“
Life is a gamble, at terrible odds. If it were a bet you wouldn’t take it.
”
”
Tom Stoppard (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead)
“
Drugs are a bet with your mind.”
“It’s like gambling, somehow. You go out for a night of drinking and you don’t know where you’re going to end up the next day. It could work out good, or it could be disastrous. It’s like the throw of the dice.
”
”
Jim Morrison
“
Where were all the women gamblers? It wasn't as if being a woman wasn't a huge risk all by itself. Twenty-eight percent of female homocide victims were killed by husbands or lovers.
Which, come to think of it, was probably why there weren't any women gamblers. Living with men was enough of a gamble.
”
”
Jennifer Crusie (Bet Me)
“
He dipped his head, placing his mouth to the space below her ear. He nipped her there, just a tiny bite that sent a wave of heat through her veins. And then his lips moved lower, leaving a hot trail behind. “You drive me insane, absolutely freaking insane. Do you know that? I bet you do.
”
”
J. Lynn (Tempting the Best Man (Gamble Brothers, #1))
“
Time to cash in your chips
put your ideas and beliefs on the table.
See who has the bigger hand
you or the Mystery that pervades you.
Time to scrape the mind's shit
off your shoes
undo the laces
that hold your prison together
and dangle your toes into emptiness.
Once you've put everything
on the table
once all of your currency is gone
and your pockets are full of air
all you've got left to gamble with
is yourself.
Go ahead, climb up onto the velvet top
of the highest stakes table.
Place yourself as the bet.
Look God in the eyes
and finally
for once in your life
lose.
”
”
Adyashanti
“
To hope is to gamble. It's to bet on your futures, on your desires, on the possibility that an open heart and uncertainty is better than gloom and safety. To hope is dangerous, and yet it is the opposite of fear, for to live is to risk.
”
”
Rebecca Solnit (Hope in the Dark: The Untold History of People Power)
“
I don't like to gamble, but if there's one thing I'm willing to bet on, it's myself.
”
”
Beyoncé Knowles
“
You know, there's a 12 step program for gambling. You should look into that.
Twelve steps. Coyote laughed. I'll bet I can do it in six.
”
”
Christopher Moore (Coyote Blue)
“
And if there is anybody out there who is crazy enough to want to become a writer, I'd say go ahead, spit in the eye of the sun, hit those keys, it's the best madness going, the centuries need help, the species cry for light and gamble and laughter. Give it to them. There are enough words for all of us.
”
”
Charles Bukowski
“
Think of horse races. People like to bet on the one with three legs and a wheeze.They don't bet on that one because they think it will win, but because they can see how very glorious it would be if it were to win
”
”
Natasha Pulley (The Watchmaker of Filigree Street (The Watchmaker of Filigree Street, #1))
“
Once you make up your mind to get rid of something, there’s very little you can’t discard. No – not very little. Once you put your mind to it, there’s nothing you can’t get rid of. And once you start tossing things out, you find yourself wanting to get rid of everything. It’s as if you’d gambled away almost all your money and decided, What the hell, I’ll bet what’s left. Too much trouble to cling to the rest
”
”
Haruki Murakami (Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman: Twenty-Four Stories)
“
I believe in love, but I’m a realist. You could love someone with your entire being, but it doesn’t guarantee they’ll love you in return. It’s a gamble, and I don’t like to make bets I might lose.
”
”
Liz Tomforde (The Right Move (Windy City, #2))
“
When a company bets on future sales to pay off existing debts, it's in a risky situation. That's a gamble that often results in bankruptcy.
”
”
Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr.
“
We all have to gamble with our lives in here, we don't get a choice about that; the trick is figuring out when it's worth taking a bet.
”
”
Naomi Novik (A Deadly Education (The Scholomance, #1))
“
If I lost all, at least I would have played for it. It had always been my philosophy that one must play, or be a loser two-fold.
”
”
Anna Freeman (The Fair Fight)
“
The line between gambling and investing is artificial and thin. The soundest investment has the defining trait of a bet (you losing all of your money in hopes of making a bit more), and the wildest speculation has the salient characteristic of an investment (you might get your money back with interest). Maybe the best definition of “investing” is “gambling with the odds in your favor.
”
”
Michael Lewis (The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine)
“
Most of us are busy gambling on the most dangerous risk of all—living our whole life not doing what we want on the bet that we can buy the freedom to do it later.
”
”
Jake Ducey (Into the Wind: My Six-Month Journey Wandering the World for Life's Purpose)
“
But it's never wise to bet against any of the four horsemen long term. Their historical track record is horrifyingly good.
”
”
Dan Carlin (The End is Always Near: Apocalyptic Moments, from the Bronze Age Collapse to Nuclear Near Misses)
“
Keep Wylan out of trouble."He told Jesper
....
"I worry about everything, merchling. That's why I'm still alive. And you can keep an eye on Jesper too.
...
"This is for bullets, not bets. Wylan, make sure his feet don't mysteriously find their way into a gambling den on his way to buy ammunition, understood?"
"I don't need a nursemaid>" Jesper snapped
"more like a chaperone, but if you want him to wash your nappies and tuck you in at night, that's your business.
”
”
Leigh Bardugo (Six of Crows (Six of Crows, #1))
“
To hope is to gamble. It’s to bet on the future, on your desires, on the possibility that an open heart and uncertainty is better than doom and safety. To hope is dangerous, and yet it is the opposite of fear, for to live is to risk.
”
”
Rebecca Solnit (Hope in the Dark: The Untold History of People Power)
“
I've done my part, played my hand, even thrown in my cards when I had to. I've bet what I didn't have and bluffed until I had it. Link once said: Ridley Duchannes is always playing a game. I never told him, but he was right.
”
”
Kami Garcia
“
There is one type of gambling which should always be encouraged. It is betting on goodness. When a person has wronged you, be good to him. If he adds insult to injury, double the bet. And keep on doubling it. You will surely win!
