Using his models, his computers look for moments when the short-term traders are moving opposite to the long-term investors-and then he bets that the… - Benoit Mandelbrot

I claim that many patterns of Nature are so irregular and fragmented, that, compared with Euclid — a term used in this work to denote all of standard geometry — Nature exhibits not simply a higher degree but an altogether different level of complexity … The existence of these patterns challenges us to study these forms that Euclid leaves aside as being "formless," to investigate the morphology of the "amorphous."

"With such theories, economists developed a very elaborate toolkit for analyzing markets, measuring the "variance" and "betas" of different securities and classifying investment portfolios by their probability of risk. According to the theory, a fund manager can build an "efficient" portfolio to target a specific return, with a desired level of risk. It is the financial equivalent of alchemy. Want to earn more without risking too much more? Use the modern finance toolkit to alter the mix of volatile and stable stocks, or to change the ratio of stocks, bonds, and cash. Want to reward employees more without paying more? Use the toolkit to devise an employee stock-option program, with a tunable probability that the option grants will be "in the money." Indeed, the Internet bubble, fueled in part by lavish executive stock options, may not have happened without Bachelier and his heirs."

"In economics, there can never be a "theory of everything." But I believe each attempt comes closer to a proper understanding of how markets behave."