Irving Kristol Quotes

Where great evils lie on all sides, it is very difficult to follow the best counsel.

It is sometimes rational to do what is wrong, and sometimes irrational to do what is right

The choice before human beings, is not, as a rule, between good and evil but between two evils.

Life often presents us with a choice of evils, rather than of goods.

In philosophy seminars, the choice is usually between good and evil. In the real world, however, the choice is often between a bad guy and a worse guy.

Choices of right or wrong are not presented to you in black and white. If they were, I'm sure most people would choose white.

If this isn’t good versus evil, what is?

People can do bad things for good reasons, or for what they think are good reasons.

There are two kinds of people in this world, son. Those who save lives, and those who take lives." "And what of those who protect and defend? Those who save lives by taking lives?" "That's like trying to stop a storm by blowing harder. Ridiculous. You can't protect by killing.

Morality and ethics are nothing but footballs, wherewith people, strong people play to win points.

The apprehension of the good Gives but the greater feeling to the worse.

Every act has both good and evil results. The best we can do is lean to the light.

How can you do the right thing when you can't figure out what that is? When all you have before you are choices in various shades of wrong?

All evils are to be considered with the good that is in them, and with what worse attends them.

Moral issues rarely have yes or no answers. -Myles to Alanna when she asks about the Gift

If some incarnation of evil as unambiguous as Hitler appeared again, I would have no moral qualms about killing the enemy. But in the modern world of moral murkiness, I prefer to keep my hands as clean of enemy blood as possible.

D'you know how embarrassing it is to mention good and evil in a scientific laboratory? Have you any idea? One of the reasons I became a scientist was not to have to think about that kind of thing.

Whenever there is a conflict between universal principles and self-interest, self-interest is likely to prevail.

You got to wrestle with your conscience. You got to listen to people. It doesn't come so easy to me that this is right and that's wrong. It's never that simple.

Science is important, but so is ethics, so is balancing life. To destroy life to save life - it's one of the real ethical dilemmas that we face.

There is another temptation which we must especially guard against: the simplistic reductionism which sees only good or evil; or, if you will, the righteous and sinners. The contemporary world, with its open wounds which affect so many of our brothers and sisters, demands that we confront every form of polarization which would divide it into these two camps.

I think the human race needs to think about killing. How much evil must we do to do good?

There is a certain kind of morality which is even more alien to good and evil than amorality is.

I find that the interesting challenges, because there's obvious things where, you know, don't be unethical, don't be evil, you know, don't break the law, don't do immoral things, those are all straightforward and don't create ethical dilemmas. The thing that's interesting is when you actually have multiple interests at stake and you have to kind of navigate your way through it.

There could conceivably be circumstances in which an experiment on an animal stands to reduce suffering so much that it would be permissible to carry it out even if it involved harm to the animal... [even if] the animal were a human being.