethical focus and concern by the scientific community—as well as the most broadly based public education into the importance of science and democracy.

If the enemy can think and feel, you might hesitate to kill them. And killing is very important. Better to see them as monsters.

The unprecedented powers that science now makes available must be accompanied by unprecedented levels of ethical focus and concern by the scientific community—as well as the sort broadly based public education into the importance of science and democracy.

As long as you find something beautiful, good, and true to believe in and abide by, you have the equivalent of God in your life.

Words and thoughts concerning compassionate action that are not put into practice are like beautiful flowers that are colorful but have no fragrance.

Anyone can practice some nonviolence, even soldiers. Some army generals, for example, conduct their operations in ways that avoid killing innocent people; this is a kind of nonviolence.

We will receive the fruits of any act we have done, whether wholesome or unwholesome.

When you abstain from eating and drinking animal products, fewer animals are slaughtered, and you contribute less to climate degradation.

True happiness does not reside in the ill-considered consumption of goods paid for by the suffering, famine, and death of others, but in a life enlightened by the feeling of a constant responsibility for one's neighbor.