Expectation is a statistical fiction, like having 2.5 children. - William Poundstone

The dealer now theorized that Thorp was memorizing the entire deck. He knew exactly which cards remained in the deck and bet accordingly. Thorp said it was impossible for any one to do that.

From Adam Smith through John Maynard Keynes, economics had been mostly talk. At Harvard economics was talk. At MIT, Samuelson made it math.

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