Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Fooled by Randomness book review

In a nutshell (368 pages), this is the first of the Incerto series by Taleb. The book is a deep dive into the effects of randomness on our lives, as well as our responses to the outcomes of randomness. Taleb goes full circle in making his arguments. Taleb shows where people are most prone to being fooled by randomness, why this is so, and how to fight the problem. The book ends with an admission of Taleb's guilt in being no better than the people he insults.

What I got out of it

There are a ton of great ideas, stories, tips and tricks. Every other page requires at least a bit of thinking and ideas worth debating with friends over a coffee. A lot of what Taleb writes about was fantastic for correcting or fine-tuning many of my points of view.

What was difficult

A few chapters/subchapters before Taleb’s admission of hardly being any better than the people he trounces for bad behaviour in the face of randomness, or luck, the book gets a bit tiresome for its negativity. I don’t think it is a spoiler to let the prospective reader know that Taleb makes amends with this and explains his reasoning and why he is at best marginally better than those he insults throughout the book. This makes the book more fair than balanced.

Recommendation

This book is a must-read. Probably great as an audiobook as well. The ideas are easy enough to understand or well explained enough that makes this book appropriate for an audiobook. That said, the whole Incerto series can be bought for a reasonable price and is worth having on anyone's bookshelf.