Tag: asymmetric bets
8 posts tagged "asymmetric bets".
Decisions where the potential upside vastly outweighs the potential downside (or vice versa) — capped losses paired with open-ended gains. The appeal is structural rather than predictive: you don't need to be right often if being right pays many times more than being wrong costs. This is the engine behind Nassim Taleb's barbell strategy and his focus on tail risk, and it sits at the heart of this blog's case for optionality — arranging your life so that surprises tend to help you more than they hurt. Good decision-making under uncertainty often comes down to hunting for these lopsided payoffs and avoiding their mirror image.
Posts:
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Keto Experiment Results
I mentally categorised keto as just another trendy, stupidly-restrictive diet. Then I realised I was thinking about it wrong.
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Why Bitcoin is Not That Stupid
No, not even at these apparently ridiculous prices. Not even when financial illiterates are making grandiose claims about where it'll end up.
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10 Principles of Optionality For an Uncertain World
What is optionality? If you want a thorough answer, check out the big juicy book I spent the last couple of years writing.
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Is Blogging Worth It? A Cheap Option for Attracting Serendipity
Blogging is an endurance sport. As Deep Dish's 4th birthday approaches—a million views, a thousand comments—I have a decent sense of whether it's been worth it.
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The Self-Experimentation Guide
A self-experiment that doesn't generate obvious results, like taking tiny, sub-threshold doses of LSD, crosses the line into fiddling on the margin.
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Inevitable Coronavirus Post
If it costs nothing at all to mitigate a small chance of a big risk, then do it! Ignore anyone who makes fun of you for being 'paranoid', and don't wait for permission.
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The Optionality Approach to Getting Lucky
What is optionality? My favourite tool for finding juicy asymmetries between risk and reward, and creating your own luck.
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Is Crypto Bullshit? Calling My Shots
Nothing in this arena can be taken at face value, which makes it unusually fertile ground for battle-testing your own critical thinking skills.