5 comments about The Black Swan: Second Edition: The Impact of the Highly Improbable: With a new section: "On Robustness and Fragility".

1. First, understand that I say everything here in the same spirit that I give my 20 something daughter advice: This is all TIOLI: "Take It Or Leave It."
   
   Had I read the reviews and discussions before reading the book, I might have held off on buying it since after a ways into it I'd actually give it a one star but because of the many thoughtful reviews and discussions it's worth a five. First, a few cliches: Recent quote:" I used to think my brain was the most important organ. Then I realized who was telling me this."- a Google Widget."Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but not their facts."-? "Life is so miraculous it's surprising we have time to think about anything else."- Somewhere in the NY Times. To really appreciate this last one it helps to have had a near-death experience. I was fortunate enough to recently have had two within a year. Terrified the hoo-ha out of me and I'm now somewhat disabled but I wouldn't trade those experiences for anything. Many situations are hopeless but not all that serious. It's much easier now to dispense with so much recieved wisdom, especially those spoken by The Great Mother of Money and Schedules. It's a lot more fun to pick on liars, mosquitoes and moral gnats than before and to do it as noisily as possible. Little else has the power to make you certain than personal experience, with the qualification that it be extreme and preferably adverse. Coming into large sums of money is assuredly adverse, but in the end it makes things harder to enjoy because of money's ability to perform magic tricks and delude you into thinking that endurance and exertion are useless anachronisms. My only regret is that I thought near death, while it changed me radically, would have changed me more, like they would have shown me that there is color darker than black and that even the sweetest, most evidence-based grudge should be easy to give up....not so. Therefore I will have to settle for becoming an "Almost Buddhist." Those who drew up the plans for the human mind were first order pranksters who probably had been bullied in childhood. The mind, it seems, craves certainty but "exists" in a "universe" in which certainty is defined by the epistemology of the definer. Therefore we are faced with the one thing I can recall from high school algebra that has practical relevance, unlike cosines and unreal numbers or whatever numbers that don't exist but are called and which I'm told are useful to mathematicians. It's the same with Zombies. They don't exist but they're useful to screenwriters and eccentrics of various stripes. Anyway, I found the idea of the "asymptote" positively enchanting: the formula for a curve that when graphed will always approach the axis but never reach it. That's a certainty only because numbers are a language that can do what all languages can do: say what they want. So I like to think of certainty, or complete knowledge, as as something like true love: a mentally tranquil and reassuring metaverse that you can always get halfway to but never reach. It's the "unreachability" that makes me certain. Science is the anonymous sum of collected information that has the illusion of truth; it can and must be consensually validated by empirical evidence that can be replicated and held to a standard of truth, the whole truth and nothing but statistics. Until it is pointed out, most everyone confuses truth with reality, which is simply what one experiences and ironically is the absolute opposite of truth. To confuse matters further, we have religion, for those who have been robbed of their sovereign right "to experience" as children or those who are afraid to grow up and require "a being" to depend on for security, a proxy for Mom and Dad. Rest assured, if you think this is just a lot of babbling, you should read what I'd say if I didn't have to run off now for a night of carousing with my Recovering UFO Buff group. Let me just leave you with this "The truth hurts." "There are no easy answers" "Everything is a trade-off." The book will likely be more enjoyable if you think of it as a personal narrative in drag.



