Paul Graham：Black Swan Farming, Excerpt 3

The probability that any group will succeed really big is microscopically small, but the probability that those 19 year olds will might be higher than that of the other, safer group. The probability that a startup will make it big is not simply a constant fraction of the probability that they will succeed at all. If it were, you could fund everyone who seemed likely to succeed at all, and you'd get that fraction of big hits. Unfortunately picking winners is harder than that. You have to ignore the elephant in front of you, the likelihood they'll succeed, and focus instead on the separate and almost invisibly intangible question of whether they'll succeed really big. Harder That's made harder by the fact that the best startup ideas seem at first like bad ideas.

Source： https://paulgraham.com/swan.html
Locator：Essay, additional excerpt 3 · Verified：2026-10-19 · Verification：Short excerpt

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