Friends, I have a question on ethics. Nineteen years ago, when I submitted Dynamic Hedging, the publisher sent the manuscript to a bunch of academics interested in the subject. The referee reports came very negative, as academics think they have the monopoly of knowledge and everything they don’t do is crap. Not one at the time considered that quants had sophistication they didn’t have: it had to be inferior. Luckily I convinced the publisher to send the book to quants (who had PhDs and Dr in front of their name) and it was all OK.

As nothing ever remains secret (there is no anonymity) I managed to get hold of the list of academics who reviewed the book. Two were excusable (ignorance); one of them was mean, extremely nasty, totally in bad faith, thinking he was protected by the anonymity of the process. His point was people had nothing to learn from traders about the risk of options.

Now the question: Given that I know his name and that he can harm others, should I bust him for the sake of exposing fraud ? It is a moral obligation?

Or should the anonymity of the peer-review mechanism (with all the inequities it causes) be preserved in the name of a higher benefit? Which route is more ethical: exposing him or NOT exposing him?

Thank you in advance.

http://www.amazon.com/Dynamic-Hedging-Managing-Vanilla-Options/dp/0471152803/ref=pd_sim_b_7

via Friends, I have a question on ethics. Nineteen… – Nassim Nicholas Taleb.