I was fortunate to see a FB post from NNT in time to catch his discussion with Didier Sornette at ETH Risk & Risilience 2014 conference. Which means, dear reader, that I was able to capture the audio which I make available in two versions. The Nassim Taleb version (mostly NNT) and the entire discussion. Happy to report the event remained very civil despite moments of obvious tension. NNT considered Sornette’s ‘Dragon-Kings’ to be examples of Gray Swans. They were joined by insurance CEO Dan Riordan, who seemed somewhat out of place, but at the same time provided a ‘reality anchor’ which caused me to listen to NNT and Sornette from the perspective of an ‘on the ground’ manager for whom unexpected disasters have an enormous impact.

The conference was running a little late so I ended up seeing another presentation on the hypothetical impact on the global electric grid of  giant solar flares. It was truly horrifying to project (along with slides, charts and statistics) the chaos and catastrophe that could arise in such a scenario and leads me to ponder how something like the electric grid could be made Antifragile.

Nassim Taleb, Didier Sornette, moderator Wofgang Kröger ( ETH Zurich), and Dan Riordan, (CEO, Zurich Global Corporate in North America)

A slide from Didier Sornette’s presentation.

A slide from NNT’s presentation.

NNT and Didier Sornette.

Background on Didier Sornette.