Last year started with a tough setback. After I got into skiing in the winter,
I fell and got a herniated disc. That was when I was just training to do my first
half Iron Man and also got a spot for the Berlin Marathon later in the year. These dreams
were eradicated in an instant. It should be fair to say, I had every reason to be upset.
Yet, pretty soon, I discovered something unexpectedly positive about it.
Prior to the injury, I had invested lots of time in the preparation for my
athletic goals and did not read as much any more.
Forced to lie on my back most of the day, I finally — for the first time in my life — found both the
time and the will to read many classics that were on the top of my list for years.
I read many hours every day and since then finished one book every two weeks despite reading
slowly and mostly thought-provoking nonfiction material. Soon, this period became
supremely inspiring and rewarding to me, with a couple books making it to my personal top 10.
My hope with this post is that you might also find motivation to invest some time into reading
some of these books - without the need to hurt yourself first.
Lessons when reading a lot
Before going into the details of the best titles I read, I'd like to touch on some lessons and experiences
that I had while reading that much for the first time.
It might not apply to you in the same way but when I read regularly, I tend to feel like
I think clearer and calmer throughout the day.
This could stem from the focused attention reading requires — a welcome contrast to my sometimes connected and distracted days.
At times, reading even has a similar effect on me as meditation where random thoughts arise from the back of my consciousness
that I can then deliberately process.
Somewhat related to this was my observing a steadily decreasing friction for picking
up a book. Earlier, I often felt too tired to read on harder topics after a mentally exhausting day
but it got easier and easier the longer I kept at it. Yet, for any given day there is still a limit to how much I can
consume and reflect on.
Which brings me to another important point: I learned to really reflect
on what I read. Often - especially while reading nonfiction - thoughts about applying the material
to my own life arise. I stop and think about that deeply, challenging what I read and my previous approach to the issue.
I also write down the most important learnings in my own words and even keep some as flashcards in an app so
I'll repeatedly get reminded of the lesson. What also really helped me is reading with the intention of
discussing the content with somebody. It simply makes me more attentive and I find the greatest value in
getting my understanding challenged by others.
Here I also want to mention that I always considered myself a slow reader, and still do. I tried to learn speed reading but
it makes me nervous and so far I can't imagine that you can think and reflect as deep about the content while
reading fast.
Another very interesting aspect about reading a lot is that many books will touch on the same points.
While that might sound repetitive, I found it fascinating — especially when authors disagreed on the same topic.
Then, you have two opposing views elaborated before you that you can think about even harder.
On the other hand, I found it also really exciting to learn that many
of the authors and people I admire agree on some unexpected points. For instance, Steve Jobs, Tim Ferriss, Cal Newport,
Albert Einstein and Nassim Taleb (all of whom are mentioned later in this post) share a love for long walks,
to a degree that might seem extreme by today's sedentary standards. They describe how while walking
they think deeply about main challenges they face - either alone or in conversation with
others. Another surprise to me was to discover that Naval, Ferriss, Taleb, and von Schirach
(who's not explicitly mentioned here but whose books I like a lot too) advocate for the
stoic school of thought. The stoic classics by Marcus Aurelius and Seneca are mentioned repeatedly in the best terms -
which I did not expect from modern intellectuals. This made me pick up Meditations
by Marcus Aurelius, which I currently read (very) slowly and already highly recommend if you're interested in stoic principles.
But now let's talk business. I included not all but only the best books I've read that year across all kinds of domains.
If something bores you, just jump to another section - I cover a wide range of nonfiction domains. Here are the
links to every title:
Elon Musk - Walter Isaacson (2023)
Ok, actually some more about me first: right after new year's I got my eyes lasered and
had to keep them closed for about a week. So I could only listen to audiobooks - a medium
I like most for biographies. What a great coincidence that the master of biographies,
Walter Isaacson, just finished his newest piece on the richest man on the planet
(formerly, maybe). I loved Isaacson's work on Steve Jobs, Jennifer Doudna, Albert Einstein,
and Benjamin Franklin, so I was looking forward
for a balanced view on the polarizing character of Elon Musk. My expectations were
more than satisfied. The book is filled with interesting and inspiring stories while
following a clear development of Musk's character and discussing his flaws and
virtues, both of which there are plenty.
What especially stuck with me is his insight on the iterative approach to development.
