A related point from geometry is that high-dimensional spheres are &quot;spiky&quot;. (<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=3995615" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=3995615</a>)<p>E.g. if you have a set of things which vary in many dimensions (even if each element is no more than a set &quot;distance&quot; from normality), very few elements will belong in the &quot;centre&quot; (normal on all dimensions) and most will belong on a spike (wildly extreme in 1 or 2 dimensions).