"Preface

Chance plays a huge part in your life, whether you know it or not. our particular genetic makeup mutated slightly when you were created, and it did so based on specific laws of probability. Performance in school involves human errors, yours and others', which tends to keep your actual ability level from being reflected precisely in your report card or on those high-stakes tests. Research on careers even suggests that what you do for a living was probably not a result of careful planning and preparation, but more likely due to happenstance. And, of course, chance determines your fate in games of chance and plays a large role in the outcome of sporting events."



"If I come home from school and tell my mom that I got a 16 on the big exam in school today, she'll probably say a few things, including "Why are you still living at home at age 42?" and "That's nice, dear. Is 16 good?""

"According to the Wikipedia, O'Reilly started in 1978 as a consulting firm doing technical writing. It's July 2005 as I write this, so O'Reilly has existed as a company for approximately 27 years. How long can we expect O'Reilly to continue to exist? 

here's our prediction with 95 percent confidence:


Minimum

27/39 = 0.69 years = about 8 months and 1 week (until mid-March 2006)


Maximum

27x39 = 1,053 years (until July 3058)"

"The fickle finger of fate pops randomly from possible outcome to possible outcome, and the probability of it appearing at any outcome is the probability associated with each outcome. There is no momentum."