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PaperclipPerfector  8mo ago (text post)   3255 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for March 22, 2024

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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What are the finance books? Anything interesting you’d recommend?

Statman's Finance for Normal People. Klarman's Margin of Safety. Pysh's Warren Buffett's 3 Favorite Books.

They're all pretty good. The first one gives insights into various wants, errors, and biases. The differences between the mythical rational person, and the actual human being. The second one is a guide to becoming a value investor. The third one I haven't got very far into, but it gives some idiot proof explanations into what business, shares, etc actually are, and goes from there. As I read a few chapters in it I remember thinking that this is stuff kids with rich parents probably learn growing up, but lots of people don't.

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

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