Probability Theory Quotes

One of the most striking and fundamental things about probability theory is that it leads to an understanding of the otherwise strange fact that events which are individually capricious and unpredictable can, when treated en masse, lead to very stable average performances. ~ Warren Weaver

At least some of them, I suspect, have turned to probability theory in the hope that it would give them what they had originally expected from a subjectivist or epistemological theory of the attainment of truth through verification; that is, a theory of rational and justifiable belief, based upon observed instances. ~ Karl Popper

At a purely formal level, one could call probability theory the study of measure spaces with total measure one, but that would be like calling number theory the study of strings of digits which terminate. ~ Terence Tao

The final story of randomness - utter chaos - has not yet been told to us by the mathematicians. It seems remarkable that something so fundamental for probability theory has not been defined and even more remarkable that we can go so far in mathematics lacking a definition. By simply assuming randomness exists, mathematicians assign elementary probabilities to events, and that is their starting point. But they have not captured chaos and looked it in the eye. ~ Heinz R. Pagels

Questions lead to further questions, and inquiry breeds insight. Gathering expertise brings both confidence and consolation. E. O. Wilson wrote: "You start by loving a subject. Birds, probability theory, stars, differential equations, storm fronts, sign language, swallowtail butterflies....The subject will be your lodestar and give sanctuary in the shifting mental universe. ~ Lyanda Lynn Haupt

Yet Laplace had built his probability theory on intuition. As far as he was concerned, "essentially, the theory of probability is nothing but good common sense reduced to mathematics. It provides an exact appreciation of what sound minds feel with a kind of instinct, frequently without being able to account for it. ~ Sharon Bertsch McGrayne

Maybe we should teach schoolchildren probability theory and investment risk management. ~ Andrew Lo

The puzzle of time, the mystery of creation, the problem of evil, the enigma of knowledge, the state of soul, the vexations of probability theory of the nature of God's grace, all reduced to a single question. What does it mean, in a world of God's creation, that man is free to choose between the paths of good and evil? ~ Bernard Beckett

I failed math twice, never fully grasping probability theory. I mean, first off, who cares if you pick a black ball or a white ball out of the bag? And second, if you're bent over about the color, don't leave it to chance. Look in the damn bag and pick the color you want. ~ Janet Evanovich

Entropy theory, on the other hand, is not concerned with the probability of succession in a series of items but with the overall distribution of kinds of items in a given arrangement. ~ Rudolf Arnheim

The theory of probabilities is at bottom nothing but common sense reduced to calculus; it enables us to appreciate with exactness that which accurate minds feel with a sort of instinct for which of times they are unable to account. ~ Pierre-Simon Laplace

A scientist worthy of a lab coat should be able to make original discoveries while wearing a clown suit, or give a lecture in a high squeaky voice from inhaling helium. It is written nowhere in the math of probability theory that one may have no fun. ~ Eliezer Yudkowsky

Probability theory is nothing more than common sense reduced to calculation. -1819 ~ Pierre-Simon Laplace

We can measure the fine structure constant with very great precision, but so far none of our theories has provided an explanation of its measured value. One of the aims of superstring theory is to predict this quantity precisely. Any theory that could do that would be taken very seriously indeed as a potential 'Theory of Everything'. ~ John D. Barrow

The Hindu religion is the only one of the world's great faiths dedicated to the idea that the Cosmos itself undergoes an immense, indeed an infinite, number of deaths and rebirths.
It is the only religion in which the time scales correspond to those of modern scientific cosmology. Its cycles run from our ordinary day and night to a day and night of Brahma, 8.64 billion years long. Longer than the age of the Earth or the Sun and about half the time since the Big Bang. ~ Carl Sagan

Social cognitive theory rejects the dichotomous conception of self as agent and self as object. Acting on the environment and acting on oneself entail shifting the perspective of the same agent rather than reifying different selves regulating each other or transforming the self from agent to object ~ Albert Bandura

Among other members of our cell I remember Dr. Wilhelm Reich, Founder and Director of the Sex-Pol. (Institute for Sexual Politics). He was a Freudian Marxist; inspired by Malinowski, he had just published a book called 'The Function of the Orgasm,' in which he expounded the theory that the sexual frustration of the Proletariat caused a thwarting of its political consciousness; only through a full, uninhibited release of the sexual urge could the working-class realize its revolutionary potentialities and historic mission; the whole thing was less cock-eyed than it sounds. ~ Arthur Koestler

