All models are wrong, but some are useful

--- George Box, Robustness in the Strategy of Scientific Model Building, Technical Summary Report #1954, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Mathematics Research Center, May 1979 (h/t David Weinberger for the reference)

Some more great passages by Box, also via Weinberger, from George E. P. Box, Science and Statistics, Journal of the American Statistical Association, Vol. 71, No. 356 (Dec., 1976), pp. 791-799, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2286841

...he must not be like Pygmalion and fall in love with his model.

2.3 Parsimony

Since all models are wrong the scientist cannot obtain a "correct" one by excessive elaboration. On the contrary following William of Occam he should seek an economical description of natural phenomena. Just as the ability to devise simple but evocative models is the signature of the great scientist so overelaboration and overparameterization is often the mark of mediocrity.

2.4 Worrying Selectively

Since all models are wrong the scientist must be alert to what is importantly wrong. It is inappropriate to be concerned about mice when there are tigers abroad.

2.5 Role of Mathematics in Science

Pure mathematics is concerned with propositions like "given that A is true, does B necessarily follow?" Since the statement is a conditional one, it has nothing whatsoever to do with the truth of A nor of the consequences B in relation to real life. The pure mathematician, acting in that capacity, need not, and perhaps should not, have any contact with practical matters at all.

In applying mathematics to subjects such as physics or statistics we make tentative assumptions about the real world which we know are false but which we believe may be useful nonetheless. The physicist knows that particles have mass and yet certain results, approximating what really happens, may be derived from the assumption that they do not. Equally, the statistician knows, for example, that in nature there never was a normal distribution, there never was a straight line, yet with normal and linear assumptions, known to be false, he can often derive results which match, to a useful approximation, those found in the real world.

It follows that, although rigorous derivation of logical consequences is of great importance to statistics, such derivations are necessarily encapsulated in the knowledge that premise, and hence consequence, do not describe natural truth. It follows that we cannot know that any statistical technique we develop is useful unless we use it. Major advances in science and in the science of statistics in particular, usually occur, therefore, as the result of the theory-practice iteration...

All photographs are accurate. None of them is the truth.

--- Richard Avedon (attributed passim, couldn't confirm source), via Gagosian on Instagram

The more I think about it, the more fatuous (or do I mean specious?) this quote seems. 

No photograph is "the truth," but then, nothing is (to a modern, or certainly a postmodernist).

So what if he'd said, "All photographs are accurate. None of them is true"? That seems a bit more accurate to me. But then consider the first part: "All photographs are accurate." 

If accurate means correct in all details (cf. Lexico), then this is false since many photos - especially in fashion magazines! - are doctored in some way, from soft focus to color correction to airbrushing Trotsky out of a the photo of Lenin's speech in Sverdlov Square.

Now, to the extent that Trotsky was no longer an important figure in Soviet history after the rise of Stalin, editing him out of the photo was true in its context. Which takes us around 180 degrees to, "No photographs are accurate. All of  them are the truth."

A language is a dialect with an army and navy

--- popularized by Max Weinreich (see Wikipedia discussion), via Rita Tan

Weinreich's story about it, per Wikipedia

A teacher at a Bronx high school once appeared among the auditors. He had come to America as a child and the entire time had never heard that Yiddish had a history and could also serve for higher matters.... Once after a lecture he approached me and asked, 'What is the difference between a dialect and language?' I thought that the maskilic contempt had affected him, and tried to lead him to the right path, but he interrupted me: 'I know that, but I will give you a better definition. A language is a dialect with an army and navy.' From that very time I made sure to remember that I must convey this wonderful formulation of the social plight of Yiddish to a large audience.

The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne

--- Geoffrey Chaucer, "The life so short, the craft so long to learn", the first line of the Parlement of Foules (Wikipedia), quoted by Hilary Mantel in The Mirror & the Light, according to Helen Thomas in the Talking Politics podcast "In Praise of Hilary Mantel" (at 38:53)

I feel as if I've at last tracked down the origin of my favorite saying by my father, "Too soon old, too late smart."

From Mantel, p. 321

Sometimes Henry says to him, ‘Still at the antique letters, Lord Cromwell? What did you learn today?’ 

He says, ‘I learned that ars longa, vita brevis: I learned how to say it in Greek.’ 

‘That is Hippocrates,’ Henry says. ‘He tells us, life is short and our task so great that we will die before we can . . .’

The king breaks off. It is an offence for his subjects to speculate about his death or predict it, but it is not an offence for him to speak of it himself; yet he looks chary, as if he thinks it should be. ' "Life is short and art is long, the opportunity sudden and fleeting: experiment dangerous, judgement difficult." I think I have the sense of it.’ 

He bows. ‘I am the better instructed, sir.’ 

Daily, daily, one must practise the courtier’s art, and nightly, the art of governance: and never get it right. Chaucer says it in our own English tongue. ‘The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.’

I was embarrassed that I hadn't realized that it all goes back to "ars longa, vita brevis." Hippocrates's original is wonderful.