Fooled by Randomness

”[Taleb is] Wall Street’s principal dissident… . [Fooled By Randomness] is to conventional Wall Street wisdom approximately what Martin Luther’s ninety-nine theses were to the Catholic Church.” –Malcolm Gladwell, The New Yorker “Fascinating … Taleb will grab you.” –Peter L. Bernstein, author of Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk “Recalls the best of scientist/essayists like Richard Dawkins … and Stephen Jay Gould.” –Michael Schrage, author of Serious Play “We need a book like this … fun to read, refreshingly independent-minded.” –Robert J. Shiller, author of Irrational Exuberance

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. Although he spends most of his time in the intense seclusion of his study, or as a flâneur meditating in cafes, he is currently Distinguished Professor of Risk Engineering at New York University’s Polytechnic Institute. His main subject matter is “decision making under opacity”-that is, a map and a protocol on how we should live in a world we don’t understand.