Musk is dedicated to always try new ideas without fear of blowing things up (like
his rockets used to). If nothing ever goes wrong, you're not risking enough.
Really thought-provoking and exciting to see how he had unseen success across
various industries with this approach and his extreme commitment.
Isaacson also covers Musk's vices and the stories of those that suffered under his extreme
leadership and general personality. The book ends with Musk's seemingly insane move to
buy Twitter - becoming CEO of 4 major companies at once. In the year since, Musk got even more
public attention since he's increasingly involved in the Trump administration, leading the DOGE department.
I definitely recommend the book to anyone who is remotely interested in Musk, his life, and his work.
You will have your idea about him changed or refined in many ways.
The War of Art - Steven Pressfield (2002)
Finally I tackled this short work that seems to be on every must-read list out there
on the internet. Don't confuse it with "The Art of War" as I have.
I read on the topic of work ethic a lot already but found this to be a true masterpiece
as a category of its own in style.
I loved every bit of it and will re-read it for sure. The book covers
dedication to ones work and the mindset that one should bring to their art. I related
this to my work of building software solutions, which I find is a form of art too. The "war"
is an inner struggle with resistance to do anything but work. I'm sure everybody
can relate and goes to battle almost every day. So if you're at all open for an
artistic and inspiring new view on the matter, I beg you to read this one.
The Almanack of Naval Ravikant - Eric Jorgenson (2020)
This is pretty unique: Naval's almanack was first published by Naval himself as a
tweetstorm. He then did a podcast with Eric Jorgenson in which they discuss Naval's
ideas in more depth. The transcript of this podcast became to be the book.
The original tweetstorm, podcast and the transcript are available for free but you
can also order the book if you like (as I did since I didn't know it's free). Naval
is one of the more extreme examples of living the American Dream.
He grew up in New York City as a poor immigrant with only his mother and brother
as family. He spent most of his childhood in the library, which
had practical reasons since his mother had to work and wanted him safe after school.
So he read tons of books of various fields, which he considers the single most important
habit that lead to his future success. He got multiple degrees and briefly had a
job at BCG but his progression really took off after he moved to Silicon Valley.
There he founded a number of startups and became an early-stage investor in over 200 companies,
including Uber, FourSquare, and Twitter.
What's special about Naval is not only his knowledge for wealth creation but also his
views on happiness and philosophy. This combination of fields seems to relate strongly
to many modern individuals that think about how to achieve economic success while
spending their life in a good and happy way. To get a sense, I highly recommend
Naval's interview
at the Joe Rogan Experience.
I'm inspired by his ideas on most topics, yet I got the most immediate returns from his insights into reading:
"Every successful person I know reads a lot."
"I don't want to read everything. I just want to read the 100 great books over and over again."
"Read what you love until you love to read."
He opened me to not being afraid of skipping chapters, reading a random passage, or even to skip a book entirely if I'm not excited
to continue reading it in a particular moment. There's way more to consume than time to consume it, so make sure
you're really enjoying your time spent reading. Even if you drop a book, you can always pick it up later again,
if you feel like it.
I embrace that mindset and apply it to podcasts and videos as well. For this insight, I dropped
three titles that year: 'The Effective Executive', 'The Compleat Strategyst', and 'Kaufen oder Mieten'
(which translates to 'Buying or Renting' from German). I think I might return to all of them
but they didn't catch my ongoing curiosity after a few chapters.
Then Naval's insights on wealth creation are also abundant. He goes deep into career strategies, building assets, being
one's own unique brand, and more. He combines these ideas with thoughts about how
to live properly. To see wealth as a means to an end, not the end itself.
"Happiness is being satisfied with what you have. Success comes from dissatisfaction.
Choose."
If you, like me, liked one of his interviews, I urge you to read the free book.
I certainly took away a lot and it gave me the greatest motivation to continue
reading in the following months.
The Seven Habits of highly effective people - Stephen Covey (1989)
The bible of self-improvement. I read it multiple times already and will do so multiple times more. It's just so
deeply insightful and generally applicable that I always enjoy reading it and never feel like it's time not well spent.
This year for the first time, I started a bet with my girlfriend that we read a book the other one recommends.
This was my (very well received) recommendation to her and I used the opportunity to re-read it in parallel so we
could discuss the chapters in detail. That was especially great since Covey covers lots of practical exercises that can
be implemented for both individuals and groups so we did some of them together as partners.
