“If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it.”

“I have not eaten enough of the tree of knowledge, though in my profession I am obligated to feed on it regularly.”

“Only the Catholic Church protested against the Hitlerian onslaught on liberty. Up till then I had not been interested in the Church, but today I feel a great admiration for the Church, which alone has had the courage to struggle for spiritual truth and moral liberty”

“PARAPHRASE: Genius is not that you are smarter than everyone else. It is that you are ready to receive the inspiration.”

“Older men start wars, but younger men fight them. ”

“We owe a lot to the Indians, who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made.”

“The word 'God' is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation, no matter how subtle, can (for me) change this.”

“You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war.”

“The tendencies we have mentioned are something new for America. They arose when, under the influence of the two World Wars and the consequent concentration of all forces on a military goal, a predominantly military mentality developed, which with the almost sudden victory became even more accentuated. The characteristic feature of this mentality is that people place the importance of what Bertrand Russell so tellingly terms “naked power” far above all other factors which affect the relations between peoples. The Germans, misled by Bismarck’s successes in particular, underwent just such a transformation of their mentality—in consequence of which they were entirely ruined in less than a hundred years. I must frankly confess that the foreign policy of the United States since the termination of hostilities has reminded me, sometimes irresistibly, of the attitude of Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm II, and I know that, independent of me, this analogy has most painfully occurred to others as well. It is characteristic of the military mentality that non-human factors (atom bombs, strategic bases, weapons of all sorts, the possession of raw materials, etc.) are held essential, while the human being, his desires and thoughts—in short, the psychological factors—are considered as unimportant and secondary. Herein lies a certain resemblance to Marxism, at least insofar as its theoretical side alone is kept in view. The individual is degraded to a mere instrument; he becomes “human materiel.” The normal ends of human aspiration vanish with such a viewpoint. Instead, the military mentality raises “naked power” as a goal in itself—one of the strangest illusions to which men can succumb.”

“Your imagination is your preview of life’s coming attractions.”

“Success = 1 part work + 1 part play + 1 part keep your mouth shut”

“Tanda kecerdasan sejati bukanlah pengetahuan tapi imajinasi.”

“It is our American habit if we find the foundations of our educational structure unsatisfactory to add another story or wing.”

“I am not a genius, I am just curious. I ask many questions. and when the answer is simple, then God is answering.”

“I do not believe in the immortality of the individual, and I consider ethics to be an exclusively human concern without any superhuman authority behind it.”