quote · Legacy record
Reality is far more vicious than Russian roulette. First, it delivers the fatal bullet rather infrequently, like a revolver that would have hundreds, even thousands of chambers instead of six. After a few dozen tries, one forgets about the existence of a bullet, under a numbing false sense of security. Second, unlike a well-defined precise game like Russian roulette, where the risks are visible to anyone capable of multiplying and dividing by six, one does not observe the barrel of reality. One is capable of unwittingly playing Russian roulette - and calling it by some alternative “low risk” game.
Reality is far more vicious than Russian roulette. First, it delivers the fatal bullet rather infrequently, like a revolver that would have hundreds, even thousands of chambers instead of six. After a few dozen tries, one forgets about the existence of a bullet, under a numbing false sense of security. Second, unlike a well-defined precise game like Russian roulette, where the risks are visible to anyone capable of multiplying and dividing by six, one does not observe the barrel of reality. One is capable of unwittingly playing Russian roulette - and calling it by some alternative “low risk” game.
Approximate author period: c. 1960 AD · modern
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- Author or tradition
- Nassim Nicholas Taleb
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- Approximate author period: c. 1960 AD · modern
Approximate author-period anchor from documented birth year 1960; activity date not established; Wikidata Q333521, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q333521 (accessed 2026-10-08). Not a quotation composition date.
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Supplied reference C; CSV row 13809; supplied attribution, independently unverified
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