2. I wanted to like this book because I can identify with many of the premises. I abhor the faulty use of models - mathematical and otherwise - and I certainly believe in skepticism. But reading this book was, like interviewing a brilliant psychotic, painful. The author doth protest too much -- railing against academics, Frenchmen, bankers (easy targets...yes?)-- but in the end the most an intelligent reader will get is the banal observation that models used outside of their appropriate domain are inaccurate and that unpredictable events are...well..unpredictable. The author has obviously been neglected by the academic establishment and he is hurt, and can't wait to share his wide breadth of knowledge and prove that he is smarter than all those ignorant fools and that he doesn't care anyway. It comes across as a temperamental spoiled brat on the playground. The flight of ideas, forced little tidbits from philosophy to theoretical physics mixed with quotes in other languages and all crammed on each single page comes across as just pathetic. I get it...you are smaaaart!! But the ideas belong to others...truly original thinkers like Kahneman and Tversky or writers like Gladwell,Ariely etc. And one wonders about the true depth of the author's knowledge by little slips...like when he says his coffee cup contains "several trillions of atoms" (you might want to check how many orders of magnitude you are off here). The book is supposed to give us some insight about improbable but highly significant events but the title and mantra "black swans" leave me mystified. OK, I see that most swans are white and then one day a black swan appears -- uh -- so what?? Couldn't he have come up with something that more accurately reflects his premise?
   There are some nuggets of interest here and I suspect the author could write a very interesting book s'il devient moins poseur (ooh la la, je peux ecrire des mot en francais aussi)-- stop with the aggressive megalomania. Grow up, stop bashing everyone else, focus on your premise and examine the boundaries where it might be useful, trash 98% of the pseudo-erudite bulls*** (2% is OK...like a little garnish) -- and it might grow into something intelligent and worth reading. As it is, the book will appeal to the self-styled avant-garde pseudo-intellectual set and has already generated some copycat publications (even among some of the hated "academics" who are always looking for something to set them apart from the pack). But ultimately it isn't going to lead to any paradigm shifts and it is headed for the $1.00 remainder bin.



3. I admit it: I am a "Black Swan" groupie. Maybe I'm one of those people who heartily express their agreement with Taleb and then go back to applying the same flawed models "made in Mediocristan" to illuminate our way through Extremistan. But I still delude myself into thinking that the book had a profound impact on me. That I am wiser because of it. Maybe if I read the book enough times I will some day cease to be a turkey... In any case, I bought the second edition, not just for the new section but also to re-read the entire book. Ok, the impact of a second reading is not the same sensation of being struck by a thunderbolt that you felt three years ago. For one thing, Taleb's ideas have gone mainstream. They're simply everywhere. I was recently listening to a lecture from British astronomer Martin Rees and, boom, the Black Swan is there. The concept even pops up in books written before 2000 (read Stephen Jay Gould's Full House: The Spread of Excellence from Plato to Darwin for a pre-Talebian critique of the Gaussian curve that sounds distinctly familiar). For another, a megacatastrophe like the 2008 financial meltdown has made us more amenable to the idea that the universe is probably less stable than we delude ourselves into believing, and that "economy" and "equilibrium" should probably not be used in the same sentence.
   
   So is it worth buying the expanded edition? The author has apparently been told one too many times that there aren't enough positive recommendations in the original book. Busy executives want "actionable lists." Editors want tidy tips to put at the back of the book. Although Taleb protests repeatedly that negative advice is just as useful as positive prescriptions, he caves in to a certain extent and --in his trademark obnoxious style-- goes on to lay out several useful dictums to guide you in life, some more tongue-in-cheek than other ("Don't give dynamite sticks to children even if warning labels are attached"). Having drunk the Kool-Aid, I found the section enjoyable (not surprisingly), but probably the most useful tip is that it highlights over and over the importance of the "barbell strategy" laid out in Chapter 13: don't be moderately conservative or moderately aggressive; rather, be hyperconservative but leave some exposure to positive Black Swans. In any case, if you want very explicit answers to the burning questions of the moment, you will find some here: further stimulus runs the risk of setting in motion inflationary forces that are scarily non-linear; don't let anything become too big to fail; love redundancy, etc. Hey, there's even a hint at a pre-historic diet and exercise plan. Somebody get this man a Dear Abby column. Better yet: when is the "Black Swan Cookbook" coming out? I'm only half joking. I would totally buy it.



4. A compilation of pretentious citations from historical literature and anecdotes, this book is an intellectually hollow basket delivered with a bombardment of flamboyant arrogance. It is a lengthy elaboration of an obvious problem that is widely recognized, consciously or subconsciously, by anyone with some basic analytic education: Total prescience is simply unattainable and thus any model attempting it is inherently defective (recall Gödel). In other words, there is no absolutely correct model -- including those of hard sciences such as relativity and quantum mechanics, but that doesn't make them worthless. A popular analogy among the revolutionary physicists at the turn of the last century makes the perfect point: Models are like Austrian train schedule; you can't trust it to predict exactly when the train will arrive, but without it, how would you tell if the train is late? The moral is, the fact that all models are defective is no reason to abolish modeling altogether; rather, it is a perpetual process of improvements. The author seems deliberately ignore -- since he is unlikely oblivious of the reason why math models, or for that matter, human knowledge exists.
   