Don't be scared off by the outdated title (as I have). It's not the next hot-shot book on the next best basic habits.
The habits discussed should be considered as meta-habits. E.g. the first is called 'Be Proactive'.
I don't know how to put everything I feel about this book into appropriate words so let me just leave it by saying
it's a very rare masterpiece on a life well lived and I strongly feel anybody should read it once in their lifetimes
(the sooner the better). It was already sold over 40 million times so I don't seem to be alone under that impression.
The Gene - Siddhartha Mukherjee (2016)
The Gene is a very enjoyable and broad read that my girlfriend recommended to me as part of the bet that I just mentioned in
the previous paragraph.
The book covers the greatest findings of the field of genetics, starting at around 1850 and leading up to very recent
discoveries.
Siddhartha approaches these historical discoveries by describing clever anecdotes that are easy to understand even for somebody
who is an amateur to the topic, like me.
One of these stories that really stuck with me is the life of Gregor Mendel, an austrian who failed to become a teacher so became a monk instead.
In the 1850s, his extreme interest in biology made him conduct experiments of unbelievable scale and significance - given the times he lived in.
Mendel cross-bred peas for more than 8 years,
observing changes in heritable traits. Somehow, he did all that without telling anybody about it!
When he finally got the courage to publish his findings, the established scholars of his days did not take the monk's work seriously.
He died unknown (and assumably dissappointed).
Yet, his data was groundbreaking and would mark the beginning of the modern age of genetics - alas only 15 years after his death.
When the first scholars found and recognized the significance of Mendel's work, one of them even tried to publish it under his own name!
Other anecdotes in the book are equally interesting and I find Siddhartha has a very enjoyable way of writing.
In later chapters, the biological content is increasingly connected to philosophical questions.
Siddhartha covers the eugenics of the early 20th century in Europe and the US and topics of modern discourse, such as
gender identity and gene editing. I personally found the book could have been a bit shorter towards the end
but it never stopped to excite.
Amusing Ourselves to Death - Neil Postman (1985)
This classic from 1985 was recommended by Cal Newport, the author of "Deep Work" (and other great pieces).
It's a critical, alarming call to being more conscious about the kinds of media that
we consume. Postman explains the historical development of public discourse in the US.
Before the invention of radio, the written word of newspapers was the main medium
where current issues were discussed. Politicians elaborated their arguments in depth across
pages and pages and the American citizens were informed and interested. So much so that
Benjamin Franklin observed they are so busy reading newspapers that they have no
time for books.
An anecdote from that time that stuck with me were the debates between Abraham Lincoln
and Stephen Douglas. Before the internet, TV and even radio, they traveled the country,
filling halls with discussions that
had the format of hours spent by one side elaborating on their views on current political
issues, followed by hours of the other's reply. In one instance, the opening address
by Douglas took 3 hours. They had to interrupt the debate so the full audience
could go home for dinner and return before the 4 hour reply by Lincoln. This image is in such extreme
contrast to presidential debates we see in the US (and other places) today.
With the invention of radio
and later, television, the media allowed for more arousing, acoustic and visual content.
Advertisement went from informational to sensational, and so did public discourse.
Postman argues that looks and entertainment replaced ideology in politics.
He continues about other implications of this shift in media for marketing, religion,
and teaching.
While reading, I reflected about how the internet is an improvement to linear
television in that the user can choose, which content to consume more freely and can also
interact and give a response. Of course, the development to more and more arousing
content continued, which is best shown by the success of Instagram and TikTok. Yet,
there are also developments towards productive discourse, knowledge sharing, and learning,
such as Wikipedia, reddit, informational YouTube, or blogs - especially mine ;)
Again, a very thought-provoking book on a topic that affects
all our lives. Not the easiest read but I enjoyed it a lot. Thanks for recommending, Cal!
The Relationship Handbook - George Pransky (1991)
Last year I found Derek Sivers' reading list
to be a source of great titles, including this one by George Pransky.
Sivers writes: "Everyone in a romantic relationship should read this" and I very much agree.
It's written as a kind of marriage counseling but many lessons are valuable for all kinds of relationships.
Pransky sets a strong emphasis on empathy towards your partner - even if you're upset by their behavior.
