My major hobby is teasing people who take themselves and the quality of their knowledge too seriously and those who don’t have the guts to sometimes … - Nassim Nicholas Taleb

My principle activity is to tease those who take themselves and the quality of their knowledge too seriously.

"Note that I am not relying in this book on the beastly method of collecting selective "corroborating evidence." ...I call this overload of examples naïve empiricism — successions of anecdotes selected to fit a story do not constitute evidence. Anyone looking for confirmation will find enough of it to deceive himself — and no doubt his peers.* The Black Swan idea is based on the structure of randomness in empirical reality.

*It is also naïve empiricism to provide, in support of some argument, series of eloquent confirmatory quotes by dead authorities. By searching, you can always find someone who made a well-sounding statement that confirms your point of view — and, on every topic, it is possible to find another dead thinker who said the exact opposite. Almost all my non Yogi Berra quotes are from people I disagree with."

Half the people lie with their lips; the other half with their tears.

Nothing is more permanent than "temporary" arrangements, deficits, truces, and relationships; and nothing is more temporary than "permanent" ones.