William Poundstone Quotes

There is a deep connection between Bernoulli's dictum and John Kelly's 1956 publication. It turns out that Kelly's prescription can be restated as this simple rule: When faced with a choice of wagers or investments, choose the one with the highest geometric means of outcomes.

The best paradoxes raise questions about what kinds of contradictions can occur-what species of impossibilities are possible.

A bit is worth 10,000 basis points.

Your second ducat, like your second million, is never quite as sweet.

Shannon's most radical insight was that meaning was irrelevant.

The story of the Kelly system is a story of secrets - or if you prefer, a story of entropy.

At a bare minimum, understanding entails being able to detect an internal contradiction: a paradox.

The best strategy is one that offers the highest compound return consistent with no risk of going broke.

Are there any mythical beasts which aren't simple pastiches of nature? Centaurs, minotaurs, unicorns, griffons, chimeras, sphinxes, manticores, and the like don't speak well for the human imagination. None is as novel as a kangaroo or starfish.

People tend to be clueless about prices. Contrary to economic theory, we don't really decide between A and B by consulting our invisible price tags and purchasing the one that yields the higher utility, he says. We make do with guesstimates and a vague recollection of what things are "supposed to cost."

There were many at Bell Labs and MIT who compared Shannon's insight to Einstein's. Others found that comparison unfair - unfair to Shannon.

The more improbable the message, the less "compressible" it is, and the more bandwidth it requires. This is Shannon's point: the essence is its improbability.

Paradox is thus a much deeper and universal concept than the ancients would have dreamed. Rather than an oddity, it is a mainstay of the philosophy of science.

The ultimate compound return rate is acutely sensitive to fat tails.

Samuelson, however, hedged his personal bets - by putting some of his own money in Berkshire Hathaway.

Average" isn't so hot at the race track given those steep track takes. "Average" is pretty decent for stocks, something like 6 percent above the inflation rate. For a buy-and -hold investor, commissions and taxes are small.

In The Tricky Art of Co-Existing, Sandi Toksvig navigates life's little dilemmas with wit and not-so-common sense. You'll learn the strange history of common courtesy and the one true secret of social success: how to not drive everyone around you crazy.

Kelly was aware that there is one type of favorable bet available to everyone; the stock market.