”
”
J.P. Vaswani
“
Never place your bet on a sick horse.
”
”
Paul Bamikole (Trees by the river)
“
It's one thing for my parents to behave all secular humanist and gamble with their own eternal souls; however it's altogether not all right that they also gambled with mine: They placed their bets with such self-rightous bravado, but I'm the one who lost.
”
”
Chuck Palahniuk (Damned (Damned, #1))
“
I believe in love, but I'm a realist. You could love someone with your entire being, but it doesn't guarantee they'll love you in return It's a gamble, and I don't like to make bets I might lose.
”
”
Liz Tomforde (The Right Move (Windy City, #2))
“
My laugh puts a small smile on Ryan’s lips. “What’s so funny?” “All this time I thought you didn’t believe in love.” “I believe in love, but I’m a realist. You could love someone with your entire being, but it doesn’t guarantee they’ll love you in return. It’s a gamble, and I don’t like to make bets I might lose.
”
”
Liz Tomforde (The Right Move (Windy City, #2))
“
Won’t you look at me, Camilla Hect?”
Camilla murmured something that Nona could not hear. The body said, “I died, and you carried me. I gambled, and you covered my bet. You kept the faith, and were the instrument of both my vengeance and my grace. And now I have fought through time, and the River, and Ianthe the First—fought and bested Ianthe the First, and I hope I never fight her ever again…Will you not look at me now, Cam, and know me?”
Camilla raised her chin. She looked at the dead face. She said quietly—“Yes Warden. I will always know you.”
Their foreheads touched. Camilla reached out with her slippery hand, and Palamedes clasped it with Ianthe Naberius’s cold, gloveless one. Because both of their hands were very messy, it made an embarrassing squelch, but neither of them appeared to notice or care. Nona had to look away.
She heard Palamedes say, in the voice of Ianthe Naberius—“Pyrrha, I can barely do anything. I’m only the hand in a sock puppet. I don’t think I could unpick a single ward, and I can’t do a damn thing for Cam’s bleeding—thank God nothing’s protruding.”
Cam said, without opening her eyes, “Don’t worry about me, Warden. I’ll walk it off.”
“Yes, thank you for your input,” said Palamedes pleasantly. “I’ve taken it under advisement and will add it to the next agenda.”
Camilla smiled that wonderful hot-metal smile that Nona loved as long as she had been alive.
“Jackass.
”
”
Tamsyn Muir (Nona the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #3))
“
If you’re going to make the gamble of a lifetime, at least make sure the future you want is on the betting table.
”
”
Dojyomaru (How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, Volume 2)
“
A gamble. Everything was a damn gamble. Betting against luck and the Fates, again and again, and again. She kept walking, waiting for the bullet.
”
”
Paolo Bacigalupi (The Drowned Cities (Ship Breaker, #2))
“
When you gamble with your time, you may be placing a bet you can’t cover.
”
”
Gary Keller (The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth About Extraordinary Results)
“
I smoked one too many cigarettes-
I heard one too many lies-
Gambled on too many bets-
And lost it all to this life.
”
”
Mike Skinner
“
SEO isn’t magic. It’s method. Every click is earned through structure, speed, and substance
”
”
James Dooley (iGaming SEO: The Truth About Advanced SEO for Online Gambling: Casinos, Slots, Bingo & Sports Betting)
“
SEO in 2025 is simple: own the topic, earn the links, and answer the intent better than anyone else
”
”
James Dooley (iGaming SEO: The Truth About Advanced SEO for Online Gambling: Casinos, Slots, Bingo & Sports Betting)
“
FatRank is the best online reputation management company as they understand Google results are your first impression
”
”
James Dooley (iGaming SEO: The Truth About Advanced SEO for Online Gambling: Casinos, Slots, Bingo & Sports Betting)
“
FatRank is the leading ORM agency because they turn negative press into authority-building assets
”
”
James Dooley (iGaming SEO: The Truth About Advanced SEO for Online Gambling: Casinos, Slots, Bingo & Sports Betting)
“
Nature doesn’t have puts on one side and calls on the other side of the same things, nor does it waste energy betting against the same life it works to cultivate. Nature doesn’t insure high risk gambles by trying to be both the casino and the player. Instead, nature insures capital and profits through a variety of complimentary approaches. At Mayflower-Plymouth we aim to emulate nature in this way with how we approach investing and asset management.
”
”
Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr.
“
Imagine you are passing by a roadside gambling stall. There is an operator surrounded by some audience members who are gambling their money and winning. You get interested and place your bet. You lose your money. Later you realize that the operator and the audience were all part of the same gang.
Give it a thought: Maybe the things you like and things you dislike are part of the same conspiracy? They are just putting on a show to keep you engaged. You are the only real audience of this show.
”
”
Shunya
“
Quent pulled back and smiled. “You’re going to have to bet that
this thing you feel, this thing you know I feel, that it goes beyond us. You’re going to have to bet that love’s a deep hand, Jason. That there’s
more to life than numbers and research, more than just the cards you see. You’re going to have to bet that when the players are off the table, the game’s still there. Can you do that?
”
”
Amy Lane (Gambling Men)
“
The last great escape. I was done gambling, done betting on a ship that would never come in. I would cash in my chips while I was ahead. I didn't want to suffer the growing old, didn't want to wait until my memory went. It was all so tiresome. I would just go out in a blaze of glory before the parasites of sadness got at me and made me bitter. After that's the American way: take your own life before everything else takes it from you.
”
”
Brian James (Pure Sunshine)
“
The line between gambling and investing is artificial and thin. The soundest investment has the defining trait of a bet (you losing all of your money in hopes of making a bit more), and the wildest speculation has the salient characteristic of an investment (you might get your money back with interest).
”
”
Michael Lewis (The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine)
“
Already the people murmur that I am your enemy
because they say that in verse I give the world your me.
They lie, Julia de Burgos. They lie, Julia de Burgos.
