Talk:Antifragility

Examples?
This page needs more examples of things/systems that are antifragile. EmperorFishFinger (talk) 15:02, 29 October 2015 (UTC)


 * Agree :) . It would for example be nice to see how this could be applied to software or a web site. --JamesPoulson (talk) 04:55, 5 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Bitcoin and other decentralised p2p networks like BitTorrent would be your best bet. - Shiftchange (talk) 13:17, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
 * I'd like to advise to avoid any examples from cryptocurrency, as they don't have inherent values. The reason why cryptocurrencies are not antifragile is because they fail to cover up their left tails, in which antifragile systems have that property as a primary prerequisite of being antifragile. Cryptocurrency, on the other hand, when you stop using it, it stops being valuable as well, or its value being zero. Just like cryptocurrency, a lot of ruin are illustrated in the book, such as Bernie Madoff and Bernanke, in which most of them failed to failsafe their investments. Counterexample, gold; gold can be used for a lot of things, but if you don't use it, it's still valuable. Cryptocurrencies can't preserve themselves in the event of stress or disorders, making their antifragility (price fluctuations) only as style, not substantial. Greatprasetya (talk) 06:11, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Perhaps adding some examples in finance as well? One such textbook example could be the CBOE VIX. ThetaDeltaGamma (talk) 15:40, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
 * I would like some help to identify and describe antifragile species. So far I got emus, coyotes, tree-of-heaven, feral pigs. AspiringAntifragilista (talk) 10:12, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
 * If you wish to illustrate examples of antifragile things/system, I think the Triad from Book 1's appendix (Antifragile, 2012) would fit. Greatprasetya (talk) 06:12, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Weak criticisms
The criticism listed (you can be benefit from some variability, but not all variability) is actually mentioned in one of the first chapters of the Antifragile book and well addressed. It makes it appear that the criticizers have not read Taleb's work, and it looks very weak on Wikipedia to portray this as true criticism. I think we should remove this. 2620:0:1003:513:5064:BC6B:D0A8:2D73 (talk) 21:23, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
 * I agree that it is weak. Perhaps we leave it and then post the refutation citing the reference from AF? My sense is that this will keep others in the future from posting similarly weak criticisms. VergilDen (talk) 22:14, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
 * The refutation posted under what you call weak criticism is original research and really doesn't belong here. In order for a refutation to be a refutation it must explicitly address the criticism. Obviously something that was published before the criticism was made can't be a refutation. Citing it as a refutation is original research because it's an original interpretation. (I also think that Kovalenko and Sornette's critique is more thorough than the brief description indicates, but that's another story.) What's needed is something from someone who explicitly addresses Kovalenko and Sornette's critique. Surely Taleb has done this somewhere. I've added an tag for now. Mrrhum (talk) 15:22, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Taleb wouldn’t because he’d be restating what he’s already written in AF. K&S seem not to have read the book. I’d recommend we remove the criticism altogether, which would put this matter to rest VergilDen (talk) 16:08, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The "criticism" doesn't belong here as it is not in a peer-reviewed publication, just in a Davos presentation material. And indeed it it not publication material. Limit-theorem (talk) 17:17, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Since there are no objections, I will remove the “criticism” for the reasons cited above VergilDen (talk) 17:39, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Mathematical model
Would you be open to the addition of a section discussing the mathematical model of Taleb's fragility theory? If so, I'd be happy to write it. Fjparker (talk) 18:45, 23 July 2020 (UTC)


 * @FjparkerPlease do so! That would be amazing :) Yitz (talk) 05:04, 25 November 2021 (UTC)
 * It would sure be interesting to actually be able to understand it. In the "Mathematical Heuristic" section, what is given is just the definition of a convex function. So are we just renaming a known definition? Also, convexity could be associated with decreasing monotonicity, so I'm not sure how that would work out with the interpretation that is being suggested. So some explanation, rigorous treatment, and logical language would be useful to understand what is really being proposed. So far, it looks quite messy and confused, overlapping with a well-known concept. 2001:B07:6463:1997:CC79:C7F0:1CC0:8062 (talk) 00:21, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

Use of sources
Paragraph about antifragile booking should probably not link directly to a startup's website, but to an article describing how the product works. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:4B00:B602:D300:C54F:ACE3:AB79:3D2A (talk) 21:23, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Antifragility and evolvability
What is the connection and or difference of antifragility and evolvability? AspiringAntifragilista (talk) 14:44, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

Antifragile species
I would like a Wiki page with all species that can be considered antifragile. So far I got coyotes, feral pigs, emus and tree-of-heaven. AspiringAntifragilista (talk) 18:49, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

Wrong quote
I have looked for the publication for this quote in the Wikipedia article and found that it doesn't match the publication cited:

"Simply, antifragility is defined as a convex response to a stressor or source of harm (for some range of variation), leading to a positive sensitivity to increase in volatility (or variability, stress, dispersion of outcomes, or uncertainty, what is grouped under the designation "disorder cluster"). Likewise fragility is defined as a concave sensitivity to stressors, leading to a negative sensitivity to increase in volatility. The relation between fragility, convexity, and sensitivity to disorder is mathematical, obtained by theorem, not derived from empirical data mining or some historical narrative. It is a priori.

—  Taleb, N. N., Philosophy: 'Antifragility' as a mathematical idea. Nature, 2013 Feb 28; 494(7438), 430-430"

This was how the publication (Nature, 2013 Feb 28; 494(7438), 430-430) wrote it:

"In his review of my book Antifragile, Michael Shermer mischaracterizes the concept of ‘antifragility’ (Nature 491, 523; 2012).

‘Fragility’ can be defined as an accelerating sensitivity to a harmful stressor: this response plots as a concave curve and mathematically culminates in more harm than benefit from random events. ‘Antifragility’ is the opposite, producing a convex response that leads to more benefit than harm.

We do not need to know the history and statistics of an item to measure its fragility or antifragility, or to be able to predict rare and random (‘black swan’) events. All we need is to be able to assess whether the item is accelerating towards harm or benefit. The relation of fragility, convexity and sensitivity to disorder is thus mathematical (N. N. Taleb and R. Douady Quant. Finance, in the press) and not derived from empirical data, as Shermer implies.

Shermer’s suggestion that I should offer “a checklist of things companies or countries can do to prepare for black-swan events” overlooks 50 or so such heuristics based on the identification of convex responses."

I thought I've seen the mismatched quote somewhere, too, so I'm not sure whether the volunteer used the wrong citation or cited the article wrong. Should it be edited to match the publication or was it another quote from somewhere else? Greatprasetya (talk) 06:00, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Antifragility applied to personal lives, not systems?
I first encountered the concept of antifragility as a way of teaching people how to overcome their own personal challenges, rather than getting depressed or angry about how the world won't change to accommodate them. Some of this came from the book The Coddling of the American Mind. Then I was surprised a year ago to hear it from the lips of a homeless person who had just been through antifragility training that was helping him get his life together. This aspect of antifragility isn't mentioned in the antifragility article. Does it deserve coverage here? Gnuish (talk) 15:23, 2 January 2024 (UTC)