   Thanks to Dr. Taleb -- unmistakably a smart and well-read man but of questionable ego and judgment, for glorifying a trivial observation (unpredicability of rare events) and canonizing it as the "Black Swan" problem. The trouble is, after being fed with all the model trashing, it is only fair for the reader to expect an alternative, if not better, approach from the author. That, after I reached the closing period of the book, is still as far from sight as at the time i turned the first page.



5. As a counterpoint to many who disliked this book, I really enjoyed this book BECAUSE of the over-the-top egotistical presentation, the liberal use of high-falutin' words, and actually naming names of his foes in economics and finance. I am disappointed with the ending because he does not provide much of an alternative to the thoroughly bashed Gaussian models. His main advice is: if you are in a positive black swan world, actively take on risk, but if you are in a negative black swan world, be hyper-cautious.
   
   I think the reason for this lack of a workable approach for living with black swans (both positive and negative) is that our collective understanding of the field is so undeveloped. So I see this book as a CALL TO ARMS to the profession by goading them into an angry riot. Maybe if enough of them rolled up their sleeves and said, "I'll show that ---- Taleb, what he can do with his high-falutin' arse!" then we will have a robust development in non-Gaussian models.
   
   There are already small groups working on non-Gaussian models (e.g., computer simulations using inheritance rules, stress tests using data from previous market crashes and imagined potential crashes, and substituting power-law distribution in place of the Gaussian). This group could really benefit from the media spotlight derived from Taleb's book! Several researchers say that "independence" and "stationarity" assumptions are harder to get around than the "Gaussian" assumption. I have high hopes for these groups and wish them the best of luck. :-)

5 comments about Gamestorming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers.

1. Years ago, I realized there is a great value by introducing games to our software development team meetings. The result was astonishing. Many of our members have learned so much out of these carefully designed games. We have been a much better team since then. Game Storming is an excellent book that covers the core principals and benefits of games, how to design games, games for opening, games for exploring, and much more. Just by reading this book helps me to think outside the box. I already have a dozen ideas need to try out that may help us to build better collaboration and synergy. Team games can help group leaders on strategic planning, build a energetic team, and find innovative solutions to difficult issues.



2. For several weeks, I've been combing my bookshelves for activities to incorporate into my LIM College class on social media marketing. I wanted games to drive home the information in unconventional, interactive ways. I went to my theatre books, my business books, and my books filled with writing exercises. Nothing seemed quite right. And then I found Gamestorming. It felt like a gift out of the sky. My anxiety about the class diminished a bit more with every page.
   
   Gamestorming details games that engage groups, both large and small, in learning and discovery. They work in corporations and in schools, and I'd like to add that they are a valuable tool for navigating just about any decision and complication in life. I found myself noting in nearly every margin how to use each game. The clear, concise description, depictions, and plan for each took a great deal of thought and care from the authors.
   
   The metaphor of life as a game is well worked over. The trouble with the game of life is that there are no rules. You don't make them and neither does anyone else. They change from moment to moment, and the rule that seemed to work today may never be useful again. We are forced in every situation to think on our feet. Gamestorming gives us more confidence and empowers us to take our futures in our own hands.



3. Having been dazzled in a workshop with Dave, I was eager to get this book and it did not disappoint. The collection of generative and evaluative "games" which I would call "tools or technology" are rockin. Many of the approaches presented have been floating around for awhile but Dave, Sonni and James brought them together in a great collection and use plain language to make it easy to get down to the business of creating new ideas, group buy in and fun. Will be using some of the approaches I found here immediately.



4. "Gamestorming" seemed to be chosen as the title of this book because the authors encourage the use of games for the purpose of "brainstorming" (i.e., generating ideas). I find this to be a noble goal because elements of games are underutilized in realms of business, education, etc. However...
   