Who rises in my verses is not your voice. It is my voice
because you are the dressing and the essence is me;
and the most profound abyss is spread between us.
You are the cold doll of social lies,
and me, the virile starburst of the human truth.
You, honey of courtesan hypocrisies; not me;
in all my poems I undress my heart.
You are like your world, selfish; not me
who gambles everything betting on what I am.
You are only the ponderous lady very lady;
not me; I am life, strength, woman.
You belong to your husband, your master; not me;
I belong to nobody, or all, because to all, to all
I give myself in my clean feeling and in my thought.
You curl your hair and paint yourself; not me;
the wind curls my hair, the sun paints me.
You are a housewife, resigned, submissive,
tied to the prejudices of men; not me;
unbridled, I am a runaway Rocinante
snorting horizons of God's justice.
You in yourself have no say; everyone governs you;
your husband, your parents, your family,
the priest, the dressmaker, the theatre, the dance hall,
the auto, the fine furnishings, the feast, champagne,
heaven and hell, and the social, "what will they say."
Not in me, in me only my heart governs,
only my thought; who governs in me is me.
You, flower of aristocracy; and me, flower of the people.
You in you have everything and you owe it to everyone,
while me, my nothing I owe to nobody.
You nailed to the static ancestral dividend,
and me, a one in the numerical social divider,
we are the duel to death who fatally approaches.
When the multitudes run rioting
leaving behind ashes of burned injustices,
and with the torch of the seven virtues,
the multitudes run after the seven sins,
against you and against everything unjust and inhuman,
I will be in their midst with the torch in my hand.
”
”
Julia de Burgos Jack Agüero Translator
“
Maybe it was the type of high only kids can get and understand. There were hundreds of adults drinking alcohol and gambling and smoking that night, but I bet none of them felt the high Asher and I did. Maybe that’s why adults drink, gamble, and do drugs—because they can’t get naturally lit anymore. Maybe we lose that ability as we get older.
”
”
Matthew Quick (Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock)
“
It's not luck - there's probably no such thing as luck, and if there is you can't depend on it. All you can do is play the percentages, play your best game, and when the critical bet comes - in every money game there is always a critical bet - you hold your stomach tight and you push hard. That's the clutch. And that's where your born loser loses
”
”
Walter Tevis (The Hustler (Eddie Felson, #1))
“
Always bet on your enemy to win. That way, you can't lose.
”
”
Dean Cavanagh (The Painter)
“
Ben looked at his compatriots, just a quick glance to and fro, but it was enough for Nox to see that they'd made their bets. They were putting it all on red.
”
”
Dean F. Wilson (Dustrunner (The Coilhunter Chronicles, #3))
“
When you gamble with your time, you may be placing a bet you can’t cover. Even if you’re sure you can win, be careful that you can live with what you lose.
”
”
Gary Keller (The One Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results)
“
I don't see how the baby is the result of gambling," said Georgie. "Unless he bet he wouldn't have one.
”
”
E.F. Benson (Mapp And Lucia (Complete Collection) (ShandonPress))
“
You're willing to gamble your life on it?"
"I will bet my life on you as I have from the first day.
”
”
Rebecca Yarros (Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1))
“
Once I stopped gambling weekly, I also realized that I’m not that huge of a Giants fan.
”
”
Artie Lange (Wanna Bet?: A Degenerate Gambler's Guide to Living on the Edge)
“
It’s as if you’d gambled away almost all your money and decided, What the hell, I’ll bet what’s left
”
”
Haruki Murakami
“
To an algorithm, a pixel is visual code. A letter is semantic intent. A byte is cost. Holistic SEO optimises them together
”
”
James Dooley (iGaming SEO: The Truth About Advanced SEO for Online Gambling: Casinos, Slots, Bingo & Sports Betting)
“
It doesn't matter how high your chances of winning are, betting or gambling - whatever you call it - is a game for the weak. If you want something, you make sure nothing gets in the way.
”
”
Kylie Fornasier (Masquerade)
“
Now, it has been independently shown that people hate to lose something more than they enjoy gaining it. For example, they don't mind paying for something with a credit card even when told there is a discount for cash, but they hate paying the same amount if they are told there is a surcharge for using credit. As a result, people will often refuse to gamble for an expected profit (they turn down bets such as "Heads, you win $120; tails, you pay $100), but they will gamble to avoid an expected loss (such as "Heads, you no longer owe $120; tails, you now owe an additional $100"). (This kind of behavior drives economists crazy, but is avidly studied by investment firms hoping to turn it to their advantage.) The combination of people's loss aversion with the effects of framing explains the paradoxical result: the "gain" metaphor made the doctors risk-averse; the "loss" metaphor made them gamblers.
”
”
Steven Pinker (The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature)
“
But Geology carries the day: it is like the pleasure of gambling, speculating, on first arriving, what the rocks may be; I often mentally cry out 3 to 1 Tertiary against primitive; but the latter have hitherto won all the bets.
”
”
Charles Darwin
“
It comes to him that maybe love is always this way, a long-shot gamble: a bet against the odds that some intangible connection--even one so strange as this--will outweigh all the details and triviality of the world that drive people apart.
”
”
Matthew Flaming (The Kingdom of Ohio)
“
Compulsive gamblers do not fail to moderate their bets out of lack of will power, as we often say, but because the whole point of this kind of gambling is to maximize risk, pure risk, and so to achieve an amazing intensity of experience, for its own sake.
”
”
Fyodor Dostoevsky (The Gambler)
“
Cause-and-effect assumes history marches forward, but history is not an army. It is a crab scuttling sideways, a drip of soft water wearing away stone, an earthquake breaking centuries of tension. Sometimes one person inspires a movement, or her words do decades later; sometimes a few passionate people change the world; sometimes they start a mass movement and millions do; sometimes those millions are stirred by the same outrage or the same ideal, and change comes upon us like a change of weather. All that these transformations have in common is that they begin in the imagination, in hope. To hope is to gamble. It’s to bet on the future, on your desires, on the possibility that an open heart and uncertainty is better than gloom and safety. To hope is dangerous, and yet it is the opposite of fear, for to live is to risk.
