Wisdom in fragments

Until now, we had an insolvency problem – but we didn't have a liquidity problem that could trigger that insolvency because interest rates were so low. Now they're rising, and the mother of all debt crises is going to occur.

Economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis.

The high debt ratios also masked the zombie households, zombie corporates, zombie businesses, zombie banks, zombie shadow banks, zombie governments and zombie countries. They never went bankrupt.

Economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis.

We are facing the mother of all debt crises. When you look at the data on private and public debt, the debt to GDP ratio was near 200% of global GDP in 1999, today it's more like 350% and rising. In advanced economies, it's over 420% and in China, 330% and rising.

Economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis.

I don't think it was inevitable until the point where the tanks started rolling-in. It was unstoppable at that point… But 20 years ago, would we have realised this was going to happen? My sense would be absolutely not.

Russia often seemed simply to assume that you get what you want if you're bigger, and more powerful. Russia always seemed to me to have a problem accepting that you have to listen to the voice of smaller countries.

I was working in Russia from 1998-2002... You also had this extraordinary episode where Putin is on record being asked a question, 'President Putin, do you think Russia could ever join NATO?' to which he replied, 'Why not?!' – what he actually said was 'why not…' provided that Russia could be a fully-fledged partner in NATO.

I've sat in front of the chief ideologue in the Moscow Kremlin, and I remember him saying to us in so many words, that 'you cannot govern Russia unless you have a one-party state: Our job in the Kremlin here and now, is not to recreate the communist party, but it's to recreate the one party which will be the natural choice'.

When people talk about getting there… there's no there to get to. The problem is the eternal search for there. There is no there, you are searching for something that doesn't exist.

World's Most Cited Executive Coach & Leadership Development Expert

Only one second in time you can find peace – now. There's only one second you can be happy – now. There's only one place you can find peace and happiness. Where you are. This is it, it's not out there somewhere, it's in you.

World's Most Cited Executive Coach & Leadership Development Expert

You should never place your value as a human being on results. You don't control the results of the game – people get lucky or go bankrupt. Also, what happens when you achieve your result? What long-term satisfaction does that bring you?

World's Most Cited Executive Coach & Leadership Development Expert

One of the greatest myths in the lives of the people I coach is, 'I will be happy when…' as if there is some place to go to. There's only one book that ends with the phrase happily ever after, that's a fairy-tale.

World's Most Cited Executive Coach & Leadership Development Expert

We do have quite a bit of agency over our lives, and to the degree that we can plot our own course and choose our lives as opposed to being subject to environmental factors, that means we're leading the lives we want rather than the lives we have-to live.

World's Most Cited Executive Coach & Leadership Development Expert

There is a rationality to believing in conspiracy theories that purport to identify somebody acting in secret to harm or gain an advantage that's illegal or immoral, over somebody else without their knowledge or consent.

Founder of The Skeptics Society & Science Communicator

Our brains are not so well equipped, we just tend to assume patterns that look connected are causally connected. So a conspiracy theory is just another causal theory – why did these things happen?

Founder of The Skeptics Society & Science Communicator

Enough conspiracy theories are true, it pays to believe more of them are true than actually are, make a type 1 error, false positive, you thought something was real when it wasn't, as opposed to a type 2 error where you failed to recognise a real conspiracy which could be costly.

Founder of The Skeptics Society & Science Communicator

It is very common in politics that each party assume the other party cheated in every election if they lose. It's not that republicans are more suspicious than democrats or vice versa, but their constructive paranoia leads them to believe that the other party is doing something sinister.

Founder of The Skeptics Society & Science Communicator