Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Taleb

2022-05-01 1 min read Sincheenz

This book is another version of his bestseller “The Black Swan”, only more fatalistic. The main idea he wants to convey is that we underestimate the impact of randomness in life and attribute success or failure to skill, when it’s luck that has often played a significant role. He keeps emphasizing that skill reveals itself only over time, while luck dominates short-term results.

It is true that every positive-thinking book you read or motivational speech you hear focuses too much on successful outcomes while ignoring unseen failures. It is very important to understand both success and failure.

As humans, we create stories to explain unpredictable events after they occur, falsely believing that outcomes were predictable—this is referred to as hindsight bias.

I liked how he explained the concept of cumulative effects: how small random events can lead to large consequences. He explains why predictions about markets or companies can be so misleading and unreliable.

An interesting read.