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| The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable | 
 enlarge | Author: Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Publisher: Random House
Category: Book
List Price: £17.59
Buy Used: £15.30
You Save: £2.29 (13%)
Avg. Customer Rating:  80 reviews
Sales Rank: 54819
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 400
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.5
Dimensions (in): 9.4 x 6.5 x 1.4
ISBN: 1400063515
Dewey Decimal Number: 003.54
EAN: 9781400063512
ASIN: 1400063515
Publication Date: April 17, 2007
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand New, Perfect Condition, Please allow 4-14 business days for delivery. 100% Money Back Guarantee, Over 1,000,000 customers served.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Difficult finding the gold in the dust September 1, 2008
5 out of 8 found this review helpful
This book is written by a proud sceptic, who challenges all our assumptions about systems and beliefs in modern science and particularly economics. The author worked in large financial firms, and saw the downfall of current beliefs.
He argues strenuously for people to avoid believing in the charlatans, and demonstrates numerous failings of the systems. But he fails to offer a better way so, despite his displayed intellect and thinking prowess, he comes across as a whiner. This is unfortunate, as I warmed to his message, but I found myself constantly waiting for the great revelation of how things could be run better. It never really appeared.
Entertaining, thought-provoking, over-long August 29, 2008
The central issue, which is sound, is reiterated almost to the point of boredom. Which is a shame because the style is entertaining and the critique of modern portfolio theory is pretty devastating. He could have said it in half the number of words and added more in the way of constructive alternative strategies or at least expanded on the ideas he briefly advanced. Don't buy the hardback: buy the paperback and spend the rest on something else. Well worth reading though.
 A very important book August 25, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is one of the most enjoyable and interesting books I have ever read. I have now read it about 20 times but keep finding something new every time I read it. I have also noticed that now after the credit crunch everything he says has additional meaning though the book itself was written before the credit crunch. I have even noticed politicians and central bankers start talking a bit like he does. We don't know what we don't know and we can only be as prepared as possible or pick up the pieces as well as we can after the fallout. A good book to pair with this is The Wisdom of the Crowd. It covers the stuff not covered in this book and this book covers the stuff not covered in that book.
 Good stuff! August 13, 2008
7 out of 8 found this review helpful
This is a very good book. It is thought provoking and works well as a new way of looking at the randomness in the world. A lot of people here have criticized Taleb for displaying a massive ego, and putting forward things that they dont agree with. Indeed, he is very opinionated and forward and I also disagree with some of the things he says (comments about the uncertainty principle mainly) BUT it is much more entertaining to read this way. Ultimately who wants to read a book that just confirms what they thought was true already? You read a book to challenge yourself, and your preconceptions about the world. This book does that. Just thinking about the extreme stuff helps give an insight into how some people see the world, and even if you dont agree, surely it is interesting to find out about?
 Up the Swanee August 7, 2008
13 out of 17 found this review helpful
There may be the germ of a good pamphlet in this book, but I wonder whether it might be reduced to a single trite aphorism like 'the wise man knows that he knows nothing'. Taleb's intellectual self-regard is so overpowering that it's almost comic, particularly since he has to concede that what he calls 'my ideas' have all been appropriated from others, and he rants away for page after structureless page about his pet hates(economists and other soothsaying social scientists). I do like the turkey feeding/confidence graph as an illustration of the trouble with inductive reasoning, but he blows that highlight early on. I mean, the guy is right enough - but anyone with the most moderate self-starting insight has probably come to much the same conclusions about life already.
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