文档介绍：THE
BLACK SWAN
The I m pact of t h e
HIGHLY IM PROBABLE
Nassim Nicholas Taleb
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A BLACK SWAN is a highly improbable event
with three principal characteristics: It is unpre­
dictable; it carries a massive impact; and, after the
fact, we concoct an explanation that makes it
appear less random, and more predictable, than it
was. The astonishing ess of Google was a
black swan; so was 9/11. For Nassim Nicholas
Taleb, black swans underlie almost everything
about our world, from the rise of religions to
events in our own personal lives.
Why do we not acknowledge the phenomenon
of black swans until after they occur? Part of the
answer, according to Taleb, is that humans are
hardwired to learn specifics when they should
be focused on generalities. We concentrate on
things we already know and time and time again
fail to take into consideration what we don't know.
We are, therefore, unable to truly estimate oppor­
tunities, too vulnerable to the impulse to simplify,
narrate, and categorize, and not open enough to
rewarding those who can imagine the "impossible."
For years, Taleb has studied how we fool our­
selves into thinking we know more than we actually
do. We restrict our thinking to the irrelevant and
inconsequential, while large events continue to
surprise us and shape our world. Now, in this reve­
latory book, Taleb explains everything we know
about what we don't know. He offers surprisingly
simple tricks for dealing with black swans and ben­
efiting from them.
Elegant, startling, and universal in its applica­
tions, The Black Swan will change the way you
look at the world. Taleb is a vastly entertaining
writer, with wit, irreverence, and unusual stories to
tell. He has a mand of subjects
ranging from cognitive science to business to
probability theory. The Black Swan is a landmark
book—itself a black swan.
NASSIM NICHOLAS TALEB has devoted his life to
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