Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets

Name: Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets
Author: Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Fooled by Randomness is a standalone book in Nassim Nicholas Taleb's landmark Incerto series, an investigation of opacity, luck, uncertainty, probability, human error, risk, and decision-making in a world we don't understand. The other books in the series are The Black Swan, Antifragile, Skin in the Game, and The Bed of Procrustes.

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List Price	$20.00
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25 - 99	$12.40	38%
100 - 249	$12.00	40%
250 - 499	$11.60	42%
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Book Information

Publisher:	Random House Trade
Publish Date:	08/23/2005
Pages:	368
ISBN-13:	9780812975215
ISBN-10:	0812975219
Language:	English

What We're Saying

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By Porchlight

U. S. News and World Report has a huge special report on the Best Business Books. READ FULL DESCRIPTION

February 01, 2007

The Black Swan - Few and Far Between

By Porchlight

I just started reading Nassim Nicholas Taleb's The Black Swan and I think it is wonderful. The former Wall Street trader writes about outliers in the world (9/11, 1929 Market Crash, etc). He says Black Swans have three characteristics: rarity, extreme impact, and retrospective (though not prospective) predictability. READ FULL DESCRIPTION

July 30, 2008

Freakonomics' Levitt Questioning Good To Great

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Steven Levitt on his Freakonomics blog takes a shot at Good To Great and the recent performance of GTG standouts Fannie Mae, Circuit City, and Wells Fargo. A purchase of either Fannie Mae or Circuit City at the time of the book's publication would have netted you an 80% loss in your investment today. Not so good. READ FULL DESCRIPTION

February 09, 2009

Our Response to BusinessWeek

By Porchlight

There are only a few people in the media who know business books as well as Jack and I. Hardy Green, an associate editor at BusinessWeek, is one of those people. We met with Hardy in New York two weeks ago and he quickly commenced with critiquing our selections for The 100 Best. READ FULL DESCRIPTION

November 23, 2010

An Excerpt from THE BED OF PROCRUSTES

By Porchlight

This week we have an excerpt from The Bed of Procrustes by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. You may remember Taleb from his bestselling The Black Swan or his first book, Fooled by Randomness. Taleb is a big thinker, and The Bed of Procrustes is a collection of "philosophical and practical aphorisms" from the author. READ FULL DESCRIPTION

November 13, 2012

Antifragile: Things That Gain From Disorder

By Sally Haldorson

This morning I perused the Amazon Top 100 for 2012. A few of our favorite books that made the top 20: Nate Silver's The Signal and the Noise; Charles Duhigg's The Power of Habit (our JCS review here); and Susan Cain's Quiet (our take here. ) Rounding out the top 40 is a book that's been sitting on my desk for awhile, daring me to crack it open: Nassim Nicolas Taleb's Antifragile: Things That Gain From Disorder. READ FULL DESCRIPTION

Full Description

Fooled by Randomness is a standalone book in Nassim Nicholas Taleb's landmark Incerto series, an investigation of opacity, luck, uncertainty, probability, human error, risk, and decision-making in a world we don't understand. The other books in the series are The Black Swan, Antifragile, Skin in the Game, and The Bed of Procrustes. Fooled by Randomness is the word-of-mouth sensation that will change the way you think about business and the world. Nassim Nicholas Taleb-veteran trader, renowned risk expert, polymathic scholar, erudite raconteur, and New York Times bestselling author of The Black Swan-has written a modern classic that turns on its head what we believe about luck and skill. This book is about luck-or more precisely, about how we perceive and deal with luck in life and business. Set against the backdrop of the most conspicuous forum in which luck is mistaken for skill-the world of trading-Fooled by Randomness provides captivating insight into one of the least understood factors in all our lives. Writing in an entertaining narrative style, the author tackles major intellectual issues related to the underestimation of the influence of happenstance on our lives. The book is populated with an array of characters, some of whom have grasped, in their own way, the significance of chance: the baseball legend Yogi Berra; the philosopher of knowledge Karl Popper; the ancient world's wisest man, Solon; the modern financier George Soros; and the Greek voyager Odysseus. We also meet the fictional Nero, who seems to understand the role of randomness in his professional life but falls victim to his own superstitious foolishness. However, the most recognizable character of all remains unnamed-the lucky fool who happens to be in the right place at the right time-he embodies the "survival of the least fit." Such individuals attract devoted followers who believe in their guru's insights and methods. But no one can replicate what is obtained by chance. Are we capable of distinguishing the fortunate charlatan from the genuine visionary? Must we always try to uncover nonexistent messages in random events? It may be impossible to guard ourselves against the vagaries of the goddess Fortuna, but after reading Fooled by Randomness we can be a little better prepared. Named by Fortune One of the Smartest Books of All Time A Financial Times Best Business Book of the Year

About the Author

Nassim Nicholas Taleb has devoted his life to problems of uncertainty, probability, and knowledge. He spent nearly two decades as a businessman and quantitative trader before becoming a full-time philosophical essayist and academic researcher in 2006.

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