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Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions

Book by Brian Christian · 6 quotes · Act Now, Algorithms, Decisions

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Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions Quotes

“When Charles Darwin was trying to decide whether he should propose to his cousin Emma Wedgwood, he got out a pencil and paper and weighed every possible consequence. In favor of marriage he listed children, companionship, and the 'charms of music and female chit-chat.' Against marriage he listed the 'terrible loss of time,' lack of freedom to go where he wished, the burden of visiting relatives, the expense and anxiety provoked by children, the concern that 'perhaps my wife won't like London,' and having less money to spend on books. Weighing one column against the other produced a narrow margin of victory, and at the bottom Darwin scrawled, 'Marry—Marry—Marry Q.E.D.' Quod erat demonstrandum, the mathematical sign-off that Darwin himself restated in English: 'It being proved necessary to Marry.”

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“The conceptual vocabulary derived from the classical form of the [multi-armed bandit] problem—the tension between explore/exploit, the importance of the interval, the high value of the 0-0 option [Gittins Index], the minimization of regret—gives us a new way of making sense not only of specific problems that come before us, but of the entire arc of human life. 54”

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Book:Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions
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