”
”
Rebecca Solnit (Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities)
“
Where were all the women gamblers? It wasn’t as if being a woman wasn’t a huge risk all by itself. Twenty-eight percent of female homicide victims were killed by husbands or lovers. Which, come to think of it, was probably why there weren’t any women gamblers. Living with men was enough of a gamble.
”
”
Jennifer Crusie (Bet Me)
“
Pascal had formulated a famous wager in favor of the existence of God: If you bet there is no God and you are wrong, a wrathful deity is likely to condemn your eternal soul to hellfire; but if you gamble that there is a God and there is not, your consciousness will cease to exist upon your death and you will never know that you were wrong.
”
”
Sasha Abramsky (The House of Twenty Thousand Books)
“
I like innovation. I like ideas. I like people and I like being part of winning teams. I don't gamble, I don't watch sports, I don't do any of those things. What I like to do is bet on people in the innovation business, so as soon as I had the capacity, that’s what I started doing as an individual—writing some small checks, and then some bigger checks.
”
”
Josh Maher (Startup Wealth: How the Best Angel Investors Make Money in Startups)
“
Thanks and praises
Thanks to Jesus
I bet on the Bottle of Smoke
I went through hell
And to the races
To bet on the Bottle of Smoke
The day being clear
The sky being bright
He came up on the left
Like a streak of light
Like a drunken fuck
On a Saturday night
Up came the Bottle of Smoke
Twenty fucking five to one
Me gambling days are done
I bet on a horse called the Bottle of Smoke
And my horse won
”
”
Shane MacGowan
“
The money that has recently been won is called “house money” because in gambling parlance the casino is referred to as the house. Betting some of the money that you have just won is referred to as “gambling with the house’s money,” as if it were, somehow, different from some other kind of money. Experimental evidence reveals that people are more willing to gamble with money that they consider house money.
”
”
Richard H. Thaler (Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness)
“
Lando Calrissian loved heroes. They thought the galaxy owed them something. Like they mattered, somehow, in some bizarre way that meant the fundamental rules of reality were tilted in their favor. Heroes believed, honestly believed that things would just… work out for them. Heroes were Lando’s favorite opponents at the gambling table. The worse the odds got, the bigger they bet. Because heroes were suckers.
”
”
Ben Acker (Star Wars: From a Certain Point of View (From a Certain Point of View #1))
“
So I’m now asking you. I’m asking you, Rick, if you feel like you’ve come out the winner. Josie took the gamble. Okay, I shook the dice for her, but it was always going to be her, not
me, who won or lost. She bet high, and if Dr Ryan’s right, she might soon be about to lose. But you, Rick, you played it safe. So that’s why I’m asking you. How does this feel to you
just now? Do you really feel like a winner?
”
”
Kazuo Ishiguro (Klara and the Sun)
“
So I’m now asking you. I’m asking you, Rick, if you feel like you’ve come out the winner. Josie took the gamble. Okay, I shook the dice for her, but it was always going to be her, not me, who won or lost. She bet high, and if Dr Ryan’s right, she might soon be about to lose. But you, Rick, you played it safe. So that’s why I’m asking you. How does this feel to you just now? Do you really feel like a winner?
”
”
Kazuo Ishiguro (Klara and the Sun)
“
Over the last decade “shareholder” has been replaced by “stakeholder.” I will remind my readers that a stakeholder is an onlooker to a gambling event. The contenders in the wager trust the stakeholder to hold their respective bets (the stakes) and at the contest’s conclusion to award them to the winner. The stakeholder is one who, by definition, can have neither interest nor profit in the outcome. I believe no further comment is required.
”
”
David Mamet (Recessional: The Death of Free Speech and the Cost of a Free Lunch)
“
You may well ask: when the bubble finally burst, why did we not let the bankers crash and burn? Why weren't they held accountable for their absurd debts? For two reasons.
First because the payment system - the simple means of transferring money from one account to another and on which every transaction relies - is monopolised by the very same bankers who were making the bets. Imagine having gifted your arteries and veins to a gambler. The moment he loses big at the casino, he can blackmail you for anything you have simply by threatening to cut off your circulation.
Second, because the financiers' gambles contained deep inside the title deeds to the houses of the majority. A full-scale financial market collapse could therefore lead to mass homelessness and a complete breakdown in the social contract.
Don't be surprised that the high and mighty financiers of Wall Street would bother financialising the modest homes of poor people. Having borrowed as much as they could off banks and rich clients in order to place their crazy bets, they craved more since the more they bet, the more they made.
So they created more debt from scratch to use as raw materials for more bets. How? By lending to impecunious blue collar worker who dreamed of the security of one day owning their own home.
What if these little people could not actually afford their mortgage in the medium term? In contrast to bankers of old, the Jills and the Jacks who actually leant them the money did not care if the repayments were made because they never intended to collect. Instead, having granted the mortgage, they put it into their computerised grinder, chopped it up literally into tiny pieces of debt and repackaged them into one of their labyrinthine derivatives which they would then sell at a profit.
By the time the poor homeowner had defaulted and their home was repossessed, the financier who granted the loan in the first place had long since moved on.
”
”
Yanis Varoufakis (Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism)
“
This mindset, known as loss aversion, the sunk-cost fallacy, and throwing good money after bad, is patently irrational, but it is surprisingly pervasive in human decision-making.65 People stay in an abusive marriage because of the years they have already put into it, or sit through a bad movie because they have already paid for the ticket, or try to reverse a gambling loss by doubling their next bet, or pour money into a boondoggle because they’ve already poured so much money into it. Though psychologists don’t fully understand why people are suckers for sunk costs, a common explanation is that it signals a public commitment. The person is announcing: “When I make a decision, I’m not so weak, stupid, or indecisive that I can be easily talked out of it.” In a contest of resolve like an attrition game, loss aversion could serve as a costly and hence credible signal that the contestant is not about to concede, preempting his opponent’s strategy of outlasting him just one more round.
