Incerto (Deluxe Edition): Fooled by Randomness, the Black Swan, the Bed of Procrustes, Antifragile, Skin in the Game

I have read Fooled by randomness which I enjoyed quite a lot. When I saw this 5 book set and the price was 50% it was an instant choice to purchase. The books itself are very nicely done and they come with a stylist presentation box. Perfect for any library or gift.

Excellent books for anyone who enjoys critical thinking. Nassim’s style is somewhat unorthodox with lots of short stories or points simply expressed. If anything, there’s too many important points to take away instantly but once reading his stuff a bit more the messages tend to stick. As for the actual hardcover books, they are lovely too look at. Only drawback is the cover can collect dust/fluff quite easily but can be brushed off quite easily.

I am reviewing the set as a physical object, not the books as texts. The books are rather big, but not heavy, binding is smith-sewn, not glued. Paper is of decent enough quality and the books are definitely made to last and withstand multiple readings. Perhaps, I'd like the size of the font to be a bit larger. But on the whole I am very pleased with the quality of the set.

The exterior is beautiful, with the box and the book covers made from a black fabric that is satisfying to hold. The gold inscription contrasts well and the bind quality is excellent. The only negative is one also noted by others - the paper used is just a shade too thin, meaning that occasionally the text from the opposite page is visible. For me, this is only really noticeable on the pages which follow chapter headings (which have bigger and bolder type). The rest of the time I barely notice and it’s not enough to spoil the books for me by any means. I have included a picture of both a chapter page and a non chapter page so the reader can judge for themselves. Reprint these with slightly higher quality paper and they will be a perfect collection for any Taleb fan

From a distance, the collection looks great, but up close, it looks terrible. The books are easily damaged, and the quality of the fabric isn’t that great, so I wouldn’t call this “deluxe” at all. The third volume also made me want to scream my head off from how cringey it was, the poetry section. Also, please don’t believe any legal opinions he writes. I know that the author isn’t a legal expert, but he makes a lot of legal opinions and claims that are completely false or misguided. His legal opinions are supposed to serve as illustrations for his arguments, so please take them with a grain of salt. Some volumes were fun, and a lot of sections shine when the author talks rationally, but there’s a decent amount of ranting which I didn’t like. Overall, I wouldn’t recommend unless you’re bored. I read all of them while waiting for meetings, but I can’t imagine myself reading them any other time.

What a cheap effort. Random House should know better. D. S. Sisko and Madison Mark reviewing here cover the problem but are too generous in their rating. A review of a box set like this is a review of the boxed set and has nothing to do with the ideas therein. The decision to use a cloth /canvas cover is daft. I expect to be able to pull out a volume from a box on the shelf, without a wrestling match. Taleb knows a lot about Incerto, but I am Certo about this crappy publication; bad design, no luxe, nor deluxe. Avoid and buy the original hardbacks, if you must, and teach Random House the meaning of skin in the game.

NICELY PACKAGED AND PRESENTED. GOOD QUALITY. BIT ON THE EXPENSIVE SIDE.

The package was delivered really fast. The quality is amazing. Looking forward to reading them and enjoying them in my library.

A product good for the wife who loves a beautiful bookshelf and a husband who loves idea's about investing. Of course, anyone can like these things. Highly recommend.

Wisdom you can't gain yourself in a lifetime without the great Talebs help.

I'm a professional Data Scientist with almost a decade of experience at this point and throughout my whole career I've had a deep sense of unease with expert knowledge, prediction, and the successes and failures of models both machine learning and statistical. I ran across NNT in various places for his radical, but rigorous take downs of many statistical concepts that I had developed independently. I think I came into the profession having high esteem of correlation, then had even less of it excepting in linear domains, and then an NNT video destroyed the rest as he pointed out some basics (the majority of interesting real world data sets aren't linear). From there I devoured many of his white papers, his videos, and great twitter feed. So this year I decided to buy this series and get even further into his work. As I'm finishing up Skin in the Game right now (with the technical companion on the way) I can say that this series is fantastic for the practitioner or layman alike. These books will describe many of the failures of statistics, modeling, prediction, and why they occur in a readable manner for any college (or perhaps well read layman) to digest even if one doesn't understand the mathematics. You'll have less respect for experts (but also less respect for contrarians who disregard the experts) and a more thorough understanding of the many dimensions these failures reverberate through in medicine, philosophy, social sciences, finance, economics, politics and more. I myself will probably have to read it again. As with all great thinkers, I don't know if I agree with 100% of NNT's opinions in this book, but like those great thinkers, his thinking is almost completely unique and even when you disagree with him you have to really think about why you disagree with him. I hope this series and the rest of his works survive the great filter into the future where works of utility to mankind end up. Can't recommend it enough.

Es lo que esperaba pero es un poco caro