‼️ The Black Swan by Nassim Nicolas Taleb ‼️

 28/∞

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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“Only God knows…”

This book is an absolute mindfuck! Now, why mindfuck, Aleš? Because it gets down to the way we think. This book explains why we tend to pay attention to certain rather unimportant facts instead of those which really matter.

Taleb won my heart over by being rightfully arrogant in a funny matter and mentioning he drives a red Vespa in NYC. 🛵 I also ride a Vespa and over the years my Vespa has become just a little bit more than a mere vehicle to take me from A to B. Taleb also won my heart over by mentioning that he speaks more than 2 languages. I believe that people who speak more languages have broader horizons, are more tolerant and find them more interesting. Out of my perspective there is nothing more interesting than intercultural exchange of knowledge. This knowledge could be literally related to anything. The way how to organise a government, a company, how to build or tear down something easily with lesser expense of energy.

...

Taleb is a foreign name and at the beginning of the book I thought he came from Israel. To my surprise, Taleb was born in Lebanon. In the “old” good Lebanon. Not a new bad Lebanon with hyperinflation and fucked up government. I believe that his interesting origin gives this book an “extra” twist. I should not forget that I was surprised to hear that Taleb is an escapee of Lebanese civil war. In the book he speaks about expats. How do they gather up and remise about “good old” days. How do they analyse historical events and retropesctively discuss what would have change the course of history. 

As I have lived in many foreign countries, I was surprised to see that Czechs who live abroad tend to idealise their country of origin. Mostly, because they do not see the bad. They do not see the frauds and the corruption scandals etc. To put it simply, they do not live in that mess. To my surprise, Czechs living abroad were also far warmer and nicer to each other (even in such country like Germany, were people are said to be very distant and strict - they are not). Those abroad living Czechs were also helping out each in other in a far greater way than they would have done in their home country. “At home country”, many of your so called friends will let you die in a gutter instead of helping you out. Just because they can laugh at you later. I genuinely love those kind of people… On many occasions, I have enjoyed listening to the old escapees of Czechoslovakia. Their life-stories were usually far more interesting than of those sitting at home and waiting for the communism to come to the end. I’m glad that I’m not the only one to have noticed such things as Taleb has made very similar observations as me. Which makes me feel very normal as I am not the only person in the universe to have the same experience. 😃

I was also surprised to hear that Taleb was a stock trader. It always pleases me to hear that somebody is not an actual dull fucking academic, but has connection to the “real” world. This book contains indeed a plenty of ideas I’m looking forward to implement in my investment skills.

I also have to mention that this book was sitting in my library for many years. I started to read it, but eventually did not get beyond the first chapter. I was not able to find a receipt confirming the date of purchase, nevertheless I found a train ticket (used as a bookmark) dated back in 2014 issued by Arriva Train Service Wales for a ride between Trefforest and Cardiff Queen St. I think I was perhaps trying to kill some time during those dull, rainy, boring commutes in Wales when some people were shouting that they are going to get their country back and they were getting angry to be “forced” to drink French wine instead of the one from South Africa (a former colony). But Steinbeck’s “The East of Eden” eventually won over and The Black Swan was forgotten only to be rediscovered by me a couple of years later.

But let’s get back to the book and some superb intellectual concepts it offers:

Umberto Eco’s Antilibrary

Why is capitalism better than socialism? In capitalism you can make bet and eventually win. I’m talking about stock markets and investments. 

Let’s imagine that the library is your portfolio. Let’s say you are investing your time by reading certain books hoping that they will bring you love, fame, wealth etc. But what you know, is what you know. Somebody said: “Insanity is doing the same thing all over again and expecting different results.”

The Black Swan is something what lies outside of the scope of knowledge of the books you have read so far. It is an unexpected event. Something that could not be predicted even by the very best mathematicians on this fucking planet. 

Taleb uses a beautiful comparison with Yevgenia’s black swan. The black swan in this case is a book. Yevgenia is a writer, she never published anything in her life. Nobody trusts her with her book and nobody wants to publish it. The manuscript of her book is being rejected by publishers based on their past experiences with books they have already published. Since they have never published book like hers. Eventually, Yevgenia succeeds and her book gets accepted by a publisher who has nothing to lose. Her book becomes a massive success. Nobody has predicted, nobody has expected it. Her book is a black swan.

Conclusion:

To be honest I enjoyed mainly 3/4 of this book. The final part was a bit “mathematical”. I was never a massive fun of mathematics, since in order to be rich or successful, you do not need to know much mathematics. (The same applies to school) The basics will suffice. 

But the other interesting 3/4 were very intriguing. It reminded me that we need to try new things every day, make different bets and keep winning. This applies to stocks, cryptos, women etc…

I loved how Taleb tarnishes the MBA programmes at universities speaking about them as about something delusional and useless.

One also can say that this book is about probability, but I think Taleb goes beyond that.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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Feel free to like, share and comment or recommend books/courses you find inspirational yourself. I’m keen to hear about them.

Coming Up Next: 

How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

Peace 🧘‍♂️✌️🌱