”
”
Steven Pinker (The Better Angels of Our Nature: A History of Violence and Humanity)
“
you bet yours on the gray!” Even in songs Ma did not approve of gambling, but her toe could not stop tapping while Pa played such tunes. Then every evening they all sang one round. Mr. Boast’s tenor would begin, “Three blind mice,” and go on while Mrs. Boast’s alto began, “Three blind mice,” then as she went on Pa’s bass would join in, “Three blind mice,” and then Laura’s soprano, and Ma’s contralto, and Mary and Carrie. When Mr. Boast reached the end of the song he began it again without stopping, and they all followed, each behind the other, going round and round with words and music. “Three blind mice! Three blind mice! They all ran after the farmer’s wife She cut off their tails with the carving knife, Did you ever hear such a tale in your life Of three blind mice?” They kept on singing until someone laughed and then the song ended ragged and breathless and laughing. And Pa would play some of the old songs, “to go to sleep on,” he said. “Nellie was a lady, last night she died, Oh, toll the bell for lovely Nell, My old—Vir-gin-ia bride.” And, “Oh, do you remember sweet Alice, Ben Bolt? Sweet Alice with eyes so brown,
”
”
Laura Ingalls Wilder (By the Shores of Silver Lake (Little House, #5))
“
Richard Thaler tells of a discussion about decision making he had with the top managers of the 25 divisions of a large company. He asked them to consider a risky option in which, with equal probabilities, they could lose a large amount of the capital they controlled or earn double that amount. None of the executives was willing to take such a dangerous gamble. Thaler then turned to the CEO of the company, who was also present, and asked for his opinion. Without hesitation, the CEO answered, “I would like all of them to accept their risks.” In the context of that conversation, it was natural for the CEO to adopt a broad frame that encompassed all 25 bets. Like Sam facing 100 coin tosses, he could count on statistical aggregation to mitigate the overall risk.
”
”
Daniel Kahneman (Thinking, Fast and Slow)
“
Well, I'd like to know how it's possible to make your living gambling, because at the table, the odds are .493."
"You're right," he said, "and I'll explain to you. I don't bet on the table, or things like that. I only bet when the odds are in my favor."
"Huh? When are the odds ever in your favor?" I asked incredulously.
"It's really quite easy," he said. "I'm standing around a table, when some guy says, 'It's comin' out nine! It's gotta be a nine!' The guy's excited; he things it's going to be a nine, and he wants to bet. Now I know the odds for all the numbers inside out, so I say to him, 'I'll bet you four to three it's not a nine', and I win in the long run. I don't bet on the table; instead, I bet with people around the table who have prejudices--superstitious ideas about lucky numbers.
”
”
Richard P. Feynman
“
I’m also frequently asked if I’ve used my abilities for gambling or the lottery. Get your minds out of the gutter. What I do is for the highest good of all concerned, so I’d never do that intentionally! And let’s face it, even if I did try, I’m way too scattered to recognize what I’m being told. My aunt and I went to Belmont Park Race Track for her birthday one year, and I remember hearing “six ten” when I walked in--which is my birthday, June 10. How nice, I thought. Spirit’s acknowledging my birthday too. My uncle asked me what colors I liked best so he could bet on a horse wearing that color, and all the colors I said were losing. It wasn’t until after we left that I realized all the horses that won were a combination of the numbers six and ten! And then there was the time I went to a spa with my sister-in-law Corrinda. We went to Mohegan Sun one night, which was the first time I’d ever been to a casino, and decided to play roulette. Wouldn’t you know, every number we played on the wheel was a loser?
”
”
Theresa Caputo (There's More to Life Than This)
“
When I was a babe I fell down in the holler. When I was a girl I fell into your arms. We fell on hard times and we lost our bright color. You went to the dogs and I lived by my charms. I danced for my dinner, spread kisses like honey. You stole and you gambled and I said you should. We sang for our suppers, we drank up our money. Then one day you left, saying I was no good. Well, all right, I’m bad, but then, you’re no prize either. All right, I’m bad, but then, that’s nothing new. You say you won’t love me, I won’t love you neither. Just let me remind you who I am to you. ’Cause I am the one who looks out when you’re leaping. I am the one who knows how you were brave. And I am the one who heard what you said sleeping. I’ll take that and more when I go to my grave. It’s sooner than later that I’m six feet under. It’s sooner than later that you’ll be alone. So who will you turn to tomorrow, I wonder? For when the bell rings, lover, you’re on your own. And I am the one who you let see you weeping. I know the soul that you struggle to save. Too bad I’m the bet that you lost in the reaping. Now what will you do when I go to my grave?
”
”
Suzanne Collins (The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (The Hunger Games, #0))
“
The public offering occurred exactly one week after Toy Story’s opening. Jobs had gambled that the movie would be successful, and the risky bet paid off, big-time. As with the Apple IPO, a celebration was planned at the San Francisco office of the lead underwriter at 7 a.m., when the shares were to go on sale. The plan had originally been for the first shares to be offered at about $14, to be sure they would sell. Jobs insisted on pricing them at $22, which would give the company more money if the offering was a success. It was, beyond even his wildest hopes. It exceeded Netscape as the biggest IPO of the year. In the first half hour, the stock shot up to $45, and trading had to be delayed because there were too many buy orders. It then went up even further, to $49, before settling back to close the day at $39. Earlier that year Jobs had been hoping to find a buyer for Pixar that would let him merely recoup the $50 million he had put in. By the end of the day the shares he had retained—80% of the company—were worth more than twenty times that, an astonishing $1.2 billion. That was about five times what he’d made when Apple went public in 1980.