A hypothesis or theory is clear, decisive, and positive, but it is believed by no one but the man who created it. Experimental findings, on the other hand, are messy, inexact things, which are believed by everyone except the man who did that work. ~ Harlow Shapley

There is no error which hath not some appearance of probability resembling truth, which, when men who study to be singular find out, straining reason, they then publish to the world matter of contention and jangling. ~ Walter Raleigh

I was diagnosed with ADHD twice. I didn't believe the first doctor who told me, and I had a whole theory that ADHD was just something they invented to make you pay for medicine, but then the second doctor told me I had it. ~ Solange Knowles

How can Hitler, or some other murderer, appear in this world? I don't think any single theory can account for the phenomenon, and I think it's a mistake to try to reduce it to being brutalized by your parents or having grown up in some horrible situation - like Charles Manson. ~ James Hillman

Of course the lower classes have always felt downtrodden and aspired to a better life. But there is this theory that people respond to a class structure in England - there was a time when people knew who they were and knew whom they served and as long as management wasn't abusive, it was a good life for people. ~ Damian Lewis

I am genuinely sorry for scientists of the younger generation who never knew Fisher personally. So long as you avoided a handful of subjects like inverse probability that would turn Fisher in the briefest possible moment from extreme urbanity into a boiling cauldron of wrath, you got by with little worse than a thick head from the port which he, like the Cambridge mathematician J. E. Littlewood, loved to drink in the evening. And on the credit side you gained a cherished memory of English spoken in a Shakespearean style and delivered in the manner of a Spanish grandee. ~ Fred Hoyle

The only debatable issue, it seems to me, is whether it is more ridiculous to turn to experts in social theory for general well-confirmed propositions, or to the specialists in the great religions and philosophical systems for insights into fundamental human values. ~ Noam Chomsky

The probability of life ever evolving on Earth was slim to none. It's insane that we're all walking around and talking. ~ Kesha

I just think too many nice things have happened in string theory for it to be all wrong. Humans do not understand it very well, but I just don't believe there is a big cosmic conspiracy that created this incredible thing that has nothing to do with the real world. ~ Edward Witten

We can summarize electricity, magnetism and gravity into equations one inch long, and that's the power of field theory. And so I said to myself: I will create a field theory of strings. And when I did it one day, it was incredible, realizing that on a sheet of paper I can write down an equation which summarized almost all physical knowledge. ~ Michio Kaku

My theory is that hope is a form of madness. A benevolent one, sure, but madness all the same. Like an irrational superstition
broken mirrors and so forth
hope's not based on any kind of logic, it's just unfettered optimism, grounded in nothing but faith in things beyond our control. ~ Benjamin Wood

Truth cannot be found by intellectual effort because truth is not a theory, it is an experience. ~ Osho

A bit of a theory, more a corner of the eye noticing than an airtight argument: in the course of long artistic careers, women are more likely than men to change form and style, Proteus-like. ~ Stacey D'Erasmo

The most general way of stating the central assertion of the neo-Darwinian theory of evolution is that a population of replicators subject to variation (for instance by imperfect copying) will be taken over by those variants that are better than their rivals at causing themselves to be replicated. This ~ David Deutsch

We have confirmed something we only knew in theory, namely that revolution, in which uncontrolled and uncontrollable forces operate imperiously, is blind and destructive, grandiose and cruel. ~ Federica Montseny

The [engineer] should be equipped with knowledge of many branches of study and varied kinds of learning, for it is by his judgement that all work done by the other arts is put to test. This knowledge is the child of practice and theory. ~ Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

Merlin smiled. "Thank you, sir! It was just Game Theory."
"It was just – is this a Maths thing?"
"Well, Maths and Philosophy, and..."
"Stop! Stop right there – I really have no wish to hear you expound upon either Mathematics or
Philosophy, Merlin. Just take the compliment ~ FayJay

If you take Darwinian theory, make a 'scientific' principle out of it, put it into political action, then you have something like Nazi Germany. ~ Bruce Lipton

