"The twentieth century was the bankruptcy of the social utopia; the twenty-first will be that of the technological one."

Nassim Nicholas Taleb Mathematics See all quotes by Nassim Nicholas Taleb →

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“To be completely cured of newspapers, spend a year reading the previous week’s newspapers.”

“Professor Karl Pearson... devised the first test of nonrandomness... He examined millions of runs of what was called a Monte Carlo ... He discovered... the runs were not purely random. ...Philosophers of statistics call this the reference case problem to explain that there is no true attainable randomness in practice, only in theory.”

“Academia is to knowledge what prostitution is to love.”

“Greatness starts with the replacement of hatred with polite disdain.”

“When conflicted between two choices, take neither.”

“Wit seduces by signaling intelligence without nerdiness.”

Resonant Thoughts

"The bomb reveals the dreadful and total contingency of human existence. Existentialism is the philosophy of the atomic age."

— William Barrett (philosopher)

Philosophy1913–1992

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"What comes out of the Trump White House is an ideological cacophony. Hiring different perspectives in business could well be a strength. But it's a weakness when politics and policy are in play. Neede…"

— Ilana Mercer

Journalism

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"Metaphorically speaking, free African-American politicians and activists are boiling the bones of their enslaved ancestors to make soup. The suffering of slaves is being exploited posthumously to shap…"

— Ilana Mercer

Journalism

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"No matter the specific techniques involved, historically mass surveillance has had several constant attributes. A citizenry that is aware of always being watched quickly becomes a compliant and fearfu…"

— Glenn Greenwald

Law1967

#philosophy