Easily, one of the most iconoclastic thinkers today is Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who burst onto the intellectual scene with his 2007 blockbuster "The Black Swan." In that book, he describes the three characteristics of highly improbable events, i.e., the event has a massive effect, that it is unpredictable, and that it appears obvious after the fact. Published just prior to the Global Financial Crisis of 2007-09, his fame was conveniently assured.
The title of his new book is "The Bed of Procrustes" comes from a Greek tale about a man who tailored his house guests to fit the guest bed. If they were too short, they were tortured by stretching. If they were too long, their legs were cut off the right amount. Taleb thinks we make our truths fit convenient facts, rather than look beyond the facts.
This is a book of iconoclastic aphorisms such as: "Academia is to knowledge what prostitution is to love; close enough on the surface but, to the nonsucker, not exactly the right thing." The book is meant to be in-your-face, requiring you to think, and it is does! I'm glad I read it. It is like tilling the brain.
While I am grateful to live in the same world as anybody as brilliant as Taleb, I don't ever recall reading that he is a nice guy.
