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About this quote

What does it mean?
Facts are mere lists, but things used as language are endlessly meaningful.
In plain terms
Statistics are dry, but language brings things to life.
What can you take from it?
Language transforms data into something compelling.

Where it applies

  • analyzing data
  • writing
  • teaching

Putting it to work

  • use narrative in reports
  • frame data as story

Questions to consider

  • How do you make data engaging?
  • What makes language attractive?

Another view

It undervalues the utility of raw data for precise decision-making.

More from Ralph Waldo Emerson

  1. Great geniuses have the shortest biographies.

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  2. Keep cool: it will be all one a hundred years hence.

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  3. Every hero becomes a bore at last.

    Permalink to quote #183

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