The Arabs have an expression for trenchant prose: no skill to understand it, mastery to write it. (Location 547)
(lecturing birds on flying and believing that the lecture is the cause of these wonderful skills) (Location 3617)
This seems trivial, but there are big-time implications. (Location 3852)
Nobody worries that a child ignorant of the various theorems of aerodynamics and incapable of solving an equation of motion would be unable to ride a bicycle. (Location 3969)
before the thirteenth century no more than five persons in the whole of Europe knew how to perform a division. No theorem, shmeorem. But builders could figure out the resistance of materials without the equations we have today—buildings that are, for the most part, still standing. (Location 4033)
rubber shoes). DuPont, now famous for Teflon nonstick (Location 4263)
passing in 2002 with a front-page headline with a pun (Location 4418)
The entire idea of philosophy is to be able to reflect and understand what we are doing, examine our lives. An unexamined life is not worth living.” (Location 4579)
Fragility, Not Probability We check people for weapons before they board the plane. Do we believe that they are terrorists: True or False? False, as they are not likely to be terrorists (a tiny probability). But we check them nevertheless because we are fragile to terrorism. (Location 4700)
If I spot a black swan (not capitalized), I can be quite certain that the statement “all swans are white” is wrong. But even if I have never seen a black swan, I can never hold such a statement to be true. Rephrasing it again: since one small observation can disprove a statement, while millions can hardly confirm it, disconfirmation is more rigorous than confirmation. (Location 5430)
instance, if you have more than one reason to do something (choose a doctor or veterinarian, hire a gardener or an employee, marry a person, go on a trip), just don’t do it. It does not mean that one reason is better than two, just that by invoking more than one reason you are trying to convince yourself to do something. (Location 5509)
“even the most solid.” So Simonides had the adumbration of the idea, quite useful, that the most solid will be swallowed with more difficulty, hence last. Naturally, he did not think that something could be antifragile, hence never swallowed. (Location 5565)
grasp of the notion of “heuristics,” these often unwritten (Location 5631)
starvation of overweight diabetic patients). Cortisone. (Location 6207)
skewed, with the bulk of the deaths coming from (Location 6425)
It has been shown that many people benefit from the removal of products that did not exist in their ancestral habitat: sugars and other carbohydrates in unnatural format, wheat products (those with celiac disease, but almost all of us are somewhat ill-adapted to this new addition to the human diet), milk and other cow products (for those of non–Northern European origin who did not develop lactose tolerance), sodas (both diet and regular), wine (for those of Asian origin who do not have the history of exposure), vitamin pills, food supplements, the family doctor, headache medicine and other painkillers. (Location 6478)
carbohydrates without large, very large quantities of fiber. (Location 6496)
Enlightenment, but we also have more, a lot more transfers (Location 6818)
that America’s strength was risk taking and harboring (Location 6874)
they present themselves as press—without the noble (Location 6925)
honor can lead to commerce. Any commerce. (Location 7222)