Jeffrey Kluger Quotes

We respond to the unknown by trying to retreat from it, or trying to comprehend it, or trying to control it. The first approach is evident in longings for return to a simpler "risk-free" life that never was. The second is reflected in the fantasy of synoptic risk assessment: Measure the requisite probabilities and trade-offs, calculate the social risk-benefit function, and the common good will have been defined. The third approach is in the tradition of professional engineering. It serves us well but, as engineers have been among the first to point out, has met its match and more in the complex social problems it increasingly is called upon to address.

I think that we have to be constantly asking ourselves, 'How do we calculate the risk?' And sometimes we don't calculate it correctly; we either overstate it or understate it.

Every business and every product has risks. You can't get around it.

Take calculated risks. That is quite different from being rash.

Creative risk taking is essential to success in any goal where the stakes are high. Thoughtless risks are destructive, of course, but perhaps even more wasteful is thoughtless caution which prompts inaction and promotes failure to seize opportunity.

I held a conference in Harvard where Americans said they didn't believe in risk. They thought it was just European hysteria. Then the terrorist attacks happened and there was a complete conversion. Suddenly terrorism was the central risk.

Some of the most interesting research that I did was about risk assessment and how ordinary citizens like me handle risk assessment and how irregular our risk assessments are.

I think we need to think beyond the issue of absolute risk.

We tend to ignore the high probability of small gains or losses and focus on big payoffs or disaster despite remote odds.

People are used to dealing with risk.

It's only a risk if you think there's a chance of failure.

On climbs, there is a general way we manage fear. We look at things objectively, separating out perceived risk from real risk. You can really bring down the level of fear by knowing the real risks and setting aside the others. You also know that panicking just makes things worse.

The ability to calibrate risk doesn't happen rationally.

People say, 'Are you insane?' But the most successful climbers are the most calculating, with the most refined sense of risk. They're hyper-conscious of safety. They're the least insane people I know.

I think people overestimate the risk of high-risk projects.

Everyone has a different definition of risk. Sometimes that creates opportunities as well.

The hardest thing to judge is what level of risk is safe.

One doesn't accept bad challenges. Part of it is always the risk-taking without seeing that the risks are rational and the rewards are commensurate.. are more than commensurate.. with the risks.

Risk always looks different when you're beating the system than when you've been beaten.

We're in the business not so much of being contrarians deliberately, but rather we like to take perceived risk instead of actual risk. And what I mean by that is that you get paid for taking a risk that people think is risky, you particularly don't get paid for taking actual risk.

The entrepreneurial mind-set is that risk is the heightened probability that there is a big range of possible outcomes.

Sometimes I think we can tell how important it is to risk by how dangerous it is to do so.

First we must understand that there can be no life without risk - and when our center is strong, everything else is secondary, even the risks.

I won’t bet $100 against house odds between now and the grave.

A risk is something that feels risky to the person who's taking it.