What Nassim Taleb can teach us
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What Nassim Taleb can teach us
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Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#2I love Nassim Taleb as an academic and philosopher. I think he has a Peter Thiel like quality of being able to thinking differently, but in a very applicable way.
Nassim Taleb the author though I really can't get into, and to be fair he's had so much success that this is probably my fault.
If you want to get the most out of his work then read his medium blog. Most of his pieces are written in easily digestible formats.
I've re-started trying to read the Black Swan about 10 times and IMHO if you just read the first 3 chapters then you'll get about 95% of what you would if you had read the entire book.
I think the problem with his books that I have is that he considers himself not just an author but a modern day philosopher, and with that comes a level of rigor in his writing that brings me back to my measure theory and real analysis courses.
If you really want to read his books, then start backwards.
Antifragile is awesome, but still very wordy, and builds on top of all his other works. It almost seems to be the culmination of the idea's he's been writing about since the black Swan.
As a side note, for anyone who wants to learn about options trading with a focus on how a trader would view them, ie from a mathematical perspective, then check out one of his first books...... Dynamic Hedging of Options.
http://ca.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0471152803...
As a second side note........
His latest concept of “Skin in the game” is the best form of risk control that we've found for reigning in traders. Once traders are required to
1) keep the vast majority of their bonus in the fund for a few years
2) take part of their bonus in the form of non liquid securities if they want to hold more than a certain percentage of their portfolio in non liquid assets
we have found they pay alot more attention to the liquidity of their portfolio and the long term profitability of their portfolio, both of which are good for the long term success of the fund.
Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#3I really appreciate his books, The Black Swan and Antifragile particularly, though it does seem to me he's set up something of a cottage industry churning the same general idea into a sequence of very similar books. Then again, as long as he has extra stuff to add, and a readership willing to purchase them, I suppose this is utterly acceptable.
However, as a person, he seems to be an absolute rabid nutter. At one point he was planning to publish a book of his own aphorisms, as quoted by himself, while he is still alive. He rants and raves on Twitter[1]. Lately he's been engaged in an utterly hysterical tirade against a historian about the ethnic diversity (or lack thereof) in Roman Britain... whichever side you take in this at an intellectual level (personally, I'm more on his side than not), the tone and mode of the conversation as conducted by him is absolutely rabid and unacceptable.
[1] Full disclosure: he banned me on Twitter years ago because I fucked up an integral he had posed as a question for followers. Make of this what you will.
Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#4I love Nassim Taleb as an academic and philosopher. I think he has a Peter Thiel like quality of being able to thinking differently, but in a very applicable way. Nassim Taleb the author though I really can't get into, and to be fair he's had so much success that this is probably my fault. If you want to get the most out of his work then read his medium blog. Most of his pieces are written in easily digestible format…
Or bonuses should be based on what happens during a long period of time. Say you lead a company from 2015 to 2020, but your bonus is based on how well the company does from 2020 through 2025. And if the company fails before you get your bonus, too bad for you.
I haven't read his books but find his ideas as presented in videos and podcasts to be valuable.
Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#5I really appreciate his books, The Black Swan and Antifragile particularly, though it does seem to me he's set up something of a cottage industry churning the same general idea into a sequence of very similar books. Then again, as long as he has extra stuff to add, and a readership willing to purchase them, I suppose this is utterly acceptable. However, as a person, he seems to be an absolute rabid nutter. At one poi…
Have you read his books (not just the summary but all the chapters)? While he has good points, he is so egotistical, self-absorbed, and full of pseudo-scientific theories (e.g. that one should go between gorging themselves on food and fasting) that it makes it hard to actually extract out the good parts.
Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#6I really appreciate his books, The Black Swan and Antifragile particularly, though it does seem to me he's set up something of a cottage industry churning the same general idea into a sequence of very similar books. Then again, as long as he has extra stuff to add, and a readership willing to purchase them, I suppose this is utterly acceptable. However, as a person, he seems to be an absolute rabid nutter. At one poi…
Have you read his books (not just the summary but all the chapters)? While he has good points, he is so egotistical, self-absorbed, and full of pseudo-scientific theories (e.g. that one should go between gorging themselves on food and fasting) that it makes it hard to actually extract out the good parts.
Ya, it's really a shame. He's got some very interesting stuff to say, but he's such a completely insufferable jackass. It's really unfortunate. I manage to ignore it and enjoy his books anyway, but he's a pretty easy person to hate.
Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#7I love Nassim Taleb as an academic and philosopher. I think he has a Peter Thiel like quality of being able to thinking differently, but in a very applicable way. Nassim Taleb the author though I really can't get into, and to be fair he's had so much success that this is probably my fault. If you want to get the most out of his work then read his medium blog. Most of his pieces are written in easily digestible format…
Or bonuses should be based on what happens during a long period of time. Say you lead a company from 2015 to 2020, but your bonus is based on how well the company does from 2020 through 2025. And if the company fails before you get your bonus, too bad for you. I haven't read his books but find his ideas as presented in videos and podcasts to be valuable.
That's precisely what points 1 and 2 do, for a trader.
Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#8I really appreciate his books, The Black Swan and Antifragile particularly, though it does seem to me he's set up something of a cottage industry churning the same general idea into a sequence of very similar books. Then again, as long as he has extra stuff to add, and a readership willing to purchase them, I suppose this is utterly acceptable. However, as a person, he seems to be an absolute rabid nutter. At one poi…
To be fair, many many authors have posted books of their own aphorisms while still alive. For exmaple Nietzsche, Cioran, de La Rochefoucauld, et al.
See this wikipedia page for a list of all such authors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphorism
Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#9I love Nassim Taleb as an academic and philosopher. I think he has a Peter Thiel like quality of being able to thinking differently, but in a very applicable way. Nassim Taleb the author though I really can't get into, and to be fair he's had so much success that this is probably my fault. If you want to get the most out of his work then read his medium blog. Most of his pieces are written in easily digestible format…
Or bonuses should be based on what happens during a long period of time. Say you lead a company from 2015 to 2020, but your bonus is based on how well the company does from 2020 through 2025. And if the company fails before you get your bonus, too bad for you. I haven't read his books but find his ideas as presented in videos and podcasts to be valuable.
That's exactly the idea. Your bonuses 2015-2020 are invested in the company every year, and you can only cash them out after five years, in 2020-2025. If the company tanks in 2020 your bonuses for 2015-2020 are retroactively zero.
Re: What Nassim Taleb can teach us
#10I really appreciate his books, The Black Swan and Antifragile particularly, though it does seem to me he's set up something of a cottage industry churning the same general idea into a sequence of very similar books. Then again, as long as he has extra stuff to add, and a readership willing to purchase them, I suppose this is utterly acceptable. However, as a person, he seems to be an absolute rabid nutter. At one poi…
[1] Full disclosure: he banned me on Twitter years ago because I fucked up an integral he had posed as a question for followers. Make of this what you will.
This is why I quit caring to follow him. Interesting ideas, but huge ego. More interested in peddling books and image rather than trying to reach out and inform.
Not to say he doesn't also produce novel math. Personally, I just have a hard time connecting to a persons message, no matter what it is, when they're "right" all the time.