As part of the Deloitte Innovation Growth Track program in the Netherlands, we have eight inspiring sessions on different themes with top speakers. For each session, we give Deloitte employees the opportunity to ask a question to one of the speakers.
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HatTip to Dave Lull
“It takes a lot of intellect and confidence to accept that what makes sense doesn’t really make sense.”
The aphorism is Taleb to a tee. It showcases his wit and learning, and provides ways to fillet his enemies. All his usual suspects are present to be corrected: bankers, fools, politicians, journalists, gym members and anyone who went to Harvard: “I wonder if anyone measured the time it takes, at a party, before a mildly successful stranger who went to Harvard makes others aware of it.” Present, too, are his heroes: the curious, the intellectually anarchistic, the idle philosopher. “Preoccupation with efficacy is the main obstacle to a poetic, noble, elegant, robust, and heroic life.”
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HatTip to Dave Lull
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/Magazine/Regulars/article487481.ece
Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author; The world’s fastest interview: 140 characters max per answer. The “world’s hottest thinker” on castigating bankers and pessimism about global recovery
Mark Edmonds. Sunday Times. London (UK): Jan 2, 2011. pg. 11
Copyright (c) Times Newspapers Limited 2011
Witter: What’s happening? And I’m not looking for aphorisms or apercu.
NT: I’m drinking coffee and playing with graphs for my new book.
Witter: Do you regard yourself as one of the most intelligent people on the planet?
NT: No. But I define intelligence as asking the right questions, looking at important matters, not solving complicated combinatorics.
Witter: Combinatorics? Might need help here.
NT: Replace combinatorics with quizzes. I think I understand the limitations of my understanding better than others we tend to call intelligent.
Witter: Can you think of a single universal aphorism for our time?
NT: We will never be safe until we accept that traditions (and heuristics) know things we don’t.
Witter: You’ve been criticised for castigating bankers. Isn’t it time that you left them alone?
NT: I would leave bankers alone when you leave the mafia and other forms of organised crime alone.
Witter: Are you still pessimistic about global recovery?
NT: The problem is not recovery, but the presence of risks in the system.
Witter: You referring to the banks?
NT: Not just the banks, but publicly listed companies with managers’ options. The markets lost 20% to 50% of their value in the past decade.
Witter: Your new book reveals you to be a know-all.
Kindly assure me otherwise.
NT: The aphorisms in it correspond to people making an assumption about things and getting it backwards.
Witter: Have you been in touch with David Cameron since he took office?
NT: Yes. I hope to see him in February.
Witter: What will you tell him?
NT: To have courage; it is what modern politicians seem to lack.
Witter: What do you do for fun?
NT: In natural habitats everything should be fun. No distinction between work and play.
Witter: You’ve done rather well out of the meltdown, haven’t you? Isn’t it crass to cash in?
NT: I find it immoral to produce a forecast unless you have something at risk.
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HatTip to Dave Lull.
CORPORATE CRIME REPORTER
Taleb says that Ronald Reagan started it.
“This is why I get along with Ralph Nader,” Taleb says. “Nader was the
first to say that the difference between Republicans and Democrats is cosmetic.”
“It is Ronald Reagan who bailed out the banks in 1983 and started this whole process.”
Reagan of the Milton Friedman free market philosophy?
“Exactly,” Taleb said. “There is something about governments that will be susceptible
to the pressure of lobbyists to bailout the big corporations.”
“Had Reagan not bailed out Citibank in 1983, we would not be here.”
Where would we be?
“If the government didn’t bail out Detroit and the banks, we would have a
better Detroit and better banks. Smaller and more competitive companies.”
“People forget that much of the growth of companies came from debt building.”
“Small companies are the energetic ones. The energy and innovation comes from small
companies in California. And these companies neither go into debt nor do they
get bailed out.”
Okay, so government shouldn’t be bailing out the big banks.
But what about cracking down on corporate crime?
“If two adults want to speculate, they should be free to do so, conditional on society
not bailing them out,” Taleb says.
“The government should be there to enforce the rule of no socialization of losses.
You want to make sure the banks are never big enough to take these risks at
the expense of society.”
“The rule is as follows – if you want a bailout, you are under our regulation.
And we want you small. And we don’t want you to take speculative risks.
In other words, you are a utility. And you obey our rules.”
“If you are not to be bailed out, then you can do what you want, providing that
you don’t harm the public.”
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From NNT’s Home Page.
MY ACTIVISM
To “robustify” society against Black Swans across domains. Conversation
with U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron on how
to robustify society and Rahul Ghandi about farmers' fragility & suicides. In Congress discussing Bank
Risk Management , Hyperinflation
& Fiscal Stimulus(video), The
U.K. Tories and The Black Swan (Video), The King of Sweden’s
Bonham declaration and begging for the termination
of the economics “Nobel”. On literature (conversation
with Rolf Dobelli) . Best article (Guardian) on why Big Will Fail.