At the Brooklyn launch of his book on Wednesday, Taleb declared that, “The only anti-fragile systems now are Silicon Valley and the New York Restaurant industry.” Both entities are extremely innovative, and prone to high levels of failure and reward. The ability for individual disasters to benefit the overall quality of the collective qualifies them as anti-fragile.

Taleb is a notorious jerk, and the event Q&A proved to be no exception. Audience members who were taken to task for asking stupid questions can at least flatter themselves to be in the company of everyone and everything from Nobel prize winning journalists, academics, heads of state, artists, and bankers, to um, oranges. His scorn is abundant. But so is his insight.

via Anti-Fragile Book: Why We Should Eat Like Cave Men, Embrace Religion, and Hate Bankers.