Arsen Zahray's Reviews > Thinking, Fast and Slow

The author provides some really interesting examples of human behavior, but his understanding of economics is rather limited. In particular, he tries replacing economics with "mathematical economics", which treats humans as automatons and has been proven as wrong in theory (Mises) and in practice (notably, Long Term Capital Management, but also option price calculation formula, which Taleb's strategy claims to exploit). He also, for whatever reason believes that this is the model that lies behind libertarianism. This is really annoying because libertarianism is actually based on Austrian school, not mathematical school (which is an offshoot of Keynesianism).

However, his examples of asymmetry in choices (like the difference between how we treat gains and losses), are interesting and have improved my understanding of how trading works. Nevertheless, the author believes that this asymmetry is from one side irrational, and, from the other side, should be exploited by public policy to change people's behaviors.