   Calling the activities presented in the book "games" stretches any definition of the word (which they never define, nor do they formally define gamestorming). The activities that are presented do have rules (maybe "directions" would have been a better word), but lack an objective/goal to make them actual games. For example, "To let leadership understand and be responsive to any and all questions around the topic" (p. 181) is an example of a goal of one of the games in the book. I understand that games are difficult to define, but that goal does not sound like the goal of a game, nor does it sound very fun.
   
   That said, the activity in question ("Help Me Understand") is one that I plan on trying during my first day of class this semester. So if you can get beyond the nomenclature you will find a book with interesting activities for organizing meetings or other groups of people.
   
   Final nit-pick. The book indicates the virtues of iteration in many examples, but never includes iteration as an important attribute of the "games" they create.



5. With Gamestorming Dave, Sunni, and James created one of the most valuable and applicable collection of tools and techniques for organizational design that I have ever come across. The "games" outlined in the book help you make ideas more tangible and meetings more productive, notably through visual techniques. Gamestorming is a window into the future of how groups will work.
   
   There is no way around this book if you are serious about making innovation and change happen in your organization.

5 comments about Network+ Guide to Networks (Networking (Course Technology)).

1. I had to order for a class. For the most part, it is informative for what I needed it for. Great examples to help you understand the topologies.



2. This text book is required for my Networking concept class. I find that this book is really hard to read and understand. A lot of the time, I find myself rereading certain paragraphs or sentences to try to figure out what the author is trying to say. It's time consuming and frustrating because I have to read 2 chapters of this book per week together with other books for other courses that I'm taking.



3. I ordered this textbook for a college course that I am taking at Metropolitan Community College here in Omaha, NE. This textbook is well written. But, seriously, I am using it for a class, not something I would purchase on a 'just-because' basis. I was more impressed with the customer service for this order. The story goes a little something like this: I had originally ordered this textbook from one of Amazon's many vendors. The vendor ran out of this textbook and decided to send me the previous edition of Network+. As soon as I received the original shipment, I opened it and made the discovery. I immediately called Customer Service. The agent on the phone was EXCEPTIONAL!! She immediately offered to send me a replacement, which I told her was great, but I needed the textbook the next day because that's when my class began. The customer service agent suggested we ship it "Next Day". I'm thinking great, but I don't want to pay for the extra cost. The agent then let me know that Amazon would absorb that cost. Talk about a winning experience!



4. I ordered this book around May 15, still haven't received it as of June 24. I've been trying to contact the seller to no avail. Even though I only paid 7.00 for it, I want my dough back.



5. The book is very self explanatory, the CD that comes with it, helps test your knowledge and what you have read. If something is very VIP, for those people looking to become network + certified, the book will have a N+ next to the paragraph in question, letting the person know that inf. there is vip to pass the N+ certification. I believe there is a newer version that just came out a year ago, but if you don't want to spend that much money, this version covers 80% of items in the new book.

5 comments about Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach (3rd Edition).

1. I'm finishing up my CS Master's and this is one of the most confusing and opaque books I have had to deal with. Everything is overly complicated, poorly explained and lacking in examples. We will work through problems in class that are as easy as adding up some numbers, and the book will take 4 pages and lots of unnecessary information to make the point. The authors are more focused on creating a comprehensive encyclopedia of AI than making something that students can learn from.



2. Let me just say:
   for-all X. interested-in(ai, X) -> should own(this book,X)
   
   I'll review the diff with the 2nd edition when I have time.
   
   Here is the new table of contents:
   ===============================================
   I Artificial Intelligence
   1 Introduction 1
   2 Intelligent Agents 34
   II Problem-solving
   3 Solving Problems by Searching 64
   4 Beyond Classical Search 120
   5 Adversarial Search 161
   6 Constraint Satisfaction Problems 202
   III Knowledge, reasoning, and planning
   7 Logical Agents 234
   8 First-Order Logic 285
   9 Inference in First-Order Logic 322
   10 Classical Planning 366
   11 Planning and Acting in the Real World 401
   12 Knowledge Representation 437
   IV Uncertain knowledge and reasoning
   13 Quantifying Uncertainty 480
   14 Probabilistic Reasoning 510
   15 Probabilistic Reasoning over Time 566
   16 Making Simple Decisions 610
   17 Making Complex Decisions 645
   V Learning
   18 Learning from Examples 693
   19 Knowledge in Learning 768
   20 Learning Probabilistic Models 802
   21 Reinforcement Learning 830
   VI Communicating, perceiving, and acting
   22 Natural Language Processing 860
   23 Natural Language for Communication 888
   24 Perception 928
   25 Robotics 971
   VII Conclusions
   26 Philosophical Foundations 1020
   27 AI: The Present and Future 1044
   A Mathematical background 1053
   B Notes on Languages and Algorithms 1060
   Bibliography 1063
   Index 1095



