# Quote — John Allen Paulos, Innumeracy

> Too often, this concern for the big picture is simply obscurantist and is put forward by people who prefer vagueness and mystery to (partial) answers. Vagueness is at times necessary and mystery is never in short supply, but I don’t think they’re anything to worship. Genuine science and mathematical precision are more intriguing than are the “facts” published in supermarket tabloids or a romantic innumeracy which fosters credulity, stunts skepticism, and dulls one to real imponderables.

- Author: [John Allen Paulos](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-allen-paulos.md)
- Book: [Innumeracy](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-allen-paulos/innumeracy.md)
- Page: 126
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Allen_Paulos#Innumeracy:_Mathematical_Illiteracy_and_its_Consequences_(1988)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-allen-paulos/innumeracy/too-often-this

## More from this book

> There’s always enough random success to justify almost anything to someone who wants to believe.

p. 44 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-allen-paulos/innumeracy/theres-always-enough.md)

> The moral, again, is that some unlikely event is likely to occur, whereas it’s much less likely that a particular one will...The paradoxical conclusion is that it would be very unlikely for unlikely events not to occur. If you don’t specify a predicted event precisely, there are an indeterminate number of ways for an event of that general kind to take place.

p. 37 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-allen-paulos/innumeracy/the-moral-again.md)

> Correlation and causation are two quite different words, and the innumerate are more prone to mistake them than most.

p. 159 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-allen-paulos/innumeracy/correlation-and-causation.md)