Interesting finance book review: A Call for Judgment

[StatGuy2000]

Recently, I came across this review by Cosma Shalizi, a statistics professor at Carnegie Mellon (and who was trained as a physicist, with a PhD focusing on research in statistical mechanics and complex systems), of a book titled "A Call for Judgment" by Amar Bhide, a law professor at Tufts University.

http://masi.cscs.lsa.umich.edu/~crshalizi/reviews/bhide-contra-finance.html

As someone who does not work in or specialize in finance, I'm not particularly qualified to comment on either the review or the book, but I know that there a number of quants here on this forum (I'm thinking of twofish-quant in particular), and would like to solicit opinions here on this forum.

 

[StatGuy2000]

This is interesting. So far, this particular post had over 200 views but not one reply. Perhaps this may be due to family activities during the holidays.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

This is interesting. So far, this particular post had over 200 views but not one reply. Perhaps this may be due to family activities during the holidays.

I'm no finance wizard, but why don't you start with telling us why you feel the review is interesting :)

 

[StatGuy2000]

I'm no finance wizard, but why don't you start with telling us why you feel the review is interesting :)

Well, to start with, the reviewer is a physicist-turned-statistician with an interest in complex systems, and he periodically reviews books which are of professional interest to him, and I suspect also to a significant proportion of the audience for Physics Forums.

Furthermore, the book itself involves a discussion about the theory and practice of modern finance, and given that we have a number of people who are quants (and who were once trained as physicists), I would be curious to read what their opinions are regarding either the book or the reviewer's assessment of the book or its subject matter.