3. My seller was great. The textbook itself is ok but could be better on content.



4. This book was purchased for a college graduate class (Advanced Artificial Intelligence). It is a good book. The sections I have read have been clear and understandable. In all this is one of the better textbooks I have used.



5. I have worked with this book during two courses I have had on AI, and I must say that this is definitely one of the best textbooks I have read in the field of computer science and algorithms. The book thoroughly covers subjects from search algorithms, reducing problems to search problems, working with logic, planning, and more advanced topics in AI such as reasoning with partial observability, machine learning and language processing. I have not yet had time to study the more advanced topics, but I can say that the first half of the book dealing with searching, logic and planning are very well written and understandable by most students who know basic programming. Algorithms and data structures are mostly introduced along the way, but some prior knowledge, such as knowing the basics of graph theory etc., is probably an advantage.
   
   The book is mostly written in a concise and easily digestible language, but some sections could probably have been written in fewer words.
   
   Overall, this book is one of my favorite textbooks!

5 comments about Information Technology Project Management (with Microsoft Project 2007 CD-ROM) (6th ed).

1. IT project management is tough but this book was great in presenting the IT project management. Many project managers like me have problems managing information technology. This book revealed ideas and information that go beyond standard project management. I love the integration of theory and practice. The author wrote this book in an easy to read manner. Great book for IT project managers.



2. Book was everything seller listed. Very happy with fast service and not disappointed in the book.



3. I read the sample content and assumed that purchasing the Kindle version would be the equivalent of purchasing a new book. This is not true. The Kindle version is akin to a used book, in that it does not come with the access code required to access the premium content. This content includes "informative links from the end notes, lecture notes, interactive quizzes, templates, additional running cases, suggested readings, podcasts, the new Jeopardy-like game, and many other items to enhance your learning." If you purchase the Kindle edition, you must then purchase this other access separately for $35. The dead tree edition is a better bargain -- cheaper, and comes with both the website access and the Project CD-ROM.



4. I am a database administrator & developer, programmer, and occasionally - a project manager. I require data that is short, to the point, and gets the information across in a highly efficient manner -and this book fails to do this on all points. Schwalbe was a requirement for a class I took and I did not enjoy reading it. It had all the hallmarks of a book that has been revised, revamped and re-titled (1st edition, 2nd edition, 3rd edition, 4th edition, etc) entirely too many times; it is entirely TO verbose, provides excruciating ad-nauseam detail on the same subject matter multiple time in different sections of the book, and simply fails to get to the point. If you want a book that provides a short and informative "this is what you really need to know about project management" then avoid Schwalbe and buy something else.



5. The book arrived as expected, in the condition that was advertised. I was very happy with the prompt service.

5 comments about GO! with Microsoft Office 2007 Introductory.

1. I love my book and I LOVE the customer service was excellent, I received my book fast and in great condition. Thank you and I will use your service again for my fall classes. This book is going to help me with all my course assignments through out the semester.



2. Exellent seller--merchandise as promised. The book was brand new at a fraction of the price.



3. It's a great way to learn Office 2007 at home. Instructions are easy to follow.



4. I never received this book. I contacted the seller and told me that Amazon is responsible for refunding my money. I had to buy it from anther source and out the money.



5. Book was in good condition. Arrived in ample time. Will buy from him again if needed.

No comments about Database Systems: Design, Implementation, and Management (with Bind-In Printed Access Card).

5 comments about Essentials of Business Processes and Information Systems.

