Fooled by Randomness

Not so enamoured with this popular book. Taleb finds himself incredibly intelligent for stating that hedging one's bets is a good idea and that randomness exists. Much of the book is spent on autofellatio and disparaging complex philosophy. It starts being a worthwhile read at about page 206. The typeface is the book's greatest achievement.

this book is good

The main purpose of this book is to introduce the reader to the fact that so many times we give people credit for success, we are doing so in error and they have just been the beneficiary of random luck. It's important to note that we all do this ourselves as well and if we don't recognize the truth, we leave ourselves open to risk that we don't even see because we assume better of ourselves than we really should be.

That was all quite excellent.

I was a bit surprised by Taleb's repeated praising of George Soros throughout the book. It didn't really seem tied in to the main theme very well and really seemed to come out of (far) left field. As I read through the remainder of Incerto, maybe the connection will become clearer to me.

The book is a warning on ascribing success to a method yet it could be a result coincidence - even if the “success” runs for several years.

Randomness creates opportunities for coincidence (spurious correlation), and thus accidental millionaires. Can repetition vindicate the successful ones? The book argues no, without further information about the sample size from whence the successful person emanates, it is impossible to ascribe success to a method.

A successful person from a large initial sample size has a higher chance of being successful as a result of chance. Smaller initial sample size indicates method. A befitting summary of the book is found in the phrase “it is better to be lucky than competent”.

Excellent. Recommended.