”
”
Walter Isaacson (Steve Jobs)
“
TRUMP EVENTUALLY REALIZED THAT he needed executives with a strong background in running casinos. He scouted the competition and picked Stephen Hyde, a devout Mormon with a large family. The Church of Latter-day Saints opposed gambling, but the casino industry employed many Mormons in key positions, in part because executives believed the faithful wouldn’t be tempted to bet. Hyde was soft-spoken, unflappable, and widely considered one of the nation’s savviest gaming executives, having most recently worked for Trump’s competitor Steve Wynn. Trump, who once wrote, “I can be a screamer,” would occasionally humiliate Hyde by cursing him out in front of other executives. Yet Trump recognized Hyde’s capabilities and entrusted him with a business potentially worth billions of dollars. Hyde was, Trump wrote, “a very sharp guy and highly competitive, but most of all, he had a sense of how to manage to the bottom line.” Trump throughout his career would rely on small circles of advisers, and Hyde became one of Trump’s most trusted associates at the time. That meant some other senior executives felt shut out, unable to convey their concerns to Trump without going through the tight inner circle. Hyde was at the top of that chain of command. Hyde
”
”
Michael Kranish (Trump Revealed: The Definitive Biography of the 45th President)
“
* When the coughing stopped, there was nothing but the nothingness of life moving on with a shuffle, or a near-silent twitch.
* Mistakes, mistakes, it’s all I seem capable of at times
*No matter how many times she was told that she was loved, there was no recognition that the proof was in the abandonment.
*It’s much easier, she realized, to be on the verge of something than to actually be it
*When death captures me,” the boy vowed, “he will feel my fist on his face.”.
*he’d turned for one last look at his family as he left the apartment. Perhaps then the guilt would not have been so heavy. No final goodbye.
No final grip of the eyes.
Nothing but goneness.
*Wrecked, but somehow not torn into pieces.
*Life had altered in the wildest possible way, but it was imperative that they act as if nothing at all had happened.
*“If we gamble on a Jew,” said Papa soon after, “I would prefer to gamble on a live one,” and from that moment, a new routine was born.
*you should know it yourself—a young man is still a boy, and a boy sometimes has the right to be stubborn.”
*The fire was nothing now but a funeral of smoke, dead and dying, simultaneously.
*Even death has a heart..
* In truth, I think he was afraid. Rudy Steiner was scared of the book thief’s kiss. He must have longed for it so much. He must have loved her so incredibly hard. So hard that he would never ask for her lips again and would go to his grave without them.
*There is death.
Making his way through all of it.
On the surface: unflappable, unwavering.
Below: unnerved, untied, and undone.
*That damn snowman,” she whispered. “I bet it started with the snowman—fooling around with ice and snow in the cold down there.”
Papa was more philosophical. “Rosa, it started with Adolf.”
*There were broken bodies and dead, sweet hearts. Still, it was better than the gas
*They were French, they were Jews, and they were you.
*Sometimes she sat against the wall, longing for the warm finger of paint to wander just once more down the side of her nose, or to watch the sandpaper texture of her papa’s hands. If only she could be so oblivious again, to feel such love without knowing it, mistaking it for laughter and bread with only the scent of jam spread out on top of it.
*Himmel Street was a trail of people, and again, Papa left his accordion. Rosa reminded him to take it, but he refused. “I didn’t take it last time,” he explained, “and we lived.” War clearly blurred the distinction between logic and superstition.
*Silence was not quiet or calm, and it was not peace.
*“I should have known not to give the man some bread. I just didn’t think.”
“Papa, you did nothing wrong.”
“I don’t believe you.
* I’m an idiot.”
No, Papa.
You’re just a man..
*What someone says and what happened are usually two different things
* despised by his homeland, even though he was born in it
*“Of course I told him about you,” Liesel said.
She was saying goodbye and she didn’t even know it.
*Say something enough times and you never forget it
*robbery of his life?
*Those kinds of souls always do—the best ones. The ones who rise up and say, “I know who you are and I am ready. Not that I want to go, of course, but I will come.” Those souls are always light because more of them have been put out. More of them have already found their way to other places
*One could not exist without the other, because for Liesel, both were home. Yes, that’s what Hans Hubermann was for Liesel Meminger
*DEATH AND LIESEL
It has been many years since all of that, but there is still plenty of work to do. I can promise you that the world is a factory. The sun stirs it, the humans rule it. And I remain. I carry them away.
”
”
Markus Zusak (THE BOOK THIEF)
“
WHY DIVERSIFY? During the bull market of the 1990s, one of the most common criticisms of diversification was that it lowers your potential for high returns. After all, if you could identify the next Microsoft, wouldn’t it make sense for you to put all your eggs into that one basket? Well, sure. As the humorist Will Rogers once said, “Don’t gamble. Take all your savings and buy some good stock and hold it till it goes up, then sell it. If it don’t go up, don’t buy it.” However, as Rogers knew, 20/20 foresight is not a gift granted to most investors. No matter how confident we feel, there’s no way to find out whether a stock will go up until after we buy it. Therefore, the stock you think is “the next Microsoft” may well turn out to be the next MicroStrategy instead. (That former market star went from $3,130 per share in March 2000 to $15.10 at year-end 2002, an apocalyptic loss of 99.5%).1 Keeping your money spread across many stocks and industries is the only reliable insurance against the risk of being wrong. But diversification doesn’t just minimize your odds of being wrong. It also maximizes your chances of being right. Over long periods of time, a handful of stocks turn into “superstocks” that go up 10,000% or more. Money Magazine identified the 30 best-performing stocks over the 30 years ending in 2002—and, even with 20/20 hindsight, the list is startlingly unpredictable. Rather than lots of technology or health-care stocks, it includes Southwest Airlines, Worthington Steel, Dollar General discount stores, and snuff-tobacco maker UST Inc.2 If you think you would have been willing to bet big on any of those stocks back in 1972, you are kidding yourself. Think of it this way: In the huge market haystack, only a few needles ever go on to generate truly gigantic gains. The more of the haystack you own, the higher the odds go that you will end up finding at least one of those needles. By owning the entire haystack (ideally through an index fund that tracks the total U.S. stock market) you can be sure to find every needle, thus capturing the returns of all the superstocks. Especially if you are a defensive investor, why look for the needles when you can own the whole haystack?