1. This book does an excellent job presenting how companies can effectively use ERP by focusing on common business processes: procurement, production, and fulfillment. The books makes a clear and succinct presentation of how functional areas of an organization interact through triggers created by various types of documents within these processes. Not only are these documents discussed, but facsimiles of document 'hard copies' are presented so that readers can see the paper equivalents of documents that are increasingly electronic only. Because of the clarity of the presentation, regardless of one's background knowledge of business processes, the material is easy to understand yet not written in a way that would seem simplistic to a knowledgeable reader.
   
   When used as a textbook, the book has a number of very positive features. The chapters are short, so students don't get overwhelmed with content. The document illustrations mentioned previously are very well done. Key terms are highlighted and well defined in the text. Supporting stories and examples are used, but not to excess. I have found the book better than books that are much longer because of its focus on keeping things simple. Students like the book as well, which is rare for most textbooks.
   
   For classes where students are introduced to ERP for the first time (particularly SAP ERP), I believe this is the best book on the market at this time. For professionals and others unfamiliar with ERP but wanting to get a sense of what it is, how it works, and what its benefit is to an organization, this book is well worth the read and a fraction of the cost you'd pay for other books.



2. The registration code should be packed with a new book. But I didn't get it. Do you have one?



3. I needed this book for school and it came very quickly and in great shape. I would definitely order another book from here again next semester.



4. This book is a very useful tool. The authors are clear and straight to the point. Pictures also make it easier to visualize the business processes from beginning to end.



5. This book was great. It is very easy to read and supplies plenty of real-world examples to help the student fully understand the topics. To all professors in search of a great textbook for your ERP course, this is the text you should choose!

5 comments about Management Information Systems for the Information Age.

1. it's like a new book, however, it would be better if it came by the beginning of this semester.



2. The product was exactly what I expected it came quickly and i am very ahppy with my purchase.



3. This book is an asset. Even after finishing my course, I haven't sold it back. I know I am going to use it for reference later on.
   Easy language, various examples and online study guide. All are helpful in becoming an excellent Operations Manager.



4. I like that I can read this easily and quickly. Language is simple and straightforward.



5. On 8/28/07, I bought the textbook, Management Information Systems for the Information Age with CD and MISource. I am delighted with my purchase as all proved to be just as promised: perfect book's condition, as well as delivery within the time frame stated at the time of my purchase.

5 comments about Microsoft Office Excel 2007: Data Analysis and Business Modeling (Bpg -- Other).

1. Overall this is a great buy, it is a comprehensive read which breaks the information down into manageable sections. The only thing i think could be improved upon are the practice files which i could use a little more organization. I assume they are great in a classroom setting but are sometimes hard to immediately follow for the independent reader.



2. When I just started my career as a financial analyst, a project manager gave me a pile of condensed training materials which included the excel functions that I would be using most frequently. I bought this Data Analysis & Modeling book 2-3 weeks after my first day of work and I found many of those taught in the book aligned with those on the training materials from my manager. The book has been very useful to me as it has a lot of cases to demonstrate how those functions can be applied.
   
   This book is a book teaching MS Excel, but shaped in a way that focuses more on functions that are useful to financial analysis. It won't make you a financial expert after reading the book -- you need to know the financial concepts like fixed / variable cost, NPV & IRR, stocks & options first, then the tools introduced in the book will help you organize, calculate or present your data.
   
   Pros:
   - Clear step by step explanation
   - Lots of examples & Exercises included in CD.



3. The book and it's examples are on the most part excellent. CD examples are well done. Some of the explainations are not as clear as they should be. On the whole I really believe the book is an excellent buy and a good additions to my library.



4. I am a bit surprised to see some bad comments are being made about the book. I have found this book excellent and helpful for my day to day working hours. THis is a well written, well defined book. BUt people with no or few statistics background might found it hard as analysis is mostly statistics.
   HOwever, i thank the writer for the book.



5. The following reply was received about my complaint;
   "Hi Charles,
   Unfortunately the CD is broke but I do have a softcopy of all the contents of the CD. Its size is about 32MB, let me know the best way I can transfer this across to you. Do you have an FTP site where I can upload this otherwise I'll try to send this across in multiple mail attachments.
   
   Thanks,
   Deepak".
   I am confused. Since then I have purchased a better product that fits my purpose more completely. Inasmuch as I didn't pay much for the product, I have no intention of persuing it. In the future I will avoid this seller as a lesson learned.
   Charles Bradshaw