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Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Nassim Nicholas Taleb Quotes

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Nassim Nicholas Taleb is a renowned author, scholar, and thinker whose unique perspective and profound insights have had a wide-reaching impact in fields such as finance, statistics, and philosophy. He is best known for his books 'The Black Swan' and 'Fooled by Randomness', which have explored the nature of uncertainty, risk, and probability theory.

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Famous Nassim Nicholas Taleb Quotes

“It took us a while to discover that we do effectively think, but that we more readily narrate backward in order to give ourselves the illusion of understanding, and give a cover to our past actions.”

Thinking Past Actions Illusion Of Understanding

Book:The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable

Source: The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable

“They are born, put in a box; they go home to live in a box; they study by ticking boxes; they go to what is called "work" in a box, where they sit in their cubicle box; they drive to the grocery store in a box to buy food in a box; they talk about thinking "outside the box"; and when they die they are put in a box.”

Source: The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

“Suckers think that you cure greed with money, addiction with substances, expert problems with experts, banking with bankers, economics with economists, and debt crises with debt spending”

Thinking Problem Economics Crisis Addiction Greed Debt Spending Cures Substance Experts Economist Banking Bankers Sucker Debt Crisis

Book:The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

Source: The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

“Is the economy something organic or is it something engineered? I think it's closer to the organic. You harm it by artificially suppressing volatility in it.”

Thinking Economy Harm Suppressing Volatility

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“As countries get rich they start increasing education and the very educated people tend to not like trial and error, because they think they're obligated to use the body of knowledge they have.”

People Thinking Country Use Body Rich Errors Trials Educated Get Rich Trial And Error

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“Never, never, never think - that's one lesson you should have in life. Never think that lack of variability is stability.”

Thinking Should Lessons Should Have Stability Variability

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“We have this culture of financialization. People think they need to make money with their savings rather with their own business. So you end up with dentists who are more traders than dentists. A dentist should drill teeth and use whatever he does in the stock market for entertainment.”

People Thinking Needs Should Doe Ends Use Culture Entertainment Teeth Saving Making Money Savings Own Business Dentist Drills Traders

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“A good rule of thumb is as follows: If the numbers come from somebody wearing a tie (Wall Street economist or analyst, industry public relations department, captive think tank academic and so on), you ought to be very skeptical. By design messages from these people are intended to move markets, move merchandise and/or move public policy and are not a comment on the state of the physical universe.”

“Never think that lack of variability is stability. Don't confuse lack of volatility with stability, ever.”

Thinking Stability Volatility Variability

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“I don't know anyone on Wall Street who goes to work every day thinking of anything but how to increase their bonus.”

Thinking Knows Streets Wall Increase Bonus

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“The world we live in is vastly different from the world we think we live in.”

Thinking World Different

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“I don't read the papers; I stopped reading the papers. I read the papers only during periods of crisis, and I think papers are too long on a regular day and too short days when we have a crisis.”

Thinking Long Reading Periods Paper Crisis Papers Too Short Regular Days

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“They think that intelligence is about noticing things are relevant (detecting patterns); in a complex world, intelligence consists in ignoring things that are irrelevant (avoiding false patterns)”

Thinking World Complexes Patterns Relevant Avoiding Irrelevant Noticing Noticing Things

Book:Incerto 4-Book Bundle: Fooled by Randomness The Black Swan The Bed of Procrustes Antifragile

Source: Incerto 4-Book Bundle: Fooled by Randomness The Black Swan The Bed of Procrustes Antifragile

“The irony of the process of thought control: the more energy you put into trying to control your ideas and what you think about, the more your ideas end up controlling you.”

Thinking Trying Ideas Ends Energy Process Irony

Book:Incerto 4-Book Bundle: Fooled by Randomness The Black Swan The Bed of Procrustes Antifragile

Source: Incerto 4-Book Bundle: Fooled by Randomness The Black Swan The Bed of Procrustes Antifragile

“Let me be more aggressive: we are largely better at doing than we are at thinking, thanks to antifragility. I’d rather be dumb and antifragile than extremely smart and fragile, any time.”

Thinking Smart Let Me Thanks Dumb Aggressive Fragile

Book:Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder

Source: Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder

“Those who do not think that employment is systemic slavery are either blind or employed.”

Thinking Slavery Blind Employment Employed Nerdiness

Book:The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

Source: The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

“We should reward people, not ridicule them, for thinking the impossible.”

People Thinking Should Impossible Rewards Ridicule

Author:Nassim Nicholas Taleb