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Comment by scrumper | Hacker News Reader

Looks like it's time to add NNT to the Stephen Wolfram list of people whom it's fashionable to criticize reflexively because of their style.

I've been reading the draft chapters of this latest book on Medium for a while now. There is real insight here, at least to someone like me who isn't smart enough to have figured the entire world out from first principles yet.

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No, you’re misunderstanding (some) of the criticism. I actually enjoyed Fooled by Randomness mostly because of the meandering style. I loathe his recent work, both on paper and onTwitter, because he’s turned into just another “The West is commiting suicide” islamophobe (plus the usual assortment of misogyny and fawning over dictators like Duterte).

That's not completely fair. In his latest interview with Gad Saad, he makes the critical distinction between the danger of Salafism/Wahhabism and the relative benign nature of Shiite Islam. He takes offense at "BS vendors" like Sam Harris who lump all of Islam into a fearmongering category.

The “suicide” line was a direct quote from a recent article of his. It just struck a chord with me because that exact phrase happens to be one of the slogans of my country’s alt-right party.

In the article, he mostly talked about the danger of allowing halal food in “our” supermarkets. Since Shiites share their Sunni breathrens’ food preferences, Taleb should maybe take more care to allow his nuanced view of the world to shine through in his shorter works, lest he be misunderstood for an old egomaniac trying to ride the current wave of hatred to one last moment in the spotlight.

Re: Halal - That part of the book[1] talks about minority rule and the idea of 'renormalization groups' (I suspect not really the same thing as the identically-named concept in mathematics). It covers Kosher food, organic food, non-GMO food, Halal food, Christian intolerance, and politics. So saying it is about the "danger of halal food in our supermarkets" isn't accurate. It is explaining the mechanism by which a small, intolerant minority is able to have its views spread.

[1] http://fooledbyrandomness.com/minority.pdf

> he makes the critical distinction between the danger of Salafism/Wahhabism and the benign nature of Shiite Islam.

Pretending that the dangers within Islam are isolated to particular Sunni sects and that there's none of that dangerous religiously grounded violent extremism on the Shi’a side of the divide is, to be sure, a different error than typical “The West is dying” islamophobia, but no less of one.

What is the punishment for homosexuality within Shia Islam? What about apostasy? Caling it benign is what I'd call vending BS.

Nope, don't think I am.

That's also style. SW self-aggrandizes and arrogates credit while he talks about CAs and complexity; NNT bloviates and inflames while discussing statistics.

Your comment says that you don't like his work because he's an Islamophobic, misogynistic, dictatorphile: you loathe certain elements of his style - aspects of the form that his function is wrapped in, so to speak - to the point where you no longer appreciate his ideas. Those ideas haven't changed: they're still about skin in the game, resilience, randomness... All the stuff you liked in Fooled by Randomness.

All of which is fine! I'm not trying to change your mind at all.

Islamophobia and misogyny are stylistic criticisms?

I only know him from Medium and Twitter, haven‘t noticed misoginy so far. Got an example?

How did you manage to take someone's dislike of value, like Islamaphobia or liking dictators, and decide that meant there was only an issue with the authors style? Style is how you present your views, not the views themselves

Because those are personal attributes of the author, not aspects of the work itself. The book isn't a collection of his tweets. What does his admiration for dictators have to do with his explanation of the Lindy Effect?

I realize today we are obliged to write off every aspect of a person's work due to their personal failings, related or otherwise. Personally I don't think that is a good or healthy thing to do; nobody is perfect and we risk throwing out an awful lot of babies in our desire to bathe only in clean water.

Ah I hadnt realized, thought OP meant it was in the book. I agree with your assessment then

It is in the book. See the satirical take by the Guardian posted elsewhere in this thread: Anyway, want to know why Islam is taking over the world? It’s because Muslims have more skin in the game. They are prepared to shout loudest and bully people into becoming Muslim. Christians take note.

Does anyone have a quote directly from the book? I agree with the point that a broken clock can be right twice a day, so someone with opinions I find reprehensible about subject a might have rational arguments concerning opinion b.

However since we are talking about concrete examples instead of theoreticals, I'd need to see some quotes to come to a conclusion at this point with multiple people telling me opposing statements as fact

If it helps, I posted a link to a draft of that chapter above. A big chunk of the text of SitG is on that site. It isn't a long read, and we all know what you can do with a single quote taken out of context, so I'd suggest going there.

It really is interesting how 95% of attacks are ad hominem without any substantial counter arguments. He has some strange ideas sometimes, but the central ideas are pretty solid imho.

Suddenly Silicon Valley progressives hate Taleb as they realize he doesn’t share their views. It’s almost comical.

Yeah, obviously Silicon Valley doesn’t deadlift......dot

Taleb is in my "Stephen Wolfram" list too. I'm curious, who else is in yours?

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