Pierre Teilhard de Chardin Quotes

Religion may have become a codification of morality, and it may fortify it, but it's not the origin of it.

Let us be moral. Let us contemplate existence.

What is the real relation between happiness and goodness? It is only within a few generations that men have found courage to say that there is none.

I wasn't looking for religion; I was looking for a world view.

Without philosophy man cannot know what he makes; without religion he cannot know why.

I don't subscribe to any particular doctrine or ideology. I just think that there's kind of a good and bad, the good being life in its purest, happiest form, and the other being the darker side of existence.

All men are born good.

The ends do not justify the means. The means are the ends.

Philosophy, to be relevant, must offer us a wisdom to live by.

Intellectual generalities are always interesting, but generalities in morals mean absolutely nothing.

I worry that when you start quoting Machiavelli to justify your actions, you have ceased to be one of the good guys. No, quoting Nietzsche does that. Machiavelli is just cool.

But the nature of the universe is such that ends can never justify means. On the contrary, the means always determine the end.

At the core of every moral code there is a picture of human nature, a map of the universe, and a version of history. To human nature (of the sort conceived), in a universe (of the kind imagined), after a history (so understood), the rules of the code apply.

The only thing that is good without qualification is a good will.

For Aristotle, goodness is a kind of prospering in the precarious affair of being human.

The rules of morality are not the conclusion of our reason.

But I think it is a serious issue to wonder about the other platonic absolutes of say beauty and morality.

All serious conversations gravitate towards philosophy.

Ethical and questions of philosophy interest me a great deal.

Better than worshiping gods is obedience to the laws of righteousness.

I have no evidence that libertarianism leads to a better life. I just think it is morally right.

That's a central part of philosophy, of ethics. What do I owe to strangers? What do I owe to my family? What is it to live a good life? Those are questions which we face as individuals.

Mencius said that human nature is good. I disagree with that.

One has only as much morality as one has philosophy and poetry.

I like films that deal with some of those questions that you can never answer: 'Why are we here? What's it about? What happens to us with the choices that we make? What are the ramifications for doing something right, or doing something wrong?' Those universal questions, I enjoy.