Fooled by Randomness came up with a genuine on-air endorsement 7 times across the episodes we processed. This page collects every one of those moments: who said it, what they said, and the exact point in the episode.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb wrote Fooled by Randomness decades ago, yet it keeps resurfacing, 7 times so far across Lex Fridman and Tim Ferriss alone. Guests reach for it whenever the conversation turns to luck, risk, or why success gets misread as skill.
Below is the full list of who brought it up and what they said about it, each tied to the exact timestamp in the source episode. No summaries, just the actual on-air words.
"[Taleb is] Wall Street's principal dissident. . . . [Fooled By Randomness] is to conventional Wall Street wisdom approximately what Martin Luther's ninety-nine theses were to the Catholic Church."--Malcolm Gladwell, The New Yorker Finally in paperback, the word-of-mouth sensation that will change the way you think about the markets and the world. This book is about luck: more precisely how we perceive luck in our personal and professional experiences.
Where to get it & every mention“his book Fooled by Randomness is awesome ... Fooled by Randomness is I think the better of all of his books” — Nick Kokonas 01:09:46
Tim Ferriss 10-year anniversary super combo: Naval Ravikant on honesty, habits, and happiness, plus Nick Kokonas on asymmetric risk and reinventing restaurants.
“his first book was called fooled by randomness great book it's a fabulous book a lot of people's reaction to that book was oh there's nothing new in there” — Russ Roberts 01:20:17
Economist Russ Roberts on why life's biggest decisions can't be solved with cost-benefit analysis, and what makes a life well lived.
“Antifragile, Fooled by Randomness, and The Black Swan... I found all of them to be very thought-provoking, and worth reading, and I don't say that lightly” — Tim Ferriss 01:19:25
Tim Ferriss answers live and submitted Q&A on sleep, parenting, fear, mood, psychedelics, learning, and travel.
“I think Taleb and Black Swan, Fooled by Randomness, read those books. Just start to read Fooled by Randomness and Black Swan” — Tim Ferriss 01:12:43
Josh Waitzkin turns the tables on Tim Ferriss, probing gating questions, the entanglement of genius and wounds, surrender, and preparing for accelerating change.
“a series of books by nicholas taleb about fooled by randomness and black swan highly recommend them” — guest 00:19:10
MIT roboticist Russ Tedrake on why robots should embrace contact, softness, and physics instead of fighting gravity.
“fooled by randomness is over and over again a book that I come back to and have suggested to people to read during this” — Nick Kokonas 01:25:56
Restaurateur Nick Kokonas explains how Alinea and his Tock startup pivoted to record revenue during the COVID-19 shutdown through asymmetric thinking and rapid execution.
“The Black Swan or Fooled by Randomness specifically I think helped to explain what we are contending with... I think that is that is worth reading.” — Ryan Holiday 00:48:59
Ryan Holiday and Tim Ferriss apply Stoic philosophy to the COVID-19 crisis, choosing alive time over dead time.
