BLACK SWAN THEORY.

"The expression 'black swan' describes impossibility - something that cannot exist, and was popular in 16th century London coming from the notion that 'all swans must be white'! After 'discovering' Australia in the 18th century and finding black swans the term evolved into meaning something that had perceived impossibility but that was later found to exist. In his book 'The Black Swan' of 2007, Nassim Taleb describes all major events, discoveries and accomplishments in history as black swan events - unpredicted. Writing in the New York Times, Taleb asserted, "What we call here a Black Swan (and capitalize it) is an event with the following three attributes. First, it is an outlier, as it lies outside the realm of regular expectations, because nothing in the past can convincingly point to its possibility. Second, it carries an extreme impact. Third, in spite of its outlier status, human nature makes us concoct explanations for its occurrence after the fact, making it explainable and predictable. I stop and summarize the triplet: rarity, extreme impact, and retrospective (though not prospective) predictability. A small number of Black Swans explain almost everything in our world, from the success of ideas and religions, to the dynamics of historical events, to elements of our own personal lives."

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BLACK SWAN THEORY. justin

Bristol, UK, 2009