Quotes About Perspective

they have what is lacking in the young:

suckers try to be right, nonsuckers try to make the buck, or: Suckers try to win arguments, nonsuckers try to win.

Consider the situation where the dentist examines his portfolio only upon receiving the monthly account from the brokerage house. As 67% of his months will be positive, he incurs only four pangs of pain per annum and eight uplifting experiences. This is the same dentist following the same strategy. Now consider the dentist looking at his performance only every year. Over the next 20 years that he is expected to live, he will experience 19 pleasant surprises for every unpleasant one!

To put it again in other words: it is rather a good thing to lose arguments.

We humans scorn what is not concrete. We are more easily swayed by a crying baby than by thousands of people dying elsewhere that do not make it into our dining room. The one case is a tragedy, the other a statistic.

The problem lies in the structure of our minds:

The sucker's trap is when you focus on what you know and what others don't know, rather than the reverse.

Things are not as simple as that. We

It struck me, a belief that has never left me since, that we are just a great machine for looking backward, and that humans are great at self-delusion.

Once your mind is inhabited with a certain view of the world, you will tend to only consider instances proving you to be right. Paradoxically, the more information you have, the more justified you will feel in your views.

good news is good news first; how good matters rather little.

history belongs to those who can write about it (whether winners or losers)

it depends on how the choices are presented to you.

The future ain't what it used to be," Berra

Plenty of mildly good news is preferable to one single lump of great news.

It is also naïve empiricism to provide, in support of some argument, series of eloquent confirmatory quotes by dead authorities. By searching, you can always find someone who made a well-sounding statement that confirms your point of view—and, on every topic, it is possible to find another dead thinker who said the exact opposite. Almost all of my non–Yogi Berra quotes are from people I disagree with.

The neglect of silent evidence is endemic to the way we study comparative talent, particularly in activities that are plagued with winner-take-all attributes. We may enjoy what we see, but there is no point reading too much into success stories because we do not see the full picture.

Someone with optionality—the right to pick and choose his story—is only reporting on what suits his purpose.

We cannot teach people to withhold judgment; judgments are embedded in the way we view objects.

Likewise, it is not possible to hold a situation in one's head without some element of bias.

you need a story to replace a story

she may have been happier before the Black Swan of her success than after.

American culture encourages the process of failure, unlike the cultures of Europe and Asia where failure is met with stigma and embarrassment.

Contrary to what people might expect, I am not recommending that