On roughly 95 trades out of 100 they lose money… Spitznagel is unruffled as he sits in his office listening to classical music and losing money each day. He is ready and waiting for the next black swan to arrive. 

Spitznagel is pretty young to be so pessimistic; only about 40. So he might have gotten that way from Nassim Taleb, the author of “The Black Swan.” Spitznagel was Taleb’s right hand man at Empirica, another doom-scenario fund. Taleb is now principal and senior scientific adviser at Universa (he shut Empirica after getting seriously ill).

Most people think that democracy is the result of people wishing to take control through voting; nobody considers that democracy can just be the side effect of people liking to vote in elections.

Dear Hindi and Farsi speaking friends (and other philologists): Red Beet is called Shmandar in Arabic; just wonder if root is Hindi Shaminder godlike princess; also wonder if connection Shaminder to Salamander.

Action Bias