Contents
- 1. The consequences of the pandemic – moving work and study online and growing interest in local politics
- 2. In the near future, humanity is not waiting for a global war
- 3. Growth in the number of enterprises around the world will solve most social problems
- 4. Changing the cultural paradigm will solve the problem of religious violence
- 5. The biggest risks are public debt and oil prices
Which predictions of the former trader came true, and which ones were intervened by the “black swans”
Nassim Nicholas Taleb has long gained a reputation as a visionary in the world of statistics. His 2007 bestseller The Black Swan revolutionized risk assessment and established Taleb as one of the world’s most famous thinkers. What the American writer and former trader thinks about the future – in a selection of predictions from Trends.
1. The consequences of the pandemic – moving work and study online and growing interest in local politics
The COVID-19 pandemic has been going on for over a year now. Philosophers and analysts have already made thousands of suggestions about how much our lives will change after everything is over. In an interview with Pro, Taleb was categorical: many familiar signs of civilization will remain in the past:
“When the first fax machines appeared, many felt that they would “destroy cities” – after all, documents can now be exchanged at a distance. The same was said after the advent of the Internet. But now Zoom and other video telephony programs are actually fulfilling those predictions. Why would I have to travel somewhere, spending half a day getting to work when I can communicate with colleagues from New York from my home in Atlanta?
In addition, according to Taleb, many companies will reduce the number of office jobs, and people will move from densely populated metropolitan areas to the periphery or the countryside. The education sector will not escape change either: campus areas will shrink, more and more courses will move online.
Another unexpected consequence: people’s interest in politics at the local level.
“Now people understand that their quality of life is affected not only by the country, but also by a particular state or city. For example, the governor of Ohio is doing a better job than Donald Trump. This is a reason to move to Ohio, ”said Taleb.
Some of the effects of the pandemic predicted by Taleb have already taken effect. According to EY, 67% of consumers make purchases within 5 km from home [1], and European analysts estimate a 10% drop in demand for office rental in the center of European cities over the past year. [2] However, it is too early to rush to conclusions: employers note the need for face-to-face meetings for effective business conduct [3], and the widespread transition to online education has led to a significant gap in academic performance between well-to-do and low-income schoolchildren and students, so the expectation of obsolescence of campuses may be premature. [four]
By the way, Taleb does not consider the coronavirus pandemic a “black swan” and predicted the threat of a global disease back in 2017.
2. In the near future, humanity is not waiting for a global war
According to Taleb, despite the tense relations between a number of countries, a global war should not be expected in the near future.
“War is good for some states and some companies, but not too many. Most often, powers that can really afford to wage war prefer to wage it by proxy,” he said. [5]
At the same time, Taleb is known for his polemics with scientist and popularizer of science Steven Pinker about the latter’s theory that violence around the world is gradually decreasing. According to Taleb, Pinker’s optimistic observations are nothing more than the result of “naive empiricism” and are not supported by statistical data.
In his blog on Medium, Taleb spoke rather sharply about NGOs and traditional institutions of power – in his opinion, volunteering is not capable of solving all problems, and state institutions are too archaic. The solution to the problem will be the mass exodus of active young people into business.
“Take risks and, if you get rich (optional), spend your money generously on others. We need people who take limited risks. We need to move away from abstract universal goals, sociotechnics that bring side risks to society,” Taleb instructs. [6]
4. Changing the cultural paradigm will solve the problem of religious violence
In a recent post on Medium, Taleb scathingly criticizes sociologist and philosopher Max Weber’s famous theory about the relationship between religious ethics and economic norms. Everything is exactly the opposite, Taleb believes: it is the economic basis and cultural norms that determine the level of violence in a particular religious environment.
“Changing religious doctrines will lead nowhere. It is necessary to change the mentality and cultural norms, if possible. Ultimately, for the economic development of a social group, it is important not what religion it professes, but what cultural norms operate in it,” Taleb notes.
He cites the strict diet in Jewish religious law as an example: it was the prescribed diet that united the Jews and allowed them to preserve their cultural identity.
5. The biggest risks are public debt and oil prices
Taleb spoke about this in an interview with Forbes in 2016.
“There are several vulnerabilities in the global economy right now. First, it is a huge amount of accumulated debts in Western countries, which significantly exceed the level of a decade ago. This is one of the major risks. Secondly, it is a decline in demand for oil, which could turn into a catastrophe. A “boom” in renewable energy sources, including solar, could begin if oil demand falls by 10%. For many budgets, the decline in oil demand will be critical. And it will be a disaster, ”the thinker emphasized.
However, as Taleb noted, the forecasts themselves are not so important: the main thing is not whether the predictor guessed right or not, but how, as a result, these predictions affect the reputation and players in the market. “Speculators do not earn truth/falsity points, but money,” ironically the philosopher.
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