Absolutely nothing Quote by Edgar Fiedler
“When you know absolutely nothing about the topic, make your forecast by asking a carefully selected probability sample of 300 others who don't know the answer either.”
About This Quote
Source Article: Forecasting with the Crowd, Journal of Decision Science, 1998
When lacking knowledge, use a random sample of uninformed peers to estimate outcomes, leveraging collective ignorance.
In simple terms: Ask many uninformed people for a guess.
Key Takeaway
Use crowd sampling when expertise is absent.
Themes
decision making
uncertainty
crowd wisdom
Mood
analytical
skeptical
Type
methodological
practical
When to use this quote
- risk assessment
- project planning
- market research
- policy analysis
Key Concepts
probability sampling
collective intelligence
Questions to Reflect On
- How reliable is a random uninformed sample?
- What safeguards improve its accuracy?
A Different Perspective
Sample may be biased or unrepresentative.
![“By profession a biologist, [Thomas Henry Huxley] covered in fact the whole field of the exact sciences, and then bulged through its four fences. Absolutely nothing was uninteresting to him. His curiosity ranged from music to theology and from philosophy to history. He didn't simply know something…” quote by H. L. Mencken](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/f46/h-l-mencken-245_absolutely-nothing_by-profession-a-biologist-thomas-henry-h_5368.jpg)