He makes the surprising case that you should not discuss the main conflicts in a relationship -
and convincingly so. He claims that when the emotional storm passes and partners share empathy again they naturally
find solutions to their conflicts without the need for bargaining on compromises.
Other themes are personal differences, moods, active listening, focus, forgiving, intimacy and more.
I often catch myself reflecting on its ideas and reread certain passages when they fit my current situation in my relationship, friendships, or work.
Thank you Derek!
Range - David Epstein (2019)
Another book that I read due to a bet with a friend. I find the main message best described in the
opening example of comparing Tiger Woods and Roger Federer. Both were on the top of their sports for decades
and to get there, both developed extreme training habits, combining their talent with grit.
The interesting difference between them, Epstein argues, is that golf is a 'kind domain' i.e. relatively static and repeatable
whereas tennis is more dynamic, creative and chaotic - what he calls a 'wicked domain'. In kind domains the typical advice
for top performers apply: start as early in life as possible and put in as many hours as possible. Think
of the famous Polgár sisters who were raised to become chess masters and did so with unseen success after spending
all their childhoods on the board game.
Now the hook is that in wicked domains, such as Tennis, other principles seem to apply for the best of the best.
In Federer's youth, for instance, he was playing Football, Badminton, Basketball and Table Tennis besides Tennis.
'Only' at 14 he
went all-in into the sport that he would later dominate. Epstein argues that was crucial for Rogerer's success
because he learned different lessons from all the different sports and found the one that best fit his talents.
Compare that to Tiger Woods who started playing golf at the
age of 2 and was the world champion of his age at 8 already - similarly to the Polgár sisters who became grand
master as early as the age of 15. They were specializing from the start and never went broad to discover what
could be learned in other fields.
Epstein continues to argue that the successes of Woods and the Polgár sisters are cited all the time when
it comes to world-leading performance - as in one of my personal favourite books ever: 'Atomic Habits' by James Clear.
Yet, most people operate in more wicked domains, such as entrepreneurship, product development, science, or most fields of study.
There, other principles apply and too early specialization might even be harmful.
In every chapter Epstein outlines one such principle how in wicked domains, people have extreme success by
deliberately going broad instead of deep (think T-shaped skills).
One exciting example is InnoCentive, a crowdsourcing company that offers to publish challenges of all kinds
of domains that the field's experts cannot solve. The founder is a PhD in chemistry who found that often
the solution to hard chemical problems arise from knowledge in other fields. So he started by publishing
challenges that the pharmaceutical company he was working for was facing for years and did not progress on.
Soon solutions were found from unexpected people, like one lawyer who solved a molecular synthesis challenge. By now, InnoCentive awarded
more than 20 million dollars to people who solved problems for the likes of NASA, who struggled to predict
solar particle storms, or for helping to remove oil spill from Alaska's coast.
I read much in the field of peak performance and found Epstein gives us a new yet crucial perspective.
If success comes not only from going deeper and deeper but also from gaining broad experiences,
this frees us to being more open for career switches and explains the unseen successes of the likes
of Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, and so many others who are not merely experts in one domain.
The Righteous Mind - Jonathan Haidt (2012)
Another classic of our times that's been on my list for years. I had the pleasure to see Haidt - a NYU professor - presenting about
the divide in american politics back when I was a visiting scholar at CMU in 2019. The book gives deeper insights into what
might cause this ever increasing tension between the political sides in the US and elsewhere - like currently in Germany, where I live.
Haidt studied the field of moral psychology and did many anthropological studies and observations himself.
His central findings show how our liberal western world is a rare exception in that it has a very limited
set of moral norms, placing the individual's autonomy above all else - as long as nobody else is harmed.
Other cultures, and conservatives, are also moral about loyalty, authority, or sanctity - all of which seem to have
a negative connotation in our language.
For instance, when discussing the participation in religious services,
a liberal's opinion will mostly come down to whether it serves the individual in that moment. A conservative
view could include morals about loyalty to ones tribe (i.e. the religious group), respecting the authority of
the religious leader, and praising the sanctity of certain religious beliefs. This might not sound convincing
to many westerners but in all other cultures such norms are the default. Haidt explains that our 'moral taste buds'
- as he calls them - can be explained by evolution and all of us have the capacity to feel them.
What also stuck with me is the process of how we form moral opinions.
