Another mistaken notion connected with the law of large numbers is the idea that an event is more or less likely to occur because it has or has not happened recently. The idea that the...

Oh, don’t worry, I am perfectly aware of the fantasy involved here, but what we want is almost never exempt from the impossible. That barrier has very little meaning for me these days. Given what’s...

Predictability is not how things will go, but how they can go.

Among all the occurrences possible in the universe the a priori probability of any particular one of them verges upon zero. Yet the universe exists; particular events must take place in it, the probability of...

What was a shadow, after all, but a shape in the moving world reduced to a projection of possibilities?

I have stressed this distinction because it is an important one. It defines the fundamental difference between probability and statistics: the former concerns predictions based on fixed probabilities; the latter concerns the inference of those...

Stop living the life with possibilities and probabilities, live the life with certainties.

And some scientists and other intellectuals are convinced—too eagerly in my view—that the question of God’s existence belongs in the forever inaccessible PAP category. From this, as we shall see, they often make the illogical...

Ignorance gives one a large range of probabilities.

The concept of randomness and coincidence will be obsolete when people can finally define a formulation of patterned interaction between all things within the universe.

Extremely unlikely events occur every moment and it is not a priori unthinkable that the evolution of life should be due to mere chance than that a particular order in a pack of cards should...

Do not fear to think even the most not-probable.

The fact that we can neither prove nor disprove the existence of something does not put existence and non-existence on an even footing.

I know that two and two make four – and should be glad to prove it too if I could – though I must say if by any sort of process I could convert 2...

The first step is to establish that something is possible; then probability will occur.

4. Religion. Your reason is now mature enough to examine this object. In the first place, divest yourself of all bias in favor of novelty & singularity of opinion… shake off all the fears &...

Anything at all is possible. Some things are unlikely. Some things will never happen. But they always could, at any time.

Natural selection is not only a parsimonious, plausible and elegant solution; it is the only workable alternative to chance that has ever been suggested. Intelligent design suffers from exactly the same objection as chance. It...

Planning is worrying, only in a productive, proactive form. Worry has to be a large element of planning, or else how could you project different possible scenarios, situations, outcomes, and probabilities, and then plot a...

You, dear reader, have now two accounts to choose between and there can be no doubt which is most probable.

Statistically, the probability of any one of us being here is so small that the mere fact of our existence should keep us all in a state of contented dazzlement.

Occasionally I glanced at the big blue cradle of civilization hanging in the sky, remembered for the fiftieth or sixtieth or one hundredth time that none of this had any right to be happening, and...

I may finally call attention to the probability that the association of paternal and maternal chromosomes in pairs and their subsequent separation during the reducing division as indicated above may constitute the physical basis of...

Blind nature will nearly always select the most probable, but man can let the most improbable become actual.

Every month that begins on a Sunday has a Friday as the 13th.

All statistics have outliers.

The 50-50-90 rule: anytime you have a 50-50 chance of getting something right, there’s a 90% probability you’ll get it wrong.

The greatest risk is not taking one.

If nature has taught us anything it is that the impossible is probable

In practical life we are compelled to follow what is most probable ; in speculative thought we are compelled to follow truth.

The future is certain. It is just not known.

A likely impossibility is always preferable to an unconvincing possibility. The story should never be made up of improbable incidents; there should be nothing of the sort in it.

The greatest risk is not taking any.

I believe that we do not know anything for certain, but everything probably.

We either base our ‘confidence’ on reason (evident probabilities, past experience, competence, etc) or we base our beliefs on faith, which is blind by definition. Faith is the most dishonest position it is possible to...

There’s no such thing as probability,” she says, slowly, with minimal movement of her jaw. “Things turn out the way they do.

I do not pretend to be able to prove that there is no God. I equally cannot prove that Satan is a fiction. The Christian god may exist; so may the gods of Olympus, or...

It is highly probable that we choose our posture, not our problems.

Every time you understand something, religion becomes less likely. Only with the discovery of the double helix and the ensuing genetic revolution have we had grounds for thinking that the powers held traditionally to be...

One should not inquire too closely where ancient legends about the gods are concerned; many things which reason rejects acquire some color of probability once you bring a god into the story

Statistics, likelihoods, and probabilities mean everything to men, nothing to God.

Based on the law of probability Everything is possible because The sheer existence of possibility Confirms the existence Of impossibility.

If the universe was scientific and just left to itself, then we’d have statistical probabilities to rely on. But once people are involved it sometimes becomes much more problematic because they’re erratic. People do crazy...

He who jumps for the sake of jumping will probably keep jumping until he jumps back into his own jumping ground.

Further, the same Arguments which explode the Notion of Luck, may, on the other side, be useful in some Cases to establish a due comparison between Chance and Design: We may imagine Chance and Design...

The probability of an event is the reason we have to believe that it has taken place, or that it will take place.The measure of the probability of an event is the ratio of the...

One of the recent arguments from design, that based on the so-called fine-tuning life of some fundamental physical constants, founders on the following objections: an extremely small prior probability merited by the God of theism...

If scientific reasoning were limited to the logical processes of arithmetic, we should not get very far in our understanding of the physical world. One might as well attempt to grasp the game of poker...

He could not believe that any of them might actually hit somebody. If one did, what a nowhere way to go: killed by accident; slain not as an individual but by sheer statistical probability, by...

Peace shouldn’t be an option, it must be the objective, peace shouldn’t be a possibility, it must be the purpose.