The "John Doe" Posts No.3 - Envy: The Consolations (or not) of 'The Black Swan'

Jan 22, 2010



In Nassem Nicholas Taleb’s ‘The Black Swan’, in a chapter called ‘Giacomo Casanova’s Unfailing Luck’, he points out the inevitable narrative bias in the stories that we read. Taleb relates how ‘Casanova felt that every time he got into difficulties, his lucky star… would pull him out of trouble’. But Casanova’s luck, it is argued, should not necessarily be seen as evidence that destiny favoured him above all others. Rather, out of all the ‘risk-takers’ in history who got themselves into scrape after scrape, there is going to be someone (or a few someones) that will pretty much always get out of them. And the stories we read will be written by these winners (the losers may well not live to tell their tales), who will attribute their success to their cunning, their charm, or their outlook on life, and pretty much anything besides their dumb luck in being one of the fortunate survivors.

Another example that Taleb gives are the books written by self-made millionaires providing tips and insights into how they made their dough. They will talk about what happened to them, and then make the generalisation that, if others only follow the same steps, they will get the same result. What they don’t see is that many other people with similar attributes did not turn out to have the same extraordinary level of success (while some were even miserable failures), because very few people want to read about those who did not succeed.

This line of reasoning potentially provides some consolation as to why you may be an excellent writer, musician, or stock market speculator and still, no matter how hard you try, not have the world at your feet. Or does it? The problem is that what Taleb calls the ‘narrative fallacy’ is so widespread that you will have a hard time convincing those smug, successful stock market speculators (or conversely, those who were abject failures) that their position in life is due in large part to blind luck. No doubt many of them will say you are making excuses for your lack of similar success. And they may well be right to an extent, but not as right as they think. In that case, if you want to wipe the smile off their face, perhaps the best you can do is hope that their dose of bad luck is just around the corner.