Despite our experience, the research showed that even in this complex domain of morals we are primarily led by our emotions
and only make use of high-effort critical thinking in very rare exceptions (explained in depth in 'Thinking, Fast and Slow' by Daniel Kahnemann).
The book is Haidt's plea to treat politics and religion not as taboos but discussing them with curiosity - especially when opinions differ.
Haidt wants us to gain a better understanding of the other side's opinions. Showing empathy and respect in political discourse
is increasingly rare yet so foundational for constructive discussions.
With all the political chaos around the world these days, I am thankful to have this book to get a better grasp at what's happening.
Code - Charles Petzold (1999)
One of the insights of 'The Almanack of Naval Ravikant',
is to start by reading the foundational books in your field and derive
anything high-level and fancy from the basics. The idea really resonates with me so I decided to include this
piece on my list. It's another recommendation from the previously mentioned
reading list of Derek Sivers, who
says it's a 10/10 for anybody who's interested in computers and electronics. It seems that I am!
I didn't think
before that I could find the book so exciting and mind-blowing. Petzold really achieves to (theoretically) build a basic CPU
by explaining concept by concept. Starting at the very foundation of simple circuits he builds up more and more logical gates to end up at
a full RAM and CPU that he also simulates on his website for anybody to play around with them.
The content is complicated at times but very rewarding. I really felt the wisdom in Naval's
words come to fruition already since this piece solidified my understanding of many of the most foundational concepts in
computers and codes. You don't need to be a professional in computer science or electronics to enjoy the book but it's
not the easiest read.
By the way: I also re-read another, more technical book in 2024: Desingning Data-Intensive Application by Martin Kleppman.
I wrote about it here.
The 4-Hour Workweek - Timothy Ferriss (2007)
The most thought-provoking book I ever read. Again, I was very hesitant to read it despite frequent
recommendations because of the exaggerated title. I just can't imagine that many people work for
merely 4 hours a week (and I wonder if that's a goal that's worth thriving towards anyways).
Yet I finally gave it a try and liked it from the start. Tim Ferriss to me is the ultimate life-hacker.
He's very practical and questions every convention.
In the book he describes how he was worked up leading his own company, making millions while being miserable
and having no private time. So he radically automated tasks, got rid of ineffective practices and customers
and after a while realized that he could earn the same while working way less.
His new won free time he invested in optimized activities, becoming the national champion in Chinese Kickboxing
or participating in the Tango World Championship.
That sure sounds like every other Self-Optimization-Guru's story on YouTube,
yet I find it rather convincing and I could transfer many of the practices he implemented to my own life.
One such practice that Ferriss first popularized and that's even more relevant today, is
a 'low information diet' in which you aggressively eliminate sources of news and connections to help
reclaim more time for other pursuits.
For instance, Ferriss used to be available for his customers and employees 24/7 via calls and mail.
Yet, he realized this had a huge toll on him while providing surprisingly little value.
So he cut his availability down all the way to checking mails only Monday mornings! Providing FAQs and letting people
find the answer themselves proved to not destroy the business.
He continued being very radical about declining meetings and calls, choosing email as the most
efficient tool (while doing it only on Mondays). He describes how the gained focus and time
made him more productive than what was expected of him. So he achieved more with less, finishing
work early. I realized the same in my career and think it's a huge productivity impediment of our times to be
connected and interrupted all day. I am certainly not as extreme but I too find
checking on every message and email immediately once it arrives leaves me distracted
from what I am working on. This might not be an issue for one notification an hour but the clutter
seems to steadily increase, making me uneasy and absent-minded in a job that requires focus.
The great realization: it's perfectly fine to check your inbox just every other hour or so. In case you really need to be available fast,
tell your collegues to give you a call in such a case.
The same principle applies to consumption of media and news. If this sounds interesting, I urge
you also consider 'Deep Work' by Cal Newport, who is the best on this topic.
Another lesson he radically applied is the Pareto principle (also known as 80/20 rule). It applies to so many
dimensions that only about 20% of the inputs generate 80% of the outputs. For Ferriss that means that only about 20%
of the tasks he invested time into while leading his company (or working a previous job) produced 80% of the gains.
Now he argues that one should cut the other 80% of activities and double-down on the vastly more effective 20%.
'Pareto is everywhere' is the quote that sticks with me most and I find that I can apply it in many situations
in my professional life.
