Nassim Nicholas Taleb Quotes

One cannot always be right in our complex world; no dishonor attends an incorrect choice among plausible outcomes drawn from a properly constructed argument.

I have to take decisions—not back hunches.

If we had had more time for discussion we should probably have made a great many more mistakes.

All policies should be guided by science, not just whose voice is the loudest.

Every decision you make in life, not just on the sporting field - a lot of time and energy goes into it. You think things through before you make decisions and you always think the decision you make at the time is going to be the right one.

I would sort out all the arguments and see which belonged to fear and which to creativeness. Other things being equal, I would make the decision which had the larger number of creative reasons on its side.

There is always a multitude of reasons both in favor of doing a thing and against doing it. The art of debate lies in presenting them; the art of life lies in neglecting ninety-nine hundredths of them.

As not infrequently happens in the affairs of war, it is easier to point out mistakes after they are committed, than to see and avoid them amid the difficulties and dangers by which the military commander is at the moment surrounded.

But what if our intelligence is wrong?

Ironically, when a bunch of very smart people are sitting around a table for hours trying to figure out whether they should do something, that tends to not necessarily lead to the best results.

You have to be just as mistrustful of straightforward rationality in business as you do of a uniquely gut approach.

Critical thinking is the most important factor with chess. As it is in life, you need to think before you make decisions.

If you overthink things, you end up doing things without the right reasons in mind.

It's very personal to me and doesn't work for everybody, but what I have found in my experience is that when I make pro and con lists, it's usually because I am trying to talk myself out of a good idea or talk myself into a really bad one.

To make a good decision, you actually need to think about it, the contours and the consequences.

The most serious mistakes are not being made as a result of wrong answers. The true dangerous thing is asking the wrong question.

Always find different ways to accomplish the mission. Then run a counter-analysis and list the advantages and disadvantages. When you have done that, you are ready to make a decision.

You only need one good reason to commit to an idea, not four hundred. But if you have four hundred reasons to say yes and one reason to say no, the answer is probably no.

The man who sees both sides of a question is a man who sees absolutely nothing at all.

It's got to be the best intellectual exercise out there. You're seeing through new situations every ten minutes. In the stock market you don't base your decisions on what the market is doing, but on what you think is rational. Bridge is about weighing gain/loss ratios. You're doing calculations all the time.

When "Why not do it?" barely outweighs "Why do it?" — don't do it.

The most part of men, though they have the use of reasoning a little way, as in numbering to some degree; yet it serves them to little use in common life; in which they govern themselves, some better, some worse, according to their differences of experience, quickness of memory, and inclinations to several ends; but specially according to good or evil fortune, and the errors of one another.

When you're having trouble making a decision you're making it too soon.

Stafford Cripps has a brilliant mind, until he makes it up.

When you're put in a position where you're having to decide, Is this a good decision? Is this the right decision for everybody involved? - it makes me feel a little unsteady, unsure.