“One thing a person cannot do, no matter how rigorous his analysis or heroic his imagination, is to draw up a list of things that would never occur to him.”
– Thomas Schelling, quoted in Seven Types of Serendipity, by Steven Johnson
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“Reports that say that something hasn’t happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don’t know we don’t know. And if one looks throughout the history of our country and other free countries, it is the latter category that tends to be the difficult ones.”
– Donald Rumsfeld, DoD News Briefing, February 12, 2002 11:30 AM EDT
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Even if I haven’t got anything noteworthy or interesting to say, I hope I have some skill in recognising and selecting from the works of others things worth repeating and sharing.
I do not have to originate any compelling ideas of my own. There are plenty out there waiting to be discovered.
My reading life is spent linking the knowns with the known unknowns.
But the greatest thrill is in the discovery of the unknown unknowns. An author new to me. A book that is a revelation.
Not everything previously unknown is life changing. But like an addict at a slot machine I know that if I read long enough the odds will provide me with a new discovery every now and then.
I want to stay in the game.
I keep coming back to play.
Conversations With Quotations 