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While the individual man is an insoluble puzzle, in the aggregate he becomes a mathematical certainty. You can, for example, never foretell what any one man will be up to, but you can say with precision what an average number will be up to. Individuals vary, but percentages remain constant. So says the statistician.

Arthur Conan Doyle

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Arthur Conan Doyle
Age: 71 †
Born: 1859
Born: May 22
Died: 1930
Died: July 7
Crime Writer
Essayist
Novelist
Physician
Physician Writer
Playwright
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Writer
Edinburgh
Scotland
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle
Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle
Sir A. Conan Doyle
Arthur Conan
Sir Doyle
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Individual
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Percentages
Never
Average
Precision
Men
Constant
Vary
Number
Puzzles
Foretell
Becomes
Statistics
Insoluble
Example
Mathematical
Statistician
Numbers
Certainty
Aggregate
Says
Individuals
Puzzle

More quotes by Arthur Conan Doyle

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Anything is better than stagnation.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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I have mastered the principles of several religions. They have all shocked me by the violence which I should have to do to my reason to accept the dogmas of any one of them.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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It is all in the way of professional experience.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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Of all ruins, that of a noble mind is the most deplorable.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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There's a light in a woman's eyes that speaks louder than words.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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The emotional qualities are antagonistic to clear reasoning.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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The chief proof of man's real greatness lies in his perception of his own smallness.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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The most winning woman I ever knew was hanged for poisoning three little children for their insurance-money, and the most repellent man of my acquaintance is a philanthropist who has spent nearly a quarter of a million upon the London poor.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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He is not a bad fellow, though an absolute imbecile in his profession. He has one positive virtue. He is as brave as a bulldog and as tenacious as a lobster if he gets his claws upon anyone.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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I love and am loved by a better man than he.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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The less experienced a doctor is, the higher are his notions of professional dignity . . .
Arthur Conan Doyle
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Let us hear the suspicions. I will look after the proofs.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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Was it hardness, was it selfishness, that she should ask me to risk my life for her own glorification? Such thoughts may come to middle age but never to ardent three-and-twenty in the fever of his first love.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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My mind rebels at stagnation, give me problems, give me work!
Arthur Conan Doyle
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The Press, Watson, is a most valuable institution, if you only know how to use it.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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It is stupidity rather than courage to refuse to recognize danger when it is close upon you.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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A fine horse or a beautiful woman, I cannot look at them unmoved, even now when seventy winters have chilled my blood.
Arthur Conan Doyle
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Only that I insist upon your dining with us. It will be ready in half an hour. I have oysters and a brace of grouse, with something a little choice in white wines. Watson, you have never yet recognized my merits as a housekeeper. ~ Sherlock Holmes
Arthur Conan Doyle
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The goose we retained until this morning, when there were signs that, in spite of the slight frost, it would be well that it should be eaten without delay. Its finder has carried it off therefore to fulfil the ultimate destiny of a goose.
Arthur Conan Doyle