History Of The World From A Gambler’s Perspective: A Scholarly Discussion

Sundry Chitchat
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I’m gonna give this review my best shot, but basically, I’m gonna give this an honest effort with an open mind and see if I can learn something or view something in a different way than I had previously thought. I try to do that with everything I read. That said, I don’t think there is much here to be gleaned so I am gonna try to enjoy myself.

Part of me feels like this is a little mean. This is obviously a subject that means a great deal to the author and one he spent a lot of effort on. Now, honestly, I hold no ill will towards 22 or mason or sklansky. I’ve held on to enough hatred in my life that I don’t need any more. So, I won’t do this with a mean spirited attitude (i leave that to other people) and will give this an honest go and try to understand the author’s perspective. If anyone else wants to buy the book and review, I think it’s worth the $20.

I am going to approach this from the author’s own thesis, which I’ll explain in a minute, because I think he contradicts himself all over the place.

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Thread now has less potential. Why are you taking this person seriously and in good faith? Clearly the best outcome would be you posting ridiculous parts of it that are full of shit and highlighting it. Which uh I hope you do anyways.

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The thesis, if I can call it that but I’m probably using it incorrectly, is that there exists certain events in history in which an individual took a gamble and it paid off spectacularly. He defines a gambling event as any event in which the standard deviation is large relative to the absolute value of the expectation. I take issues with this definition because it’s overly simplistic and mathematically does not make sense to me, but whatever, I’ll take it.

He defines many interactions in the book in terms of what he calls “non self weighting strategy.” It is one of the core ideas of the book, is that successful gamblers in history have utilized a non self weighting strategy to win. Honestly the part that explains it left me completely in the dark and I had to go to a 2p2 article to figure out what the fuck it meant. Basically, it means that your bet size is not constant, and changes depending on what your expectation is. Ok I can buy that.

A classic example he just threw in to the last paragraph of the intro is the election of Donald Trump. I read the chapter, and his claim is that because Hillary dismissed the “blue wall” states such as Wisconsin and Pennsylvania (was pennsylvania ever considered by democrats to be unloseable??) and didn’t visit them, that she was utilizing a self weighting strategy. Donald trump, however, visited far more states than she did, and thus, used a non self weighting strategy, which I’m just gonna refer to as NSWS from now on.

I honestly don’t see how Trump used a NSWS in his victory. The chapter just says he used a superior NSWS and that’s why he won, with little explanation given other than Trump visited more states than the “over-confident” Hillary did.

To me, it seems like Hillary took the more calculated gamble. She realized certain states were -EV, so she did not waste time and finite resources on them. She focused on states where there was variance. It seems to me that Hillary took the smarter gamble. Trump, however, visited states he had no chance of ever winning, had no ground game whatsoever, and (self admitted) had very little strategy. His strategy had massive variance relative to his expectation, so I can see the argument of why that was a gambling event, but I absolutely cannot see how it fits in with the theme of this book, that expert gamblers use a NSWS. Trump, to me, hit a 1 outer on the river and won.

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yea I’m gonna do this of course.

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Ok I’m buying this thing too. I can’t pass it up.

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also I think it’s funnier to have me, a known idiot with attention span issues, try to seriously dissect this mess.

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Are you sure you want to commit yourself to posting 280 pages of excerpts?

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also think there’s some serious potential if you google some passages to see if its plagerised at all plz.

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Honestly I think it would stick out like a sore thumb. so far I think this is very poorly written. My first major was english and there’s like very elementary things that bug me. He could have used a ghost writer.

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The random ass quotations drive me crazy because they’re so completely unnecessary and random.

For example, this excerpt from the chapter on Joe Namath:

[Superbowl III] was won by the New York Jets and their charismatic quarterback “Broadway Joe” Namath as they defeated the Baltimore Colts 16 to 7 despite being an 18 point underdog. This game is considered to be “one of the greatest upsets in both American Football and in the recorded history of sports.” So, how could this happen?

This is a common opinion, it does not need to be quoted, especially when you don’t cite it.

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Lol yeah that makes no sense at all

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Dear Dr. Carrasco,

You’re a shitty historian. You’re fired.

Best wishes,
MM

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lol wat

You have pets, marty? :laughing:

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That paragraph is giving me flashbacks to the nearly 10 years I spent as an instructor for the University of Phoenix.

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The comma splices and sentence fragments are INSANE

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Omfg the first serious chapter is on david and goliath and it is absolute gold. I want to post the entire chapter.

He is contending that the Israelites realized that Goliath “most likely suffered from gigantism” and thus they realized that the best strategy was to send someone small and quick, since gigantism renders you physically disabled most of the time.

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Christ this sounds like early onset of something. Is he brain damaged?

Excerpts please.

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I have always wanted to write a book about music and pop psychology (tentative title “The History of Pop Psychology from the Beatles to Taylor Swift”). I know very little about music or pop psychology, but I know how to access wikipedia so I think I am good to go.

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Now, let’s look at this [battle] a little closer. First, Goliath is a huge man, perhaps eight feet tall (or even higher) and has huge strength. So how does someone get to this size with huge strength?
The answer is it’s highly likely that Goliath suffered from gigantism, “a condition characterized by excessive growth and height.”

(describes gigantism disabilities)

Since Goliath had been the longtime Philistine champion, he was probably suffering from some of the problems just mentioned. In addition, he probably wore as much as 100 pounds of armor, which would make him even more immobile and at best would only be able to move slowly.

Assuming the Israelites knew this, they would want someone small and quick, and who could fight from a distance. Thus, Goliath would never touch him and be vulnerable to David’s sling, which in many ways was like the gun of the ancient world. And according to the bible (sic), it only took one shot from David’s sling and the battle was over.

Hence, the reason this story makes this book is that it’s like a sporting event where everyone is betting one side, Goliath. But with the right information, and the ability to interpret it correctly, the other side, David, should have been the overwhelming favorite.

By the way, these ideas are not original with us. They can be found in many places on the Internet and elsewhere. But comparing the David and Goliath Battle (sic) to a sports bet probably is unique.

Sorry but I can’t take this seriously anymore.

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THUS

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