Academia is to knowledge what prostitution is to love.

Academia is to knowledge what prostitution is to love; close enough on the surface but, to the non-sucker, not exactly the same thing.

Never ask a trader if he is profitable: you can easily see it in his gesture and gait.

The imagination of the genius vastly surpasses his intellect; the intellect of the academic vastly surpasses his imagination

My biggest problem with modernity may lie in the growing separation of the ethical and the legal

Let me be more aggressive: we are largely better at doing than we are at thinking, thanks to antifragility. I’d rather be dumb and antifragile than extremely smart and fragile, any time.

Bankers, they're not harmed by their mistakes. They benefit when things go right, and the society pays the price.