Ferriss covers many more interesting topics, making you think about your goals for your life (work vs. leisure) and
challenges if your schedule really reflects these goals (spoiler alert: for most people it doesn't - including me).
I found his concept of mini-retirements very exciting: instead of working all your life for a nice retirement,
do a mini version every other year. Take a couple months off and travel to a new place. Focus on using your
time to learn new cultures, languages, hobbies, etc.
Even if I don't apply everything from the book to my life, it certainly changed my mindset about many things
I never actively questioned. That in itself was very valuable to me and I can only recommend the book if
that sounds exciting to you.
The parts about personal assistants can be skipped or interestingly be compared to the influence of ChatGPT today
and I would certainly skip the outdated chapter about dropshipping and concrete business advice.
To Have and Have Not - Ernest Hemingway (1944)
The only fiction in this list. I typically focus on nonfiction since I think I can take
away more from that. Yet, I really enjoyed reading this one and found some provocing thoughts
about inequality and various aspects about it covered up in the stories.
A great introduction to fiction - I'll surely enjoy this some more in the future.
Finite and Infinite Games - James Carse (1986)
Very abstract and apparently too abstract for me at this time. I read it all the way but I
struggled to constructively apply it to anything I cared about at the time.
Chaos Kings - Scott Patterson (2024)
Scott Patterson is a writer on the financial system and some of its main actors. He wrote three
best-sellers and is a reporter at the Wall Street Journal. I know him from
this
rare interview with one of my favorite authors, the risk expert Nassim Taleb, where they also briefly promote this book. The first chapters
cover the separate biographies of Nassim Taleb and his hedge fund's co-founder Mark Spitznagel. Before they met,
both were successful traders and developed doubts and suspicions in common financial practices by banks and financial
experts. They shared the view and experience that it pays off to bet on outlier events: events deemed so unlikely by
common financial models that most everybody underestimates their likelihood. Taleb writes a lot(!) about this in his Incerto (which I
cover in the next paragraph).
He convincingly makes the case that common financial prediction models are based on simplified assumptions that
don't hold in general. Yet, all common financial experts and decision makers base their actions on the predictions
of these faulty models - seemingly without ever quantifying their accuracy. That leads to immensly underestimated risks of
unlikely events, called Black Swans, a term coined by Taleb's book with the same title.
So Taleb and Spitznagel make their doubts about these risky practices very public. Yet nobody seems to listen and
stop using them. So when they met in 1999, they founded a hedge fund, Empirica.
To sum up their strategy very briefly:
every day they buy cheap options (bets) on events that should only happen every thousand years or so (according to
apparently faulty yet common financial models which underestimate fat tail risks) and mostly lose these bets day
after day. Yet, there are enough crises every other decade that make the bet pay off thousandfold such that
they have immense returns when the market goes down by e.g. 20% in one day. For instance, in the financial crisis of
2008 when the S&P went down 39%, their hedge fund had a 115% gain that year. They promote their strategy to be a
protection against crises. Investors should place only 5% of their assets into their fund to be robust against
such unseen crashes.
I find these stories about the financial system, its crises and the discussions of its faults extremely exciting. While reading,
I even imagined switching jobs into the financial system - yet it seems there's a little more to it than reading
a few mainstream books.
'Chaos Kings' also covers other individuals
who gain from chaos in the financial - and other - markets. Towards the end of the book the extreme risks connected to
climate change are discussed and the very interesting concept behind Ryskex.
In the next section, I'll write more about Taleb's work. 'Chaos Kings' is an easily digestible piece
and a introduction into the domain of Taleb's world so I would recommend it as a first step, if you're in doubt if these
things are of interest to you. Yet, Taleb's ideas range far wider than in the financial sector alone and his unique
way of writing is not reflected in Chaos Kings. So if you're already convinced after the next section, I'd urge you
read the Incerto directly.
Incerto - Nassim Nicholas Taleb
The Incerto is a five-volume work by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. Its titles are:
- Fooled by Randomness (2001)
- The Black Swan (2007)
- The Bed of Procrustes (2008)
- Antifragile (2012)
- Skin in the Game (2018)
It spans over many domains while the
main theme is risks and rationality in the real world. It might be considered philosophy at
times but surely includes some statistics, many financial anecdotes and also general life lessons.
