Book Worm

It was ten years back when I was first introduced to the field of human behaviour and psychological biases. Having read a couple of dozen books on this topic, it has now become hard to find a volume with information which is not familiar to me. However, what continues to amaze (and entertain) me are the examples and case studies of people (including my own adventures often pointed out by others) that confirm the statement — We are not rational beings. We are rationalizing beings.

This aspect of human irrationality — that it can’t be overcome and keeps us mired in a behaviour similar to a kid with her hand stuck in the cookie jar because she refuses to open the fist — is what makes this subject so much fun. Once you’ve learnt enough about the broad spectrum of cognitive errors, it affords you a lifetime of entertainment content, provided you pause and watch your own actions and the way people around you make decisions.
[Read more…] about Bookworm: You Are Not so Smart by David Mcraney

The problem with Taleb is not that he’s an a**hole. He as an a**hole. The problem with Taleb is that he is right.

Those are not my words. It’s from one of the blurbs for Taleb’s book Skin in The Game. And among many other surprising things about the book, one is that all the blurbs that appear on the jacket aren’t from other famous authors. Taleb took the testimonials from ordinary readers and printed it on the back of the book. Not because other famous authors weren’t willing to offer their testimonials — many of them would be honoured to do that — but it’s because Taleb doesn’t care.

Those who have read his books agree on one thing — Taleb is idiosyncratic and he is a genius.

In out bookworm series we have already reviewed Nassim Taleb’s earlier books — Fooled by Randomness, The Black Swan, The Bed of Procrustes, and Antifragile. Skin in the Game is Taleb’s latest book. It came out last year (2018) and I had been sitting on it for quite a while. Last month I finally managed to finish reading it. Like all Taleb’s books, this one also needs to be read at least twice (perhaps thrice) to be able to absorb all the wisdom in a meaningful way.
[Read more…] about Bookworm: Skin in The Game by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

In today’s world, we’re all designers. Whether it’s creating a powerpoint presentation, designing a website for your startup, creating a flyer for your kid’s school event or even taking a decision about your home interiors — we’re always dealing with design problems.

Most people believe that design skills are reserved for the creative lot — those who have a talent for art. But it’s not commonly known that a lot of aspects of design are actually rule-based. There’s a science to it; a formula if you will. And one doesn’t need to have an “eye” for design. Knowing the rules is good enough for us civilians.

Let me give you a few examples to make it more concrete what I mean by rules.

The L-shaped Layout

If you talk to landscape designers, they will tell you that it’s better to put three of the same kind of vertical structures — they could be pillars or trees — in your land, rather than four. Odd numbers just look better in that context. Now, why is it so is a matter of deeper investigation of human perception, but if you know this rule, you can instantly become an above average designer.
[Read more…] about Bookworm: Universal Principles of Design

If you’ve been a long time reader of Value Investing Almanack, you’d have guessed that I am a big fan of Scott Adams. For the uninitiated, Scott Adams is the creator of Dilbert, one of the most popular and widely distributed comic strips of the past century. He has been a full-time cartoonist since 1995, after sixteen years as a technology worker for companies like Crocker National Bank and Pacific Bell. Apart from being a cartoonist he has written many bestselling books and is sought after speaker in corporate circles.

I had written about this book in December 2015 issue of VIA. However, some books are so good that they deserved to be read multiple times. This book falls in the category of those “must re-reads.” Don’t let the slipshod title fool you. I can vouch for the tremendous utility of Scott’s methods.
[Read more…] about Bookworm: Revisiting How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big

Bruce Lee once said, “I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.”

If I had to reframe Bruce Lee’s quote in the context of reading books, I would say, “I fear not the man who has read many books, but I fear the man who has read one good book many times.”

A good book gets better at the second reading, writes Nassim Taleb, “a great book at the third. Any book not worth rereading isn’t worth reading.”

Books-read is just a vanity metric, claims Naval Ravikant, a silicon valley entrepreneur, “if you read one book a year that changes your life, that’s all it takes.”

So to follow the advice of Bruce Lee, Nassim Taleb, and Naval Ravikant, we are going to review a book which we’ve discussed in the past — Sapiens. The author — Yuval Noah Harari — a history professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has produced a breathtaking piece of work. I had shared a few ideas from this book in Nov 2016 issue of Value Investing Almanack. In this post, let me discuss a few more insights from Yuval Harari’s masterpiece.
[Read more…] about Bookworm: Revisiting Sapiens