If people are good because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that moral goodness should not be based on fear of punishment or desire for reward.
In this quote, Albert Einstein reflects on the ethical implications of behavior motivated by fear of punishment and the desire for reward. He posits that if people's goodness is contingent upon external consequences rather than intrinsic values, then humanity is in a pitiable state. It encourages a deeper understanding of morality that transcends mere self-interest and challenges individuals to seek goodness for its own sake rather than for personal gain.
In practice
In a speech about ethics in the workplace, one might say, 'Remember, as Einstein said, true goodness shouldn't come from fear of punishment or the hope for reward.'
I cannot then believe in this concept of an anthropomorphic God who has the powers of interfering with these natural laws. As I said before, the most beautiful and most profound religious emotion that we can experience is the sensation of the mystical. And this mysticality is the power of all true science.
If I would follow your advice and Jesus could perceive it, he, as a Jewish teacher, surely would not approve of such behavior.
I want to know all Gods thoughts; all the rest are just details.
In the middle of adversity there is great opportunity.
I do not believe that civilization will be wiped out in a war fought with the atomic bomb. Perhaps two-thirds of the people of the earth will be killed.
To me the worst thing seems to be a school principally to work with methods of fear, force and artificial authority. Such treatment destroys the sound sentiments, the sincerity and the self-confidence of pupils and produces a subservient subject.
Dying is nothing to fear. It can be the most wonderful experience of your life. It all depends on how you've lived.
The Buddha never intended to make desire itself the problem. When he said craving causes suffering, he was referring not to our natural inclination as living beings to have wants and needs, but to our habit of clinging to experience that must, by nature, pass away.
I hope that when I'm 90 years old, I've accomplished a legacy that isn't all about me. I hope it's a legacy about the people who our foundation helps.
People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances.
There is no rest for the humble except in despising the great, whose only thought of the people is inspired by self-interest or sadism.
It seems that the whole world is beginning to decay, and that its putrefaction has chosen to spread outward from here, from the land of the Pashtuns, where desertification proceeds at a steady, implacable crawl even in the consciences and intellects of men.
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