The books are filled with exciting experiences from Taleb's days
as a trader, hedge-fund manager and writer. I find his thoughts provoking - challenging many
common practices while giving rational explanations. He mixes that by frequent comments on the
works of many great intellectuals,
such as Michel de Montaigne, Francis Bacon, Friedrich von Hayek, Henri Poincaré, Karl Popper
and many others whom I didn't read much about before.
I read the Incerto's first title 'Fooled by Randomness' already a couple years ago. At first, I was
unsure what to make of Taleb's aggressive tone. He's not hesitant to call people out
- even popular professors and nobel price winners (of economics). It was hard for me to judge
wether he's just a blown-up bully or if his critique is justified.
So I left it at that.
But then I kept encountering praise for Taleb from thinkers like Naval and Kahneman, so I gave
'The Black Swan' (in which he predicted the crash of 2008) another shot and became a real fanboy,
reading all the other volumes of the Incerto over the past year. Taleb's way of writing is unique
and I grew really fond of it. The concepts can become quite complex but his style
is so enjoyable that I always looked forward to continue.
One of the main lessons I took away is a deep scepticism for how much we know about the world.
It's way too complex for anyone to grasp, yet we act like we do all the time.
Consider the 'hindsight bias' for stock prices. Every day a different stock is widely discussed in daily news
and so many people talk about how this and that caused the effect. The twist is that
people only claim to understand the obvious causality after the fact. They say it's obvious Nvidia
boomed in recent years since it produces GPUs that are crucial for training AI models.
Taleb counters with 'talk is cheap', 'don't tell me what you think, show me your portfolio.'
It's a sharp way of saying: your real beliefs are revealed by what you do with your money
(or time, or actions), not by what you say. How many really trusted the obvious fact that Nvidia's stock
will skyrocket and bought some before it did?
From my experience that point is proven by all the people
who study finance, work in the field for years and still don't end up becoming millionaires.
It's too complex to understand. This realization freed me from the fear-of-missing-out of not doing
day trading or investing in single stocks or cryptocurrencies. Now I'm very happy to just bet on the general market
and enjoy the bliss of ignorance by not checking my performance in months.
Another insight worth mentioning is Taleb's description of the Lindy effect: Technology / products / practices
are likely to be still in existance for as long as they already exist. Applied to books this
means that books published 10 years ago, which are still being read, are likely to being read for another
10 years. In contrast, the newest book of my favorite author that is hyped all over the
place might only last for another few months. It's even more extreme in the sciences where
lots of papers are hyped after their release but only very few stand the test of time.
To me that realization came as a surprise, yet it makes so much sense if you think about it.
Previously I thought: 'The older the less relevant'. Now I believe:
'The older the more significant'.
As you see from the publication dates of the books I write about here, most of them already
survived at least one decade.
There are so many more inspiring insights that I might dedicate a full post to the Incerto in
the future. Let me leave it by saying that Taleb's work is unique, significant and enticing,
yet it takes some acceptance for his style and its themes might not be for everyone. Also, he sometimes
repeats himself over the five books but I didn't mind it much.
Little Bets - Peter Sims (2011)
In this short publication Peter Sims elaborates on a lesson that I read about repeatedly in the works of Nassim Taleb, David Epstein, and Walter Isaacson.
They recommend tinkering with small experiments to make new discoveries about what works for you instead of creating huge plans
upfront while becoming unable to react to changing circumstances and unforseen consequences.
Sims shows why this is important from different points of view that I found telling and interesting.
I want to keep it short so here's my summary of the book's conclusion:
As kids, we play and experiment a lot. Yet we lose this curiosity and failing is seen as something bad. Try out more new things and beware your
perfectionism - don't discourage yourself - it's great if it's not perfect for the first try.
These insights gave me the courage for tackling some long-envisioned private and professional projects,
such as getting a programmable split keyboard and a 3D printer,
solving the previous Advent of Code in Rust,
setting up my own website, writing this post, and others.
Thanks for reading!
I'm happy you made it through here! This was my longest post so far and I wrote on it for quite a while.
I hope you caught some interest in the books, my thoughts on them or reading in general.
I'm certainly grateful that all these great pieces were recommended to me and I have such wisdom at my hands!
If you have any thought on this post, or know of books I might like, please don't hesitate to reach out to me!
Thanks for sticking around and happy reading!