The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable

"One single observation can invalidate a general statement derived from millennia of confirmatory sightings of millions of white swans."

Black Swan events do not need to happen frequently, but their existence and possibility must be considered. The power of witnessing something new and unprecedented has the potential to change the way we see the world.

"A small number of Black Swans explain almost everything in our world, from the success of ideas and religions, to the dynamics of historical events, to elements of our own personal lives."

According to Taleb, human history is less affected by an accumulation of everyday mundane events than by Black Swan events, which can transform our way of life. These outliers, though less numerous than white swan events, are far more impactful.

"Ideas come and go, stories stay."

Taleb argues that philosophical abstractions or logical premises carry less power in the human imagination than stories, which help us reduce the events that occur around us to palatable narratives.