#randomness

We could not, for example, arrive at a principle like that of entropy without introducing some additional principle, such as randomness, to this topography. ↗

— Michael Polanyi

#arrive #could #entropy #example #for example

Vimes took the view that life was so full of things happening erratically in all directions that the chances of any of them making some kind of relevant sense were remote in the extreme. Colon, being by nature more optimistic and by intellect a good deal slower, was still at the Clues are Important stage. ↗

— Terry Pratchett

#meaning #randomness #life

If you hear a "prominent" economist using the word 'equilibrium,' or 'normal distribution,' do not argue with him; just ignore him, or try to put a rat down his shirt. ↗

— Nassim Nicholas Taleb

#humor #randomness #humor

Luck is not as random as you think. Before that lottery ticket won the jackpot, someone had to buy it. ↗

— Vera Nazarian

#fortunate #fortune #improving-chances #lottery #luck

I listen to Radio 4 and put the iPod on shuffle. I like the randomness of, say, the Stones, then something from Nina Simone, Nick Drake or Bob Dylan. ↗

— Catherine McCormack

#bob dylan #drake #dylan #i #ipod

Ka knew very well that life was a meaningless string of random incidents ↗

— Orhan Pamuk

#randomness #life

The world is big in some ways, and so small in others. ↗

— Ashly Lorenzana

#overwhelming #randomness #universe #world #life

... Nature almost surely operates by combining chance with necessity, randomness with determinism... ↗

— Eric Chaisson

#determinism #nature #necessity #randomness #age

The two go hand in hand like a dance: chance flirts with necessity, randomness with determinism. To be sure, it is from this interchange that novelty and creativity arise in Nature, thereby yielding unique forms and novel structures. ↗

— Eric Chaisson

#determinism #nature #necessity #randomness #age

[The sound of the wind] was just more proof that the workings of the world were random, that beauty, like suffering, was meaningless, that human life was as pointless as waves on sand. ↗

— Anita Diamant

#beauty #day-after-night #meaninglessness-of-life #random-chance #randomness