[YouTube] Nassim Taleb on Risks, Gold, Private Markets, Trump Tariffs

On By In Economics, Politics, Videos

Nassim Taleb, author of “The Black Swan,” and scientific advisor at Universa Investments, says he doesn’t think the “consciousness of risks” has improved over the last 25 years. He discusses the increasing US deficit, gold as a reserve currency, the opacity of private markets, and why the Trump administration’s approach to tariffs “makes no sense.”

00:00 – Taleb on “consciousness of risks”
02:12 – What drives markets
04:23 – Taleb on the US dollar and gold as a reserve currency
07:18 – Nassim Taleb on hedge funds and the opacity of private markets
09:33 – Trump administration’s tariff approach “makes no sense,” Nassim Taleb says

[Podcast] Nassim Nicholas Taleb to Appear on Bloomberg’s Odd Lots Live – June 26

On By In Podcasts
Nassim Nicholas Taleb to Appear on Bloomberg’s Odd Lots Live

Bloomberg’s Odd Lots podcast will hold a live recording in New York City on June 26, 2025, featuring Nassim Nicholas Taleb among several scheduled speakers. The podcast, hosted by Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway, covers topics in finance, markets, and economics.

The event will be held at Racket NYC, 431 W 16th St. Doors open at 7:00 PM; the program begins at 7:30 PM.

Confirmed speakers include:

  • Nassim Nicholas Taleb – Honorary Scientist, Universa Investments
  • Jim Chanos – President and Founder, Chanos & Company
  • Bob Brackett – Senior Analyst, Bernstein Research
  • Ira Jersey – Chief U.S. Interest Rate Strategist, Bloomberg Intelligence
  • Nellie Liang – Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution
  • Charlie McElligot – Cross-Asset Macro Strategist, Nomura
  • Emily Sundberg – Editor, Feed Me
  • Josh Younger – Lecturer, Columbia University

Additional information is available at: https://www.bloombergevents.com/oddlotsliveNY

[Medium] IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle (Argument Closed)

On By In Statements, Writing

UPDATE

ARGUMENT CLOSED (2025): The argument is now closed thanks to paper by Brown, Wai, and Chabris that tried to rebut the piece below, but confirmed all of its conclusions. The piece, most recent one on IQ and relying on multi-cohort studies, unintentially showed that IQ explains almost nothing in educational attainment, occupational attainment, and …income! And that, in spite of the circularity. I did not notice the paper until 2024.

Link: medium.com/incerto/iq-is-largely-a-pseudoscientific-swindle

[Medium] Foreword to Pierre Zalloua’s book Ancestors: Identity and DNA in the Levant

On By In Academic, Writing

Some people believe that the Levant is the end of the East and a portal to the West; others describe it as the end of the West and a portal to the East. Those in the first group tend to belong to the main branches of the Islamic faith, while those in the second belong to various Christian Levantine churches. Now, one might think that the two descriptions are equivalent: an intersection, after all, is an intersection. However, by the same mechanism that generates the so-called ‘narcissism of small differences,’ not only are these two statements not equivalent, but they are, in practice, contradictory. It even took a civil war for the Lebanese to understand this fallacy.

Read the complete foreword on Medium.

Get the book on Amazon.