Cruelty is, in theory, a perfectly adequate ground for divorce, but it may be interpreted so as to become absurd. ~ Bertrand Russell

Something terrible happened during those forty-four minutes... Death. I realised it was real. I would die one day. Kat would die. Mum would die. Dad would die... It was not a question of if but when. Of course, I'd known death before. But during those fifty-four minutes I really knew it. That's when I realised there are two kinds of knowledge: shallow and deep. You can know something in theory but not know it in practice ...I thought of the long chain of all the days of my life and wondered how far along that chain I'd already got. Was I still just starting, halfway along, or nearing the end? ~ Siobhan Dowd

Goldratt's Theory of Constraints (GTOC), ~ H. William Dettmer

The tendency of those committed to the theory of catastrophic man-made global warming to unquestioningly adopt the assumptions, at every stage, that maximise the expectation of calamity should alert us that groupthink is driving the movement. ~ Peter Lilley

According to Becker's logic, if we're short on cash and happen to drive by a convenience store, we quickly estimate how much money is in the register, consider the likelihood that we might get caught, and imagine what punishment might be in store for us if we are caught (obviously deducting possible time off for good behavior). On the basis of this cost-benefit calculation, we then decide whether it is worth it to rob the place or not. The essence of Becker's theory is that decisions about honesty, like most other decisions, are based on a cost-benefit analysis. ~ Dan Ariely

Now I realize, of course, that not everyone accepts the Thomistic (or any other traditional) ontology, and that moreover a reductio to quantity constitutes in fact the definitive tendency of the modern age. One fact, however, is incontrovertible: as I have shown in The Quantum Enigma, it is possible to interpret all of physics - by virtue of its definitive modus operandi - in traditional (and thus non-Cartesian) terms, based precisely on a categorical distinction between the 'corporeal' (i.e., perceptible) and the 'physical' universe: the universe, namely, as conceived by the physicist. Everyone, of course, is free to disagree with the non-Cartesian interpretation of physics: what is NOT possible (by virtue of the above-said finding) is to do so on SCIENTIFIC ground.

("Taking Stock of a New Philosophy of Physics: The KKE Theory") ~ Wolfgang Smith

However, robust evidence shows that people systematically overestimate the probability of positive future contingencies, and underestimate the probability of negative ones - only those who are depressed or dysphoric come to accurate assessments. ~ Daniel Nettle

The full implications of feminism will evolve over time, as we organize, experiment, think, analyze, and revise our ideas and strategies in light of our experiences. No theory emerges in full detail overnight; the dominant theories of our day have expanded and changed over many decades. That it will take time should not discourage us. That we might fail to pursue our ideas - given the enormous need for them in society today - is unconscionable. ~ Charlotte Bunch

Conceive the condition of the human mind if all propositions whatsoever were self-evident except one, which was to become self-evident at the close of a summer's day, but in the meantime might be the subject of question, of hypothesis, of debate. Art and philosophy, literature and science, would fasten like bees on that one proposition which had the honey of probability in it, and be the more eager because their enjoyment would end with sunset. Our impulses, our spiritual activities, no more adjust themselves to the idea of their future nullity, than the beating of our heart, or the irritability of our muscles. ~ George Eliot

It would probably be wiser to nail up over the door of the new quantum theory a notice, 'Structural alterations in progress - No admittance except on business', and particularly to warn the doorkeeper to keep out prying philosophers. ~ Arthur Stanley Eddington

The universe and the observer exist as a pair. I cannot imagine a consistent theory of the universe that ignores consciousness. ~ Andrei Linde

Don't confuse hypothesis and theory. The former is a possible explanation; the latter, the correct one. The establishment of theory is the very purpose of science. ~ Martin H. Fischer

She'd heard theories in her time regarding the number-one enemy of everything, ranging from Osama bin Laden to premarital sex. The dust theory she liked. ~ Barbara Kingsolver

The theory [of evolution] is a scientific mistake. ~ Louis Agassiz

In theory one is aware that the earth revolves, but in practice one does not perceive it, the ground upon which one treads seems not to move, and one can live undisturbed. So it is with Time in one's life. ~ Marcel Proust