Fooled By Randomness

I finished reading Nassim Taleb's book Fooled By Randomness. It was an interesting read. He does come across as a little preachy and yet because he is self-defacing you can't really accuse him too much of that.

I think that (despite the fact that he is probably a very irritating guy to be around), the book does bring up a lot off issues that people don't think about enough.

One of the things he looks at is how we tend to put people up on the back of repeated success (when that success may be luck.) I think a good dose of self doubt is pretty useful. We obviously like to think that we are were we are because of skill and hard work. Realising that it can easily be taken away is probably a good perspective to have.

Like I said in my previous post on the book... I liked Popper's idea of having bold conjectures and then attacking them.

It is a mind shift though. Looking at why you may have been lucky, and what you can do to mitigate the risk of everything falling apart. Looking at why you are probably wrong, and trying to stress test your ideas to see if they will fall apart.

I am mixing ideas here. But the book does make you think.

Next book... `The Google Story'. So far (50 pages in) it isn't all that well written but the story is compelling. Sounds like it would be an amazing company to work for.