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3.84 AVERAGE
3.84 AVERAGE
Pretty interesting book. Definitely good subject matter, just wasn't written in quite as much of an engaging way as some of the other recent books I've read. A lot of the middle sections got a little bogged down in the details of mathematical concepts and didn't have quite enough examples to illustrate the concepts as I would've liked. Still a lot of fun interesting anecdotes about the crazy lives of renaissance era mathematicians. I also thought that the last chapter was fantastic. It tied everything together and provided lots of good details about why some things succeed and others failed. It tied a lot into Blink and Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. I like the idea of experts not actually being experts and a whole bunch of industries just being utter bullshit. Definitely give it a read if you don't mind working through some decently technical language.
3.5. Some great insights into randomness and its impact on things to which we often instead attribute improper causes or effects. Witty and for the most part interesting and easy to follow even for non-math types! A bit too much history of individual mathematicians and scientists but otherwise quite good.
I thoroughly enjoyed The Drunkard's Walk by Leonard Mlodinow. The book offers a fascinating exploration of how probability and statistics can break down seemingly straightforward problems into complex and thought-provoking concepts. As someone with a strong interest in forecasting, I found the mathematical and statistical discussions both engaging and challenging, inspiring me to delve deeper into these topics to fully grasp their implications.
If you're curious about how randomness shapes our lives and influences our perceptions and decisions, this book is an excellent read. I highly recommend it to anyone looking to better understand the role of chance in the world around us.
If you're curious about how randomness shapes our lives and influences our perceptions and decisions, this book is an excellent read. I highly recommend it to anyone looking to better understand the role of chance in the world around us.
There is a lot that is disturbing in 'The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules our Lives.' by Leonard Mlodinow. Are we 'Masters of the Universe'? Not so much.
The author discusses in a breezy, easy to understand conversational manner how randomness and chance are behind many human decisions. We believe we make decisions based on educated guesses or personal skills. Luck, though, functions far more than we know in how things turn out for us.
Briefly, but entertaining all the while, the author discusses famous incidents which illuminate the psychology behind mistaken beliefs of 'winning'. He discusses as an overview the math which makes obvious how rules of chance control planned success, or how choices can be better made if one understands the probability of a choice's odds of happening. Each chapter covers an aspect of randomness and the math that helps expose it or measure it. A brief biography of the people who created a part of this interesting class of math is also included.
Many of the chapters show how what appears to be the results of rationalized planning or expert decision-making which resulted in successful conclusions are not that, but instead are simply random luck, measurable by probability or statistical math.
It's eerie because in explaining why so many things actually occur vs. how your brain perceived the occurrence, the book leaves you with feelings that are similar to the feelings that happen when a promotion is given that you assume is because of your excellent record - but it turns out to be because none of your rivals showed up due to a car crash on the highway. Complicating efforts to get on top of luck by increasing it in your favor by learning probability math, it appears to be so difficult of an exercise in logic in some cases that expert mathematicians flub it. The author demonstrates all of this in a couple of chapters.
The conclusion is that people are truly mere automata with delusions of grandeur. Yet through all of the illusions we create to feel we have more control and power over human events than we actually do, somehow through math and crunching numbers in formulas these same lame brains of ours are able to 'see' reality. Which we totally ignore to live and function happily in a deluded state of controlling the events of our lives. Does that bother you as much a it bothers me?
Trailer on YouTube for the movie, "The Matrix":
https://youtu.be/vKQi3bBA1y8
The author discusses in a breezy, easy to understand conversational manner how randomness and chance are behind many human decisions. We believe we make decisions based on educated guesses or personal skills. Luck, though, functions far more than we know in how things turn out for us.
Briefly, but entertaining all the while, the author discusses famous incidents which illuminate the psychology behind mistaken beliefs of 'winning'. He discusses as an overview the math which makes obvious how rules of chance control planned success, or how choices can be better made if one understands the probability of a choice's odds of happening. Each chapter covers an aspect of randomness and the math that helps expose it or measure it. A brief biography of the people who created a part of this interesting class of math is also included.
Many of the chapters show how what appears to be the results of rationalized planning or expert decision-making which resulted in successful conclusions are not that, but instead are simply random luck, measurable by probability or statistical math.
It's eerie because in explaining why so many things actually occur vs. how your brain perceived the occurrence, the book leaves you with feelings that are similar to the feelings that happen when a promotion is given that you assume is because of your excellent record - but it turns out to be because none of your rivals showed up due to a car crash on the highway. Complicating efforts to get on top of luck by increasing it in your favor by learning probability math, it appears to be so difficult of an exercise in logic in some cases that expert mathematicians flub it. The author demonstrates all of this in a couple of chapters.
The conclusion is that people are truly mere automata with delusions of grandeur. Yet through all of the illusions we create to feel we have more control and power over human events than we actually do, somehow through math and crunching numbers in formulas these same lame brains of ours are able to 'see' reality. Which we totally ignore to live and function happily in a deluded state of controlling the events of our lives. Does that bother you as much a it bothers me?
Trailer on YouTube for the movie, "The Matrix":
https://youtu.be/vKQi3bBA1y8
I really wanted to read this and I tried really hard. But on page 95 I finally gave up. It's just too hard for me - too much of it I can't quite understand! But I do believe that I understand more about probability now than I did before I read those 95 pages, so it was not completely waisted!
I really enjoyed this book, and deeply wish I had read it prior to taking a statistics course last semester. While my professor was not particularly concerned with the "why" of the field, preferring we got the math right, this book really enhanced my understanding of how everything fits together and why it matters.
Unknowingly I have chosen #science and #psychology shelves for this very good book. Now what were the odds of that? Apparently very high. After the first reading, I cannot calculate that number. But there is a way to do that with a very high accuracy.
I have better imagination than math and statistics skills and I really liked the tone of the book. A lot of history, philosophy and real life stories with some surprise Guest Stars. This was a very fun to read #science book. If I would be better at math and/or statistics, I would give five stars.
I have better imagination than math and statistics skills and I really liked the tone of the book. A lot of history, philosophy and real life stories with some surprise Guest Stars. This was a very fun to read #science book. If I would be better at math and/or statistics, I would give five stars.
This book was really interesting. I do not have a strong grasp of mathematics so it was sometimes a challenge to follow. But it was worth the struggle. Definitely a good read for the layman. Although, it may be too simplistic for those with a background in the subject.
nothing to write home about. from the title i was expecting a little more randomness. basically it talks about how humans are ill-equipped to deal with probabilities. there is also a fair amount of malcolm gladwell's _outliers_ in this book, a few of the same examples, and the conclusion that it doesn't matter if you are talented, you just have to try hard and catch a few breaks. all in all, a little disappointing.