Wednesday, May 29, 2013

The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb


The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks (September 2007)
480 pages, Audiobook (purchased myself for $9.56)
Book Rating: 5 Stars

With the continued increase of our dependence on and incorporation of technology, our world is moving more into a place in which the highly improbable will have a greater impact on our daily lives.  Due to complexity, there is no way to predict a “Black Swan” event, but there are ways to make sure you can capitalize on positive “Black Swan” events and ways to mitigate the negative ones. This is the center message from Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s book The Black Swan.

The book does read like a philosophy book: a great deal of deep analysis with lots of quotes (even though he complains about philosophers who quote too much).  Sprinkled between the deep analysis is an elitist fervor, especially about economists and their “bell curves”. 

If you can get past his elitism and sarcasm, this book and its message are truly ingenious.

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