John Allen Paulos Quotes

Uncertainty is the only certainty there is, and knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security

The Internet is the world's largest library. It's just that all the books are on the floor.

Data, data everywhere, but not a thought to think.

Mathematics is no more computation than typing is literature.

When asked why he doesn't believe in astrology, the logician Raymond Smullyan responds that he's a Gemini and Geminis never believe in astrology.

In listening to stories we tend to suspend disbelief in order to be entertained, whereas in evaluating statistics we generally have an opposite inclination to suspend belief in order not to be beguiled.

Innumeracy and pseudoscience are often associated, in part because of the ease with which mathematical certainty can be invoked, to bludgeon the innumerate into a dumb acquiescence.

Uncertainty would be the only certainty there's, and realizing how to stay with insecurity could be the only protection

I think, therefore I laugh.

Mathematicians are a bit like the laconic Vermonter who, when asked if he's lived in the state his whole life, replies, "Not yet."

There is something inhuman and vaguely pornographic about statistics... Pornography, on the other hand, with its loosely bound sequences of storyless sexual couplings often has the feel of a statistical survey.

So many see themselves as aggrieved; so few see themselves as aggrievers.

Defined broadly enough, mathematics encompasses everything.

In the stock market... You can be right for the wrong reasons or wrong for the right reasons.

How many pizzas are consumed each year in the United States? How many words have you spoken in your life? How many different peoples names appear in the New York Times each year? How many watermelons would fit inside the U.S. Capital building? What is the volume of all the human blood in the world?

The fashion pages have always baffled me. In my opinion, the articles appear to be full of gobbledygook as to make the astrology column seem factual by comparison.

The only bit of logic-based public bathroom humor I know is: the difference between men and women is that between the statement [P and not Q] and the statement [Q and not P].