"don't think zebras"

[Jonathan Lighter]

I first heard my dentist say this, maybe ten years ago. I immediately asked
him about it and he said he'd learned it in dental school (ca1980), in
reference to preferring the simplest diagnosis first.

JL

On Thu, Feb 18, 2010 at 7:01 PM, Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com>wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "don't think zebras"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> There are some fun ones. Google autocomplete the quote once you type
> "think hor". The earliest two hits seem to be 1995, attributing to
> "Doctors at the Himalayan Rescue Association" and 1994, "The phrase
> "Think horses, not zebras" will sound familiar to just about any
> American-trained physician or clinical psychologist, and perhaps to
> those who've studied those fields in other countries as well".
>
> I did not complete the review (scanned about 120 out of 200+), nor did I
> try any variations. The former seems implausible, the latter--apocryphal.
>
>     VS-)
>
> On 2/18/2010 6:06 PM, Joel S. Berson wrote:
> > Not in the Yale Book of Quotations nor a couple of recent Oxford
> > books of quotations.
> >
> > "When you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras."
> >
> > Attributed in the NYT by Michiko Kakutani (Books of the Times, Feb.
> > 16, 2010) to "the character Gil Grissom in 'CSI: Crime Scene
> > Investigation'", and characterized by her as succinctly put by him.
> >
> > This must go back earlier. I've heard it attributed to real doctors
> > but I don't know how long ago.
> >
> > What say the industrious CSInvestigators?
> >
> > Joel
> >
> >
>
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"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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