[I]t does not matter how frequently something succeeds if failure is too costly to bear.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- If failure is too costly, the frequency of success becomes irrelevant.
- In plain terms
- Rare successes don't matter when a single failure is disastrous.
- What can you take from it?
- Assess risk tolerance before pursuing high‑stakes ventures.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- When should we accept high risk?
- How can we better measure cost of failure?
Another view
It may ignore potential learning from occasional failures.
More from Nassim Nicholas Taleb
You may not be able to change the world but can at least get some entertainment & make a living out of the epistemic arrogance of the human race.
Permalink to quote #2 [U]nlike 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 obs…
Permalink to quote #4 My major hobby is teasing people who take themselves and the quality of their knowledge too seriously and those who don't have the guts to sometimes say: I don…
Permalink to quote #1
Related quotes
In order to achieve anything, you must be brave enough to fail.
Kirk DouglasKirk Douglas quote #1 Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much…
Theodore RooseveltTheodore Roosevelt quote #5 From the sublime to the ridiculous is but a step.
Napoleon BonaparteNapoleon Bonaparte quote #6