Fluke (Unabridged)
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- $19.99
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
Want to know what chaos theory can teach us about human events? In the perspective-altering tradition of Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point and Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s The Black Swan comes a provocative challenge to how we think our world works—and why small, chance events can divert our lives and change everything, by social scientist and Atlantic writer Brian Klaas.
If you could rewind your life to the very beginning and then press play, would everything turn out the same? Or could making an accidental phone call or missing an exit off the highway change not just your life, but history itself? And would you remain blind to the radically different possible world you unknowingly left behind?
In Fluke, myth-shattering social scientist Brian Klaas dives deeply into the phenomenon of random chance and the chaos it can sow, taking aim at most people’s neat and tidy storybook version of reality. The book’s argument is that we willfully ignore a bewildering truth: but for a few small changes, our lives—and our societies—could be radically different.
Offering an entirely new lens, Fluke explores how our world really works, driven by strange interactions and apparently random events. How did one couple’s vacation cause 100,000 people to die? Does our decision to hit the snooze button in the morning radically alter the trajectory of our lives? And has the evolution of humans been inevitable, or are we simply the product of a series of freak accidents?
Drawing on social science, chaos theory, history, evolutionary biology, and philosophy, Klaas provides a brilliantly fresh look at why things happen—all while providing mind-bending lessons on how we can live smarter, be happier, and lead more fulfilling lives.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
In this paradigm-shifting book, political scientist and journalist Brian Klaas explores just how much our lives are affected by random chance. Many of us want to believe that our choices determine what happens in our life—but is that really true? Klaas argues that it’s actually occurrences outside of our control that lead to so-called black swan events: moments so impactful they change the course not just of our lives but of human history. He uses amazing stories of chance to illustrate his point, like how the city of Kyoto was saved from annihilation during World War II due to a defense minister’s vacation plans, or how prehistoric phytoplankton might have led to Donald Trump’s defeat in 2020 . Klaas cleverly breaks down complex concepts like probability, convergent evolution, and chaos theory into terms anyone can understand. A guaranteed winner for fans of Malcolm Gladwell or the Freakonomics Radio podcast, Fluke is an audiobook you should absolutely take a chance on.
Customer Reviews
4.5/5
A total nerd out of one of the most important symptoms of life. This book left me with an immense sense of wonder I haven’t experienced since childhood. It’s a topic that will force a deep breath out of you due to its theoretical complexity but it’s quite comforting to have knowledge of it.