Branko Milanovic — The importance of Taleb’s system: from the Fourth Quadrant to the Skin in the Game

Interesting exploration of Nassim Taleb's systematic thought and its implicitly evolutionary basis.

Global Inequality

The importance of Taleb’s system: from the Fourth Quadrant to the Skin in the Game

Branko Milanovic | Visiting Presidential Professor at City University of New York Graduate Center and senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS), and formerly lead economist in the World Bank's research department and senior associate at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

See also

Branko Milanovic also meanings Hayek's The Fatal Conceit, in which Hayek points to what is now called "bounded rationality" in arguing for a conservative approach that emphasizes the importance of tradition as that which served us well to get where we are. Here is an interest reflection on it.

The Commentator
God, Hayek and the conceit of reason

Jonathan Neumann

Chris Dillow — On expressive rationality

What is "rationality"? Are there boundaries demarcating rationality and differentiating cognitive bias?

Problems arise owing to the entanglement of the existential and essential, structural and function, static and dynamic, as well as of the cognitive, volitional, and affective, as psychological aspects of being human. 

It's called "the human condition." Assuming that humans are perfectly "rational," or even that they can be perfectly rational, is contradicted by both experience and psychology.

Humans are not only bounded rationally but also cognitively, and humans are also differentiated by different types of thinking and feeling. 

The assumption of a homogenous "rational agent" is more restrictive than the reality. This doesn't mean that it is useless for modeling. Just that such models are limited and extending them beyond the scope of the assumptions leads to over-generalization.

Stumbling and Mumbling
On expressive rationality
Chris Dillow | Investors Chronicle