I had just begun to read the book when there it was, right on the bottom of page 5: “Your brain is most intelligent when you don’t instruct it on what to do – something people who take showers discover on occasion.” I was floored. None other than Nassim Nicholas Taleb had confirmed what I always suspected. There is value in shower thinking.

Not surprisingly, more than a few of the aphorisms in Taleb’s book are brilliant. At the least, most will cause you to stop, put the book down, close your eyes, and think. Some may make you want to run to any other person in the room to share it with them, in the hope that an interesting discussion might ensue. If nothing else, Taleb’s latest may be the ultimate bathroom book for thinkers.

Since this is a business column, here is one of Taleb’s many aphorisms that relate to business: “In science, you need to understand the world; in business you need others to misunderstand it.” Try that one out at your next Cambridge cocktail party.