Black Swans
Jan. 30, 2008
I'm about half way through Nassim Taleb's best-selling book, The Black Swan. My friend Dave is a devotee is Taleb's and has even started a blog in a similar style. I've found lots of interesting things to think about, but I wish that he had some kind of citations in his work, since I have no idea what he's just making up to bolster his position and what is based on real studies. In addition, I know I've heard a lot of the more interesting ideas elsewhere, but not as concisely presented, so it would be nice to see more of what influenced his thinking. Regardless, I especially enjoyed his description of the many logical fallacies we humans commit and I already find myself more aware of their presence in everyday life. He's also totally spot-on about the failure of experts in many fields to predict the future. (This is something Steven Levitt mentions in Freakonomics as well).
The president of my company actually met Taleb back when he traded in the S&P options pits. I mentioned that I was reading my book and was informed that Taleb came in full of bravado about how everyone else was trading incorrectly, and then subsequently blew out in two months. I guess that proves his point about prediction, but it probably isn't the result he was looking for.