The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable

This chapter serves as the only chapter in Part 4 ("The End"). It departs in tone from the previous chapters, as Taleb adopts a more conversational, less didactic tone. He reveals some of his own ambivalence, while also offering the reader some advice. For instance, he writes: "half the time I am shallow, the other half I want to avoid shallowness" (296). Here Taleb is illustrating the complexity of holding two paradoxical beliefs or attitudes at once. Recognizing the possibility of Black Swans invites a paradoxical view of life that invites questions such as, "How do I enjoy the current moment while acknowledging that a Black Swan event, that could change the world, could happen at any moment?" Taleb suggests that by not "sweating the small stuff" there is freedom to enjoy the greatest Black Swan of all—the gift of human life (298).