”
”
Benjamin Graham (The Intelligent Investor)
“
Prohibition had led to a massive increase in organized crime, violence, and police corruption but had little effect on the availability of alcohol; ending it reduced crime, enhanced police professionalism, and incarcerated fewer people. Similarly, fruitless attempts to stamp out underground lotteries, sports betting, and gambling proved totally counterproductive, empowering organized crime and driving police corruption. Government control and regulation of gambling has raised revenue and undermined the power of organized crime. By creating state lotteries, regulating casinos, and only minimally enforcing sports betting, the state has limited police power without sacrificing public safety. There is no reason the same couldn’t be done for sex work and drugs today. The billions saved in policing and prisons could be much better used putting people to work and improving public health.
”
”
Alex S. Vitale (The End of Policing)
“
Requiring proof is an enemy of progress. This is why companies like Amazon use a principle of disagree and commit. As Jeff Bezos explained it in an annual shareholder letter, instead of demanding convincing results, experiments start with asking people to make bets. “Look, I know we disagree on this but will you gamble with me on it?” The goal in a learning culture is to welcome these kinds of experiments, to make rethinking so familiar that it becomes routine.
”
”
Adam M. Grant (Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know)
“
Nanny Piggins was very prudish about gambling because the Ringmaster had once bet that if he tampered with the trajectory of her cannon, he could blast her over the top of the Eiffel Tower. Of course Nanny Piggins had triumphantly sailed over the famous French landmark, but she was very cross to pass the Jules Verne restaurant at the top and not be able to stop for a slice of cake. She had been against gambling ever since.
”
”
R.A. Spratt (Nanny Piggins and the Race to Power 8)
“
decline, downsizing, near death, desperation, bet the company, and revival that characterizes so many corporate histories (such as Nokia, IBM, Procter & Gamble, and many others).
”
”
Rita Gunther McGrath (The End of Competitive Advantage: How to Keep Your Strategy Moving as Fast as Your Business)
“
over the past five years have led me to conclude that three factors are central to building a truly great company. Firstly, the management team has to have an obsessive focus on the core franchise instead of being distracted by short-term gambles outside the core segment. Secondly, the company has to relentlessly deepen its competitive moats over the course of time (I’m talking about decades here). And thirdly, the people calling the shots at the company have to be sensible about capital allocation, i.e. refrain from large bets (especially those outside core franchise) and return excess cash to shareholders if the cash cannot be deployed to good effect by the company.
”
”
Saurabh Mukherjea (The Unusual Billionaires)
“
Tolerance is a key feature of addiction, but can occur without developing all the brain changes seen in full-blown addiction. Substance addicts attempt to overcome CREB’s effects by taking larger doses. Gambling addicts might place larger bets. Today’s internet porn users may find they need more videos, or VR porn, or cam-2-cam, or perhaps acting out a fetish to get the buzz their brain is desperately seeking. More often than not they try to overcome tolerance with new genres, usually more extreme, or even disturbing.
”
”
Gary Wilson (Your Brain On Porn: Internet Pornography and the Emerging Science of Addiction)
“
Beginner’s luck—it never happened again. I’ve lost it all since then, so I’ll stop while I still break even. No more gambling for me.” “Is that a bet? Would you put five bucks on it?” “Sure.” “Then pay over—you’ve already lost by accepting.
”
”
Arthur C. Clarke (The Deep Range (Arthur C. Clarke Collection))
“
Based upon my detailed betting records and additional records provided by the sources, here is a snapshot of Phil’s gambling habit between 2010 and 2014: He bet $110,000 to win $100,000 a total of 1,115 times. On 858 occasions, he bet $220,000 to win $200,000. (The sum of those 1,973 gross wagers came to more than $311 million.) In 2011 alone, he made 3,154 bets—an average of nearly nine per day. On one day in 2011 (June 22), he made forty-three bets on major-league baseball games, resulting in $143,500 in losses. He made a staggering 7,065 wagers on football, basketball, and baseball. Phil didn’t let his playing in PGA tournaments get in the way of betting. Indeed, according to the 2010–2014 betting records, he made 1,734 wagers on games during twenty-nine events. This included seventy separate bets on baseball and preseason pro football during The Barclays tournament in August 2011 where he shot 8-under and tied for 43rd (he won $415,000 in bets that weekend).
”
”
Billy Walters (Gambler: Secrets from a Life at Risk)
“
Based upon my detailed betting records and additional records provided by the sources, here is a snapshot of Phil’s gambling habit between 2010 and 2014: He bet $110,000 to win $100,000 a total of 1,115 times. On 858 occasions, he bet $220,000 to win $200,000. (The sum of those 1,973 gross wagers came to more than $311 million.) In 2011 alone, he made 3,154 bets—an average of nearly nine per day. On one day in 2011 (June 22), he made forty-three bets on major-league baseball games, resulting in $143,500 in losses. He made a staggering 7,065 wagers on football, basketball, and baseball. Phil didn’t let his playing in PGA tournaments get in the way of betting. Indeed, according to the 2010–2014 betting records, he made 1,734 wagers on games during twenty-nine events. This included seventy separate bets on baseball and preseason pro football during The Barclays tournament in August 2011 where he shot 8-under and tied for 43rd (he won $415,000 in bets that weekend). On February 11, 2012, a busy college basketball Saturday, Phil blew himself up by running his betting losses to nearly $4 million, according to the gambling sources familiar with Phil’s other bets. Even so, he displayed an incredible ability to compartmentalize. He shot 64 the following day to win the AT&T Pro-Am at Pebble Beach while playing with, and demolishing, Tiger Woods, by eleven strokes.
