I love economics... I love the markets... I love behavioral finance... this book is a disappointment.

Picture that monotone prof you had in university. You know, the one that made you nod off in the first five minutes. Seems like he wrote it. Bad metaphors, poor organization, brutal writing. Nothing in here is too academic, just poorly constructed arguments and presentation. If you want to know how biology makes fools of us all, stick with Dan Ariely or James Montier.

Be prepared for a politically incorrect and enlightening foray into the emerging science of evolutionary psychology. The authors stress early to avoid the common 'moral fallacies' when evaluating this material. This means that just because the science points to X, doesn't mean it is inherently good or evil; it's just the way our species is. Nor do these conclusions necessarily lead us to certain conclusions, whether they be political, economic or what have you.

The authors (one now deceased) have created this work mostly in Q&A format. It can be read chapter by chapter or you can pick and choose what topics interest you (and you won't be doing yourself a disservice). It is well written and engaging. Read it with an open mind, be prepared to challenge some long held preconceptions, and you will definitely not look at our species the same way ever again. Whether you are into behavioral finance, marketing, academia, or just curious, this work in invaluable.

I will state my biases outright: I have been a big fan of Bill Bonner for a while. I have found his libertarian approach to the markets, history, politics and philosophy to be enlightening. After falling in love with his last book "Empire of Debt" I awaited the release of this book like Xmas morning. However this work fell just a tad short of my expectations.

No one can dispute Bonner's command of history and the facts. The man is an intellectual powerhouse. At times however he writes as if this is a blog, and you end up asking yourself what the point was or how it ties into the overall thesis. Other moments felt as if I was back in a university lecture where Johnny PhD went rambling off on some esoteric topic and lost 95% of the class.

A huge plus is his understanding of behavioural finance and evolutionary psychology which he ties magically into his criticisms of our species and theories of the markets. This is the book's biggest strength, pointing out our fundamental and intrinsic defects that make EMH (efficient markets hypothesis) a fairy tale.

Those aspiring or current portfolio managers will find little pragmatic advice in this book. Some of Bonner's conclusions you have heard a million times if you read The Daily Reckoning: buy gold, we are in a commodities bullmarket, don't buy high P/Es... His analysis on some of these issues is often shallow (for instance when he discusses the growth of credit derivatives) but that is not the strength of the work. If he ran a portfolio no doubt the man would be an underperforming machine over the last few years.

I really thing Bonner needs Addison Wiggin around to keep him on track. I think I counted 3 separate occasions where Bonner UNLOADED on Thomas Friedman; they are the antithesis of each other and you can sometimes understand Bonner's frustration. However, it felt as if he was sapping his own credibility during some of these relentless attacks (not that they weren't funny!) You can tell he dominates the discourse in this book; when Lila Rijiva has her chance to speak out or pipe in with an anecdote it is almost awkward.

Despite these failings this is an engaging and informative contrarian approach that will at least have you questioning some fundamental beliefs: about history, the markets, and our Western society in general. And what could be more valuable than that?

This is, without a doubt, the single best work on investing I have read to date. Ken Fisher manages +$30B US and has a track record to prove himself. His father he is not, and he breaks down his investment philosophies for combating TGH ("The Great Humiliator" aka The Market).

Question 1: What do you believe that is actually false? Here he goes to down on some of our most cherished beliefs. Believe that low P/E stocks are always better? Wrong. Believe that deficits are bad for stocks? Wrong. Fisher shows with empirical data how a lot of the truisms we take for granted aren't exactly true. You may be affronted with a lot of his conclusions... good! Because most people will throw this book out after about chapter 3.

Question 2: What can you fathom that others can't? Here he explains how he looks for those hidden things that give him a shot at beating the market. You may remember the price-to-sales ratio... he invented it back in the 70s. While it is now usually fully priced in to the markets, he used it with great success for many years. Some of his beauties he shares include constructing a global yield curve. A global yield curve?! Yes, and he goes on to shows corelation with returns on value vs growth stocks using his global yield curve. Some of these things are so paradigm bursting you may hail Fisher as a prophet.

