I argue that it's appropriate for people to pursue their profit motive in business. If you want to change that, you're going against human nature. Bu… - George Soros

Tell us about the crisis of 1981.
It started much earlier, around the time I spelled out my three-stage strategy. Here I was, extremely successful, but I made a point of denying my success. I worked like a dog. I felt that it would endanger my success if I abandoned my sense of insecurity. And what was my reward? More money, more responsibility, more work-and more pain-because I relied on pain, as a decision-making tool.

Az adott társadalmi szituációk résztvevőiként mindannyiunknak rendelkeznünk kell bizonyos nézetekkel, amelyek alapján cselekszünk. De milyen alapon cselekedjünk, amennyiben elfogadjuk, hogy nézeteink nagy valószínűséggel tévesek, de legalábbis a valóság hiányos vetületei. A válasz ugyanaz, mint amit Popper adott a tudományos módszerre: nézeteinket átmeneti igazságokként kell kezelni, és közben biztosítani kell az állandó felülvizsgálatot. Ez a nyílt társadalom alaptétele.

The fact that a thesis is flawed does not mean that we should not invest in it as long as other people believe in it and there is a large group of people left to be convinced. The point was made by John Maynard Keynes when he compared the stock market to a beauty contest where the winner is not the most beautiful contestant but the one whom the greatest number of people consider beautiful. Where I have something significant to add is in pointing out that it pays to look for the flaws; if we find them, we are ahead of the game because we can limit our losses when the market also discovers what we already know. It is when we are unaware of what could go wrong that we have to worry.