logo

Quotes About Calculation

To understand why sludge matters, let's begin with the assumption that people are fully rational and that in deciding whether to wade through sludge, they make some calculation about costs and benefits. Even if the benefits of that wading are high, the costs might prove overwhelming.
~ Cass R. Sunstein
The problem with gross domestic product is the gross bit. There are no deductions involved: all economic activity is accounted as if it were of positive value. Social harm is added to, not subtracted from, social good. A train crash which generates £1bn worth of track repairs, medical bills and funeral costs is deemed by this measure as beneficial as an uninterrupted service which generates £1bn in ticket sales.
~ George Monbiot
If war were arithmetic, then the mathematicians would rule the world. (Lord Petyr Baelish)
~ George R.R. Martin
Despite appearances, puzzling is not a solitary game: every move the puzzler makes, the puzzlemaker has made before; every piece the puzzler picks up, and picks up again, and studies and strokes, every combination he tries, and tries a second time, every blunder and every insight, each hope and each discouragement have all been designed, calculated, and decided by the other.
~ Georges Perec
From this, one can make a deduction which is quite certainly the ultimate truth of jigsaw puzzles: despite appearances, puzzling is not a solitary game: every move the puzzler makes, the puzzlemaker has made before; every piece the puzzler picks up, and picks up again, and studies and strokes, every combination he tries, and tries a second time, every blunder and every insight, each hope and each discouragement have all been designed, calculated, and decided by the other.
~ Georges Perec
At one point they tried to calculate when time began, when exactly the earth had been created. Tomorow was September 1
~ Georgi Gospodinov
As a statement calculated to quell alarm it left a lot to be desired.
~ Gerald Durrell
We are oftener treacherous through weakness than through calculation.
~ La Rochefoucauld
I tingled all over; I counted minutes and subtracted miles.
~ Jack Kerouac
I think what should happen is companies should calculate how much money they're getting from people who are celebrating Christmas and provide exactly that much amount of Merry Christmas, because that is exactly how I would want any type of religious holiday to be celebrated.
~ Sam Seder
Indeed, as the above calculation indicates, to take full advantage of the memory space available, the ultimate laptop must turn all its matter into energy.
~ Seth Lloyd
When I went to war, I did not go making geopolitical calculations. I went to war with a lust.
~ George Friedman
who wishes to fight must first count the cost
~ Sun Tzu, The Art of War
Mathematics doesn't care about those beyond the numbers.
~ Dejan Stojanovic, The Shape
See, there's the pie chart. If you look, you can see clear as day that the happy times -- the times when you think "How fun! I'm glad I'm alive" -- don't make up even one tenth of life. I'm work this out properly with a calculator, so there's no mistake.
~ Tatsuhiko Takimoto
1 Dividing a number by zero doesn't produce an infinitely large number as an answer. The reason is that division is defined as the inverse of multiplication; if you divide by zero, and then multiply by zero, you should regain the number you started with. However, multiplying infinity by zero produces only zero, not any other number. There is nothing which can be multiplied by zero to produce a nonzero result; therefore, the result of a division by zero is literally "undefined.
~ Ted Chiang
Porque si la duración de un universo es calculable, no lo es la variedad de vida que se genera. […] nada de eso puede predecirse, porque nada de eso era inevitable
~ Ted Chiang
A healthier and far more nuanced way to address the risk of heartworm is to calculate the first date that the local temperature consistently stays above 57 degrees and when it once again dips below that. For the mid-Atlantic states and New England, this would mean giving your dog its first monthly heartworm treatment around June and the last one in November—six months of taking a toxic chemical instead of twelve.
~ Ted Kerasote
I'm brilliant at working out numbers up to 180 but if you ask me to split a restaurant bill I'm rubbish.
~ Adrian Lewis
Chess makes man wiser and clear-sighted.
~ Vladimir Putin
Once you found the math in a thing, you knew everything about it, and you could manipulate it to your heart's content with nothing more than a pencil and a napkin.
~ Neal Stephenson
He was tempted to park the SUV illegally, since, according to his calculations, the authorities were not likely to catch up with him and demand payment of the parking ticket before the end of the world, but it seemed that most of the people of Seattle were still obeying the rules and so he did likewise.
~ Neal Stephenson
Que una industria semejante pudiera existir le pareció extraño e improbable hasta que leyó un artículo donde se calculaba que el tamaño de la economía mundial del oro virtual oscilaba entre los mil y los diez mil millones de dólares al año.
~ Neal Stephenson
HE WORKED IT OUT FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES ON THE WHITEBOARD
~ Neal Stephenson