"The difference between slaves in Roman and Ottoman days and today's employees is that slaves did not need to flatter their boss."
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Quote collection
Nassim Nicholas Taleb quotes (page 14 of 18)
342 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"Never ask anyone for their opinion, forecast, or recommendation. Just ask them what they have—or don’t have—in their portfolio."
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"Ideas come and go, stories stay."
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"Most so-called writers keep writing and writing with the hope, some day, to find something to say."
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"Few understand that procrastination is our natural defense, letting things take care of themselves and exercise their antifragility."
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"My best definition of a nerd: someone who asks you to explain an aphorism"
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"Probability and expectation are not the same. Its probability and probability times the pay off."
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"If you're going to fail, you'd rather fail early than fail late in general."
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"Character is proportionate to N, the number of consecutive failures without being discouraged, or equivalently, the number of successive rejections without being intimidated."
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"Private equity has absolutely no reason to exist. The private equity holder has all the upside and the banks all the downside."
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"If humans fight the last war, nature fights the next one."
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"Rationalism crashes in the tails."
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"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."
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"It is much harder to become independent if you are wealthy than to become wealthy if you are independent."
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"Anything organic requires some dose of variability so it can adapt all the time, and fixing things is not a good idea."
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"Janet Yellen at the FED is equivalent to having a biology schoolteacher who has never seen blood perform brain surgery."
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"I am happy everywhere except in places where I see glitz and rich farts. I am happiest in Brooklyn, where the concentration of rich farts is minimal."
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"In science you need to understand the world; in business you need others to misunderstand it."
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"Banks have never made money in the history of banking, losing the equivalent of all their past profits periodically - while bankers strike it rich."
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"It is my great hope someday, to see science and decision makers rediscover what the ancients have always known. Namely that our highest currency is respect."
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