“ We know from chaos theory that even if you had a perfect model of the world, you'd need infinite precision in order to predict future events. With sociopolitical or economic phenomena, we don't have a… Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ My principle activity is to tease those who take themselves and the quality of their knowledge too seriously. Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ Effectively, there is no democracy without such an unconditional symmetry in the rights to express yourself, and the gravest threat is the slippery slope in the attempts to limit speech on grounds tha… Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ But bankers used to be subjected to Hammurabi’s rule. The tradition in Catalonia was to behead bankers in front of their own banks Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ I select a very small number of things to be sceptical about, such as markets, and on these I am hypersceptic. But I want to be fooled by randomness in art. I want the ceremonial of religion; we are m… Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ The strategy for the discoverers and entrepreneurs is to rely less on top-down planning and focus on maximum tinkering and recognizing opportunities when they present themselves. Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ The ethical is always more robust than the legal. Over time, it is the legal that should converge to the ethical, never the reverse. Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ The biologist and intellectual E. O. Wilson was once asked what represented the most hindrance to the development of children; his answer was the soccer mom….Soccer moms try to eliminate the trial and… Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ Procrustes, in Greek mythology, was the cruel owner of a small estate in Corydalus in Attica, on the way between Athens and Eleusis, where the mystery rites were performed. Procrustes had a peculiar s… Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ Artificial, man-made mechanical and engineering contraptions with simple responses are complicated, but not complex, as they don’t have interdependencies. You push a button, say, a light switch, and g… Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ Randomness, in practice, is what we don’t know; to invoke randomness is to plead ignorance). Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ Globalization has created this interlocking fragility. At no time in the history of the universe has the cancellation of a Christmas order in New York meant layoffs in China. Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ Why do we keep focusing on the minutiae, not the possible significant large events, in spite of the obvious evidence of their huge influence? Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ To be completely cured of newspapers, spend a year reading the previous week’s newspapers. Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“ There is, in the Black Swan zone, a limit to knowledge that can never be reached, no matter how sophisticated statistical and risk management science ever gets. Nassim Nicholas Taleb
