Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life

One truth of archaeology in particular bears directly on my thinking. Archaeologists have their specialties, and one of the curiosities of the field is that those who specialize in one aspect of antiquity tend to be blind to anything else. Archaeologists who look for pottery sherds will not see coins, and, conversely, those who look for coins will

The big takeaway here is that we really have no idea what policies we’ll be pushing for in, say, five or ten years. Unexpected hardship makes people do and think things they’d never imagine when things are calm. Your personal views fall into the same trap. In investing, saying “I will be greedy when others are fearful” is easier said than done, bec

A biologist observed that “when a territory holder is challenged by a rival, the owner almost always wins the contest—usually within a matter of seconds.” In human affairs, the same simple rule explains much of what happens when institutions attempt to reform themselves, in “reorganizations” and “restructuring” of companies, and in efforts to ratio

because their causes were knowable, their consequences were predictable. But only individually, for not even the canniest seer can specify cumulative effects. Little things add up in unpredictably big ways—and yet, leaders can’t let uncertainties paralyze them. They must appear to know what they’re doing, even when they don’t.