My experience is that journalists report on the nearest-cliche algorithm, which is extremely uninformative because there aren't many cliches, the truth is often quite distant from any cliche, and the only thing you can infer about the actual event was that this was the closest cliche. It is simply not possible to appreciate the sheer awfulness of mainstream media reporting until someone has actually reported on you. It is so much worse than you think.

There are no surprising facts, only models that are surprised by facts; and if a model is surprised by the facts, it is no credit to that model.

I don't want to rule the universe. I just think it could be more sensibly organised.

If you are equally good at explaining any outcome, you have zero knowledge.

Trying and getting hurt can't possibly be worse for you than being... stuck.

World domination is such an ugly phrase. I prefer to call it world optimisation.

By and large, the answer to the question "How do large institutions survive?" is "They don't!" The vast majority of large modern-day institutions - some of them extremely vital to the functioning of our complex civilization - simply fail to exist in the first place.