Nobody reads the disclosures that roll down your computer screen. You click 'I agree' but you don't know what you're agreeing to.
Nassim Nicholas TalebRead
Probability is not a mere computation of odds on the dice or more complicated variants; it is the acceptance of the lack of certainty in our knowledge and the development of methods for dealing with our ignorance.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Probability teaches us to accept uncertainty and develop strategies to manage the unknown.
In this quote, Nassim Nicholas Taleb emphasizes that probability is not simply about calculating numerical odds; rather, it is fundamentally about acknowledging the inherent uncertainty in our understanding of the world. He advocates for a deeper comprehension of how to navigate our ignorance through probabilistic thinking, implying that life is filled with uncertainties that we must learn to embrace rather than ignore.
Themes
ProbabilityUncertaintyKnowledgeIgnoranceMethods
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about statistics, one might say, 'As Nassim Nicholas Taleb noted, probability is the acceptance of uncertainty.'
More from Nassim Nicholas Taleb
All quotes →Fragility is the quality of things that are vulnerable to volatility.
Nassim Nicholas TalebRead
Those who were unlucky in life in spite of their skills would eventually rise. The lucky fool might have benefited from some luck in life; over the longer run he would slowly converge to the state of a less-lucky idiot. Each one would revert to his long-term properties.
Nassim Nicholas TalebRead
Individuals should think about the worst-case scenarios and plan for them. The world will be crazier than you think it will be. Put money away, and then you can live with much more freedom.
Nassim Nicholas TalebRead
A good maxim allows you to have the last word without even starting a conversation.
Nassim Nicholas TalebRead
A Stoic is someone who transforms fear into prudence, pain into transformation, mistakes into initiation, and desire into undertaking.
Nassim Nicholas TalebRead
Similar quotes
In a man devoted to knowledge, pity seems almost ridiculous, like delicate hands on a cyclops.
Friedrich NietzscheRead
The human wish to credit good things as miraculous and to charge bad things to another account is apparently universal.
Christopher HitchensRead
…it is so much better to work for others than for one's self alone.
Louisa May AlcottRead
Now the story of Christ is simply a true myth: a myth working on us the same way as the others, but with this tremendous difference that it really happened: and one must be content to accept it in the same way, remembering that it is God’s myth where the others are men’s myths: i.e., the Pagan stories are God expressing Himself through the minds of poets, using such images as He found there, while Christianity is God expressing Himself through what we call 'real things'.
C. S. LewisRead
In this world filled with challenges, we do need help from time to time. Religion, eternal truth, and our missionaries are vital parts of that help.
Russell M. NelsonRead
If you were an optimistic teen, then you'll be an optimist at 80. People's reactions to bad events are highly stable over a half century or more.
Martin SeligmanRead