Zack KanterVerified account

“Scars signal skin in the game.” Walking scars are beautiful and evidence of hard-fought wisdom and perseverance. Only voyeurs are scar-free.

“Envy does not travel long distance or cross many social classes. Envy does not originate with the impoverished, concerned with the betterment of their condition, but with the clerical class.” Most dangerous envy is peer envy. Intense envy is a luxury.

“Traders, when they make profits, have short communications; when they lose they drown you in details, theories, and charts.” Win = Me; Lose = Luck. The greater the justification, the higher the likelihood of culpability.

“Science is fundamentally disconfirmatory, not confirmatory.” Science doesn’t prove. It disproves. Science is a tool of reduction, not addition.

“The one who doesn’t look the part, conditional on having made a successful career in his profession, had to have much to overcome in terms of perception.” The “odd” one is usually far more skilled. Pay attention to outliers of appearance, manner, and style.

“A business plan is a useful narrative for those who want to convince a sucker.” And usually the sucker is the person who has been told to put together the business plan. Beware of those bearing business plans, or more generally useful narratives.

“The minute one is judged by others rather than by reality, things become warped.” Because incentives, biases, and politics obscure reality’s feedback loops. Gatekeepers keep gates far worse than a crowd of buyers.

“Poison is drunk in golden cups.” Nothing, and I mean nothing, comes without opportunity costs, including what the world tells you are the goals. Opportunity cost of success is invisible until it's deadly.