The Black Swan. By Nassim Nicholas Taleb

The Black Swan 
The Impact of the Highly Improbable
  
 Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2007)
  
 Penguin Books (2008)

  A pretentious book about extreme events, their impact on economic trading, and how to take care (or even advantage) of them when indulging in such activity. Basically Taleb's advice boils down to: 'Invest small amounts in a large number of highly risky ventures and large amounts in a few not so risky ventures' with the corollary that 'be careful on how you define "safe" and "risky" - take into consideration that many phenomena do not follow Gaussian distributions'.  But to get this rather simple, reasonable and probably self-evident message across Taleb firstly spews venom at a whole lot of economists and philosophers, about whom I have only the faintest knowledge, so the only point that gets across is 'Taleb is the greatest'. Secondly he drops names left right and centre, again  to prove the above point. Thirdly he unnecessarily defines new terms for concepts and ideas (e.g. mediocristan and extremistan) that could have been much easier described by accepted terminology.  Finally the book is too long, with a lot of side-tracks, none of which are properly followed up. It has a breathless style, too common in such popular science books, is mono-maniacal, and given to wide statements with almost no supporting evidence. But I'd like to quote the following.

'If you are a researcher, you will have to publish inconsequential articles in "prestigious" publications so that others say hello to you once in a while when you run into them at conferences' -Chapter 7, section 'Peer Cruelty'.