Nassim Nicholas Taleb

The sword of Damocles represents the side effect of power and success: you cannot rise and rule without facing this continuous danger—someone out there will be actively working to topple you.

We know more than we think we do, a lot more than we can articulate.

Humans somehow fail to recognize situations outside the contexts in which they usually learn about them.

The same doctor might recommend exercise so you “get tougher,” and a few minutes later write a prescription for antibiotics in response to a trivial infection so you “don’t get sick.”

How do you innovate? First, try to get in trouble. I mean serious, but not terminal, trouble.

The excess energy released from overreaction to setbacks is what innovates!

The record shows that, for society, the richer we become, the harder it gets to live within our means. Abundance is harder for us to handle than scarcity.

Redundancy is ambiguous because it seems like a waste if nothing unusual happens. Except that something unusual happens—usually.

Information is antifragile; it feeds more on attempts to harm it than it does on efforts to promote it.

I never hear anything wrong said about you. You have proven yourself incapable of generating envy.