Nassim Nicholas Taleb was born on September 11, 1960 in Amioun, North Governorate,
Lebanon. He is a statistician, stock trader, risk analyst, essayist, professor, editor,
entrepreneur, and author of books about randomness. He has written numerous articles
and at least eight books.
The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable was published in 2007. Wikipedia
explains that the book ". . . focuses on the extreme impact of rare and unpredictable
outlier events - and the human tendency to find simplistic explanations for these events,
retrospectively. Taleb calls this the Black Swan theory." The Black Swan was on the
New York Times bestseller list for 36 weeks. It was published in 32 languages and sold
more than 3 million copies. Amazon.com calls it "engaging and enlightening, The Black
Swan is a book that may change the way you think about the world, a book that Chris
Anderson calls 'a delightful romp through history, economics, and the
frailties of human nature.'"