“. . . untidy-deskers of the world may take heart. It’s we who have mathematical validation. Forget what you may have thought about the swept and tidy world of numbers. Concentrate on the fine randomness of Einstein’s hair. We connoisseurs of scrutable chaos have been guided all along by an inscrutable proposition called the 80-20 rule: a special case of Zipf’s Law (of whom, and which, more later).”
I can’t begin to tell you how vindicated I feel for having a messy desk! What a wonderful article … and all those bookshelves.
Hugh Kenner, in his “Neatness doesn’t count after all – tidy vs. untidy desks,” explains that:
“. . . untidy-deskers of the world may take heart. It’s we who have mathematical validation. Forget what you may have thought about the swept and tidy world of numbers. Concentrate on the fine randomness of Einstein’s hair. We connoisseurs of scrutable chaos have been guided all along by an inscrutable proposition called the 80-20 rule: a special case of Zipf’s Law (of whom, and which, more later).”