Wednesday
Talebisms
If you didn't know about it, Nassim Taleb has an online notebook. I'm not sure whether he regularly adds to it, but there's a ton of prose on it already. I downloaded it to my iPad and scroll through it regularly. Because I'm pressed for time this morning, I'm merely reproducing a handful of my favorite aphorisms from the site: “We worry about 'too big,' but the biggest error-prone centralized top-down institution in the world is the US Gov. It is getting bigger.” * * * * * “Charm lies in the unsaid, the unwritten, and the undisplayed. It takes mastery to control silence.” * * * * * “The Stoic sage should withdraw from public efforts when unheeded & state is corrupt beyond repair.[Seneca] Wiser to wait for self-destruction” * * * * * “Most modern technologies are deferred punishment.” * * * * * “It is much harder to be a Stoic when wealthy, powerful, and respected than when destitute, miserable, and lonely.” * * * * * “Modernity: We created youth without heroism, age without wisdom, and life without grandeur.” * * * * * “Medieval man was a cog in a wheel he did not understand; modern man is a cog in a more complicated system he thinks he understands.” * * * * * “Nietzche: Madness is rare in individuals, but in groups, parties, nations, it is the rule”
