I have had the time to read more during the recent months, even as my inventory of unread books here at the house has continued to grow. Though I love me a good literary novel, I have been on a bit a bit of a non-fiction journey as of late. My reviews follow.
How Not to Be Wrong, The Power of Mathematical Thinking – Jordan Ellenberg Jordan Ellenburg is a professor of Mathematics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has previously published books, and numerous articles in print media. His material is rigorous yet presented with a light touch and relatable to wider reading audiences, allowing readers to appreciate the perspectives of mathematicians. This book explores principles of math and statistics as they apply to issues within our modern world. Political views, athletic performance, investment advice, predicting the future, the behavior of organisms are all described through mathematical equations, charts, graphs, and straightforward descriptions.
Key learnings for me are related to the Law of Large Numbers: Law of large numbers – Wikipedia and Regression to the Mean: Regression toward the mean – Wikipedia Regression Toward the Mean: An Introduction with Examples
The Law of Large Numbers states that as you repeat an experiment a large number of times, the average of the results will get closer and closer to the theoretical expected value; examples include: flipping a coin many times to get close to a 50/50 split between heads and tails, rolling a dice repeatedly where the average result will approach 3.5, or measuring the height of a large sample of people to get a more accurate average height of the population. Casinos rely on the Law of Large Numbers to ensure profitability over time, as the odds are designed to favor the house in the long run, even though individual players might win in the short term. The chapter on the origins of lotteries and calculations of the odds of winning for modern state sponsored lotto’s was instructional, in ways that are not apparent when we hear descriptions of the games and the testimonies of winners (and losers).
Among other fascinating explorations, the book dives into a statistical analysis of the existence of God, or at least an “attempt” to quantify it. As well as the possibility that we were the creation of an advanced simulation by beings much more advanced than us. An interesting thought analysis. After much study, the author concludes that “… people are much better off arriving at their faith, or discarding it, in a non-quantitative way. …Reason can decide nothing here.”
Applications in daily life include athletic performance (shooting / batting percentages), political polling, estimation of cancer rates in a sample population, medical treatment outcomes, weather variations at a single location, even your experiences with good / bad restaurant visits or car purchases. These are relatable to me. I recently had my four-year-old laptop fail (the motherboard) after a previous issue with the cooling fan. When I decided to replace the laptop, I opted for a different manufacturer because of these experiences. My rational brain told me that this was the failure of a single unit; I didn’t have 100 laptops with an 80 percent failure rate. Still my “recency bias” told me not to trust another purchase, A decision which was not based on math for sure. Yes, that was me: Recency bias – Wikipedia
I was able to follow (most of) the calculations and data plots; this ended up being a great refresher and reminder for me of how to better understand the sometime mysteries of a statistical life.
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On the Edge – Nate Silver Nate Silver came to public view several years ago through his work as the founder of the site FiveThirtyEight, FiveThirtyEight – Wikipedia his startlingly accurate election predictions and is previous publication; The Signal and The Noise.
Silver structures his book around the concept of “The River”, as he describes “not one discreet place as much as an ecosystem of people and ideas”. ‘a sprawling community of like-minded, highly analytical, and competitive people that include everyone from poker experts to wall street analysts to AI investors. Silver considers himself to be a member of the river community, a group that tends to be overrepresented to a degree by “rational” risk takers in the world of investment communities, startups and speculative money and professional gambling.
The first half of the book does a bit of a deep dive into the world of professional poker, and the casino strategies that have supported the rapid growth of Las Vegas and online betting systems, sports books, and including lotteries.
The second half of the book explores the ecosystems of venture capitalism, and the crypto world, including the rise and fall of Sam Bankman Freidman Sam Bankman-Fried – Wikipedia. The frontiers of AI and Chat GBT development are well described, along with broader prediction markets for any type of event that you can imagine.
In between these deep dives, Silver lays out 13 habits of successful risk-takers. These thirteen habits include courage and the ability to execute under pressure. They are process oriented – they take the long game of statical outcomes (remember the law of large numbers). They prepare well with attention to detail. And they are not necessarily driven by the desire to accumulate money – they enjoy the competition as a reward in itself.
The topics covered in this book are often reflected in the current news cycles. We may hear about a startup company or a poker tournament winner or hear a leader talk about the risks of war. News organizations and individuals have a strong tendency to bend the apparent outcome of a new study or event to fit their own narrow narratives. Just this past week I heard the surgeon general of the United States announce that a link had been found between alcohol use and cancer. Or a can’t miss stock. What does that mean, how strong were the links? We can’t be experts in probability or game theory, but we can resolve to dig a bit deeper into the headlines and “certainties” presented to us each day.
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The Year 1000 -Valerie Hansen This third review is of a non-fiction title of a different sort. Valerie Hansen is a Professor of History at Yale University, where she teaches Chinese and World History. Her book takes us on a tour of human migration during the period from 1000-1200 AD, at locations across the world. It begins with a detailed description of Viking migrations to the west from northern Europe, across Iceland, Greenland, and eventually to the eastern (pre-Canadian) provinces of Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. She tracks the movement of artifacts across time and place, southward into Central America. She is careful to rely on established facts and data; I liked that aspect of her writing.
The scene then shifts eastward to western Asia, the eastern Mediterranean, and eventually across the African continent. A history lesson in migration, conquest, trade and materials. Finished products and technology traveled along these same routes of migration. The consumption and demand for aromatics (fragrant woods, plants and spices) textiles, porcelain as well as silver and gold is well described. Money trading was established to supplement and largely replace bartering. In addition, the establishment of religious practices (including Judaism, Christianity, and Islamic religions) spread through conquest, and also the desire of leaders to form alliances and rule over newly acquired territories.
The last segment of this book documents the extensive movement of goods and people across eastern Asia as local empire s rose and fell, and long-term trade routes were established. The science of archeology, discovered shipwrecks, and material found in ancient texts is used to verify the descriptions
Topics that I found especially interesting, included technology advances in boat / ship design (Viking longboats and Chinese merchant ships), and weapons of war. The rise of human (slave) trading was driven to supplement human labor for hundreds of years in pre-industrialized societies. Concepts of tribute (payments / offerings) to rulers and direct taxation of both domestic products (a share of the harvest) and early forms of import / export taxes. These forms of trade and taxation exist still today, a legacy of those early endeavors. I found it fascinating to learn that when the Chinese eventually established paper money (backed by silver) that their previous coinage (bronze) was exported to Japan where it then became the de facto currency throughout that country.
My knowledge for history is colored by the volume of writings relating to the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. Much of the information in this book was unknown to me; it set in place a foundation for modern country divisions, religious practices, trade and technologies. Quite a bit of learning packed into a single book.
You ‘all may enjoy taking this tour as well.