Explaining path dependence and maximum drawdown. I made a mistake in terminology. What I called max drawdown is a local or “window drawdown” or “peak to the subsequent valley”. The real max drawdown is the one that goes from the peak to 80.
Category: Statements
[YouTube] Simpson’s Paradox & Its Exploitation by Covid Sociopaths
In every age bracket, the vaccinated live longer than the unvaccinated. However as a group, the unvaccinated appear to have a longer life expectancy. This is because the vaccinated tend to be older (hence more likely to die). I explain Simpson’s Paradox in general.
Note: I used the vaccinated/unvaccinated ratio for 50-60 vs 10-20 of Oct 2021, so don’t bug me if it rose since; no effect on the point so long as there is an inequality.
[YouTube] Supply Chain: The Convexity in 2 ½ minutes
An antifragility tutorial, with application to supply chains.
[YouTube] Detecting Quackery in a Psychology Paper
A simple case study where model error shows the claims in a paper published in a “prestigious” psychology journal to be false. Why worry about low R^2.
[Medium] Snowden, Phony hence Traitor?

When you catch someone with a shoddy-but-carefully-curated story, Edward Snowden, producing the mother of bad faith arguments (in effect, lying) while, in addition, facilitating a character assassination (and severe cyberharassment), something very, very sinister about the person emerges that can help answer some fundamental yet still hanging questions.
Continue reading on Medium: medium.com/incerto/snowden-phony-hence-traitor-86ee41197578
[YouTube] A Conversation between Nassim Nicholas Taleb and Stephen Wolfram at the Wolfram Summer School 2021
Stephen Wolfram plays the role of Salonnière in this new, ongoing series of intellectual explorations with special guests.
[YouTube] Explanations for the last video (Difference Between Clinical and Evidence-Based Knowledge)
Explanations for the last video [Difference Between Clinical and Evidence-Based Knowledge]: Why the statistical properties of a group will NOT particularize to any individual member of the group.
[YouTube] Evidence-Based Science & Mistakes in Particularizing the General (Simplified)
1) The law of large numbers (properties of aggregates) works in one direction. Why you can generalize from particulars, never particularize from generals.
2) The difference between clinical, statistical, and risk management approached. Why they don’t scale.
3) Never compare Mediocristan to Extremistan (Covid to car accidents).
[YouTube] Comments on the “Bitcoin Black Paper” (Why Bitcoin is Worth Exactly 0)
Erratum: the equation at 3:40 of the video must include the discounting inside the summation (1/1+r)^i
Link to Bitcoin Black Paper – fooledbyrandomness.com/BTC-QF.pdf
Link to Supplementary Material / Simplifications – fooledbyrandomness.com/BTC-QF-appendix.pdf
Paper: Bitcoin, Currencies, and Bubbles
This discussion applies quantitative finance methods and economic arguments to cryptocurrencies in general and bitcoin in particular —as there are about $10,000$ cryptocurrencies, we focus (unless otherwise specified) on the most discussed crypto of those that claim to hue to the original protocol \cite{nakamoto2009bitcoin} and the one with, by far, the largest market capitalization.
Link to Paper – fooledbyrandomness.com/BTC-QF.pdf
Answering questions and providing derivations for the #bitcoinblackpaper
Link to Supplementary Material / Simplifications – fooledbyrandomness.com/BTC-QF-appendix.pdf