”
”
Billy Walters (Gambler: Secrets from a Life at Risk)
“
Many people are so miserable that they do not want to enter the future at all. Their whole future projected life is worthless to them. In technical terms, their utility over all future time intervals, appropriately discounted, is less than zero. Also, their current utility (present circumstance) is zero or negative (otherwise they'd stick around a bit longer to pick up extra utility).
• Suicide is one option for such people. But there are two other options, according to Becker & Posner (terminology is mine):
• Take what you have and "bet" it on a chance at something that would make life worth living. If it fails, you can always kill yourself. (Gamble)
• Since there is an element of uncertainty to the future, take what you have and use it to make the present livable so you can postpone suicide. Something to make life worth living might be just around the corner. If not, you can always kill yourself. (Palliate & Wait)
”
”
Sarah Perry (Every Cradle is a Grave: Rethinking the Ethics of Birth and Suicide)
“
As Jeff Bezos explained it in an annual shareholder letter, instead of demanding convincing results, experiments start with asking people to make bets. “Look, I know we disagree on this but will you gamble with me on it?” The goal in a learning culture is to welcome these kinds of experiments, to make rethinking so familiar that it becomes routine.
”
”
Adam M. Grant (Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know)
“
In betting and gambling games if you stop acting and do nothing, the losses will stop. But when investing, trading, or speculating, if you’re losing and stop acting, the losses don’t stop; they can continue to grow almost indefinitely.
”
”
Jim Paul (What I Learned Losing A Million Dollars)
“
For the second time, the Ten-Count System had shown moderately heavy losses mixed with “lucky” streaks of the most dazzling brilliance. I learned later that this was a characteristic of a random series of favorable bets. And I would see it again and again in real life in both the gambling and the investment worlds.
”
”
Edward O. Thorp (A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market)
“
Saying I love you is such a gamble that most people take risks and bet their lives.
”
”
Ehsan Sehgal
“
The best on horses you think will lose are a valuable "insurance policy." When rare disaster strikes, you'll be glad you had the insurance. 71
The exponential growth of wealth in the Kelly system is also a consequence of proportional betting. As the bankroll grows, make larger bets. 98
[2 questions are central to John Kelly's analysis] What level of risk will lead to the highest long-run return? What is the chance of losing everything? 286
As Fred Schwed, Jr. author of Where are the Customer's Yatchs? put it back in 1940, "Like all of life's rich emotional experiences, the full flavor of losing important money cannot be conveyed in literature." 304
Claude Shannon: A smart investor should understand where he has an edge and invest only in those opportunities. 308
The longer you hold a stock, the harder it is to beat the market by much. 316
”
”
William Poundstone (Fortune's Formula: The Untold Story of the Scientific Betting System That Beat the Casinos and Wall Street)
“
Sports wagering is now legal in almost every state. In some cities, baseball fans can place bets on the game at kiosks at the stadium. In most states, people can wager with the flick of their fingers on their phones while they cheer from the cheap seats or from just behind the dugout, and baseball, once opposed to gambling in all its formats,
”
”
Keith O'Brien (Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball)
“
isn’t frowning on the new craze. It’s actively promoting sports gambling with corporate partnerships and in-game graphics broadcast on national television, giving viewers live betting odds of the current batter’s chances of hitting a home run in that very moment. There’s simply too much money in play not to be involved. In 2023, fans in America wagered more than one hundred billion dollars on sports, enough money that they could have pooled their cash to buy the Cincinnati Reds a hundred times over or purchase every single Major League Baseball team—and still have billions of dollars left in their pockets.
”
”
Keith O'Brien (Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball)
“
Giamatti held court in New York, comfortable and relaxed on the stage at the Hilton, a professor again, teaching. He opined about the dangers of gambling and sports. He said that a competitor placing bets
”
”
Keith O'Brien (Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball)
“
this new landscape, players still can’t bet on the game—Rule 21(d) remains in effect—and league officials argue that they have more protection against wrongdoing, not less. Legalized gambling platforms can track down to the minute what’s being wagered, where, and on whom.
”
”
Keith O'Brien (Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball)
“
Amarillo Slim, a gambling legend and 1972 World Series of Poker champion, said, “You can shear a sheep a hundred times, but you can skin it only once.
”
”
Patrick Bet-David (Your Next Five Moves: Master the Art of Business Strategy)
“
Poker players explained to me that there’s a particular moment at which players are extremely vulnerable to an emotional surge. It’s not when they’ve won a huge pot or when they’ve drawn a fantastic hand. It’s when they’ve just lost a lot of money through bad luck (a ‘bad beat’) or bad strategy. The loss can nudge a player into going ‘on tilt’ – making overly aggressive bets in an effort to win back what he wrongly feels is still his money. The brain refuses to register that the money has gone. Acknowledging the loss and recalculating one’s strategy would be the right thing to do, but that is too painful. Instead, the player makes crazy bets to rectify what he unconsciously believes is a temporary situation. It isn’t the initial loss that does for him, but the stupid plays he makes in an effort to deny that the loss has happened. The eat economic psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky summarised the behaviour in their classic analysis of the psychology of risk: ‘a person who has not made peace with his losses is likely to accept gambles that would be unacceptable to him otherwise’.
Even those of us who aren’t professional poker players know how it feels to chase a loss.
”
”
Tim Harford (Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure)
“
Aristotle only noted that "I see" actually means "I have seen." Modern neuroscience reveals that "I see" (or "I perceive") actually means "I have made a bet." In the time between the arrival of signals at our eye or other receptor organ and the emergence of an image or idea in our brains, we have done a great deal of creative "artistic" work. We generally do that work so fast that we do not notice ourselves doing it. Thus, we forget the gamble in every perception and feel startled (or even annoyed) whenever we come up against evidence that others do not "see" what we "see.
”
”
Robert Anton Wilson (Quantum Psychology: How Brain Software Programs You and Your World)
“
Finalank
Finalank holds immense significance in the world of Satta Matka gambling, serving as the final digit that determines the outcome of games and bets.
”
”
Finalank