What's the difference between ambition and greed?

Ambition


Definition:

  • (n.) The act of going about to solicit or obtain an office, or any other object of desire; canvassing.
  • (n.) An eager, and sometimes an inordinate, desire for preferment, honor, superiority, power, or the attainment of something.
  • (v. t.) To seek after ambitiously or eagerly; to covet.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Jubilant Democrats are eyeing so-called “red states” such as Georgia and Utah and expanding their ambitions to take both the Senate and House .
  • (2) The award for nonfiction went to New Yorker staff writer Evan Osnos for his book on modern China, Age of Ambition .
  • (3) "My great ambition is to be president of a golf club where I am playing," he teased .
  • (4) So far, there is little sign of similar hubris at the Human Brain Project, a far more complex undertaking, but perhaps for the moment Markram's ambition is precisely what is needed.
  • (5) Photograph: KHIZR KHAN This sombre, serene oasis overlooking the Potomac river might also prove the graveyard of Donald Trump’s ambitions for the US presidency.
  • (6) Britain’s troubled relationship with the EU has provided Boris Johnson with nothing but fun since he first made his name lampooning the federalist ambitions of Jacques Delors as the Daily Telegraph’s Brussels correspondent in the early 1990s .
  • (7) President Obama's ambitions for new nuclear reductions?
  • (8) As Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, said when he published the initial white paper back in 2010: “At its heart, universal credit has a simple ambition – to make work pay, even for the poorest.
  • (9) "The player [Suárez] is amazing and I love his quality, commitment and ambition to play," said Mourinho.
  • (10) Some … actually dropped to the low end of their ambition ranges, which have led small island states to ask, 'Why is this?'
  • (11) Archbishop Eliud Wabukala of Kenya said the “truth [of the Gospel] continues to be called into question in the Anglican communion” and warned against “the global ambitions of a secular culture”.
  • (12) As important, if not more so, as his ambition to make exams tougher is his hostility towards other measures of ability, such as course work and controlled assessments.
  • (13) And Bristol, I guess, is following on because it has an ambition to become something similar.” According to Key, Bristol’s congestion problems are only as bad as those of other UK cities, and it’s “streets ahead” on walking and cycling .
  • (14) The company recently announced its ambition to reach a valuation of $50bn, but it is unclear how much Uber is worth if it has to start picking up expenses it has up to now pushed on to the shoulders of its drivers.
  • (15) If the ambition set out by the world’s heads of state in New York is ever to be achieved, the global tax system needs more than just a sticking plaster.
  • (16) But concerns about a slowing economy, jobs, civil rights and a lack of progress in the Kurdish peace process appear to have combined with worries that Erdoğan could assume quasi-dictatorial powers to thwart the president’s ambitions.
  • (17) Ian Macfarlane signals frontbench ambition after defecting to Nationals Read more But the deputy leader of the Nationals, Barnaby Joyce, pushed back at the criticism, saying it was not unprecedented for people to move between the Coalition parties and noted it was not as significant as ousting a prime minister.
  • (18) Susan Rice, US ambassador to the UN and a former frontrunner to replace Clinton as state secretary, saw her political ambitions cut short after she suggested that the attack could have originated from a spontaneous protest over an anti-Muslim US-made film.
  • (19) In this context, it is hard not to wonder whether a scheme on the scale and ambition of Packington, located as it is in a sea of valuable central London real estate, could ever be replicated.
  • (20) For Davutoglu, this ambition entails a "comprehensive" approach embracing enhanced economic, cultural and social ties as well as political and security relations.

Greed


Definition:

  • (n.) An eager desire or longing; greediness; as, a greed of gain.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) "Greed is not good," said Preet Bharara, the New York federal prosecutor bringing the case.
  • (2) Darth Sidious – instrumentally paranoid in the service of greed – is more like Herod than Hitler.
  • (3) Boris Johnson , the London mayor, got into hot water last week when he praised the value of greed as a spur to progress and controversially suggested some people struggle to get on in life because of their low IQs.
  • (4) Since the banking crash of 2008 – "a ghastly political situation as well as a financial problem because it was so much to do with greed" – over a third of the practice's new work is in the far east.
  • (5) This is payback, without a doubt.” The workers recently won the support of Will Self, who supported a boycott of the venue, writing : “If the punters wake up and smell the crap coffee of corporate greed, perhaps we won’t be so keen on contributing to those revenues.
  • (6) Its not just about dolphins, but human greed as well.
  • (7) But Margaret Thatcher's government was full of bankers, and Blair says nothing about boardroom greed or abuses of corporate power.
  • (8) Another member of her circle, the rapacious slum landlord Peter Rachman, had himself become a symbol of the greed and materialism of the affluent society, adding more spice to the mix.
  • (9) Greed is not only good, it is a fundamental prop to the fantasy of eternal growth.
  • (10) "Greed," he told shareholders, "will save not only Teldar Paper but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA."
  • (11) Let’s clean out the manure-filled stables of a political system that has become characterized by greed,” he wrote in his online declaration .
  • (12) The Gurlitt hoard is a survival of the Nazis' strange and ambivalent attitude to art, from Hitler's aesthetic New Order to the simple philistine greed that probably motivated most of their art theft.
  • (13) Outside, all the talk was of the corruption allegations that had led to a fresh wave of hand-wringing over the greed and grotesque sums in the game.
  • (14) Rather, the problem was the post-Soviet culture of greed, fear and cynicism that Putin encouraged and exploited," she wrote in New Republic .
  • (15) This is conscious greed, plain and simple.” David Lammy (@DavidLammy) Today Premier League clubs signed a new TV deal worth £5.1 billion.
  • (16) *** I sometimes wonder when precisely I stopped thinking of myself as a socialist – as with so much else, I’d like to blame Blair for it; I’d like to tub-thumpingly decry his emasculation of the Labour party; his resistance to true industrial democracy; his personal greed and public duplicity – and, most of all, his enthusiastic participation in the Bush administration’s self-deluding “military interventions”.
  • (17) "We won't allow greed and recklessness to ever again endanger the whole global economy and the lives of millions of people."
  • (18) Unfortunately, market forces and greed usually beat out good intentions.
  • (19) Let's be clear, RMT wants to see the entire rail network taken back into public ownership, closing the door on two decades of greed and exploitation.
  • (20) The charges announced today describe a securities fraud trifecta of lies, deceit, and greed.