Taleb's writing style is atrocious and his personality obnoxious, but his fundamental ideas are profoundly interesting and important. At its root is the idea th

Taleb's writing style is atrocious and his personality obnoxious, but his fundamental ideas are profoundly interesting and important. At its root is the idea that we humans don't understand the world we live in, but we think we do. This is just as true of "intellectuals", whose lack of understanding is merely better concealed. (Most of Taleb's critics are those, like professors, government big wigs, mainstream media editors and pundits, and the like, whose personal power depends on their ability to convince others that they understand the world better than we do.) Taleb's books, unlike almost all other "policy" books, isn't about replacing the bad theories of others with his own correct theories. It is about how best to live well despite our lack of correct theories. He examines the implications of this idea in many, MANY areas, and I think he draws the wrong conclusions some of the time. The needs of his own personality are omnipresent, which gets very tedious. But this idea of how to live well in a world nobody understands is a fascinating, and potentially very valuable, concept to explore. Taleb's books force me to ponder this question more thoroughly than any others I've read.