“The essence of life is statistical improbability on a colossal scale.”
“The more improbable the message, the less "compressible" it is, and the more bandwidth it requires. This is Shannon's point: the essence is its improbability.”
Part One, Entropy, Randomness, Disorder, Uncertainty, p. 57
Fortune's Formula (2005)
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William Poundstone 33
American writer 1955Related quotes
"The Home Builder Conserves" [1928]; Published in The River of the Mother of God and Other Essays by Aldo Leopold, Susan L. Flader and J. Baird Callicott (eds.) 1991, p. 147.
1920s
“One good song with a message can bring a point more deeply to more people than a thousand rallies.”
Statement in Broadside magazine (1962), quoted in Songs of the Vietnam Conflict (2001) by James E. Perone, p. 19
Retrospect of criticisms of the theory of natural selection. In Evolution as a Process, eds. J.S.Huxley, A.C.Hardy and E.B.Ford, London: Allen and Unwin, 1954.
1950s
“Quality is conformance to requirements - nothing more, nothing less.”
Philip B. Crosby (1979), as cited in: Colin Morgan and Stephen Murgatroyd (1994), Total Quality Management In The Public Sector.
“Everyone is more or less mad on one point.”
On the Strength of a Likeness.
Plain Tales from the Hills (1888)
Gravity's Rainbow (1973)
Source: Information, The New Language of Science (2003), Chapter 4, Counting Bits, The scientific measure of information, p. 28
"I Can't Give Everything Away"
Song lyrics, Blackstar (2016)