Question 3: What is my brain doing to blindside me now? This is the behavioural finance section. Drawing on a lot of the research in the last couple decades showing that we aren't as rational or markets as efficient as we'd like to believe, he shows us how to pragmatically apply a strategy that can hopefully exclude our tendencies to do very irrational things. Hindsight bias and myopic loss aversion are just a few problems brought up.

Not only is this book revolutionary, it is also hilarious. If you fancy yourself a libertarian/capitalist you are in for a few treats. Notable are his many diatribes on the "ineptitude" (to put it lightly) of government. If you are ready for a totally new approach where many of your long-standing beliefs will be challenged, then pick this gem up. After all, he isn't the most successful columnist/money manager in Forbes' history for nothing.

While the price of this little gem was steep, and it contained much material already printed in some Mr. Harris' essays (hence the four stars), it packs a lot in. The author is concise and his erudite sense of humour shows through the serious nature of the book.

The book was a response to the innumerable letters he received after writing The End of Faith, primarily from the Christian population. If you've read the epilogue to the latest version of that work, you'll see he addresses some of these issues there. In this book he expands upon such, systematically rebutting the arguments theologians throw at him.

For instance the author covers a counterpoint to the proclamation: atheist countries are worse to live in. Treading through standard of living issues like infant mortality, income, education, crime and the like, he show that this is not the case, based on whatever empirical measure you define. For instance, the Bible belt is worse off under all said criteria than the more secular states.

That's just a brief tidbit of info from the book. While he isn't naive enough to think he'll change the minds of dogmatists, he hopes to catch some of those in the middle ground and awaken them to threats now being posed. While The End of Faith may have alienated some religious moderates through its sheer audacity, this book should be more welcoming. Thank you once again Mr. Harris.

This book seems like the knockout punch following Sam Harris' concise 'Letter to a Christian Nation' and should top the bestseller list for a while to come.

Once again Mr. Dawkins lays out his thesis that we, as a species, do not need religion to function as a civil society. Qualities like compassion have a biological basis, and we need no scripture to decide what is right and wrong. This scientific, albeit readable, tour de force is a gift.

Just a note on a previous review, it is readily apparent how religious people who take offence to these works paint themselves as such often in the first paragraph, "He could certainly use some religion in his life, but that's another story.... " With such intrinsic bias present, Dawkins' work is cherry-picked the same way scripture is - and of course the book misses its most needy targets.

Those religious people who are easily offended typically fallback on the fallacious argument that atheism breeds atrocities (Stalin, for instance). These people than think they have found an irrevocable flaw in the arguments and essentially discount them to chatter, satisfied to crawl back in a comfortable bubble.

But as Dawkins points out, these policies are always the product of irrational dogmatism and unfounded beliefs about the world - just like religion. As Mr. Harris eloquently said, no society that was commited to discovering the truth and nature of their own existence is guilty of such. And this is precisley the type of society we need to live in.

It's nice to see a Libertarian book finally go mainstream....

Bonner and Wiggin do a delightful job of showing just how far the US has fallen from grace. From its humble beginnings as a republic focused on individual liberty, the authors progressively paint a picture of a country that slowly turned itself into an offensive juggernaut in the 20th century. The precarious position we now find ourselves is inescapable for anyone who values their financial situation and current standard of living.

They are equally proficient in historical analysis as they are in their financial musings. These guys are RUTHLESS in their criticisms of everyone from Roosevelt to Al "Printing Press" Greenspan.

Aside from the heavy and sometimes depressing material contained in this book, you will find yourself laughing frequently as these guys go no-holds-barred tangents - especially memorable is the 4 pages they dedicate to giving Thomas Friedman the lambasting he deserves.

"There is no subtler or surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debase the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which only one man in a million is able to diagnose."
- John Maynard Keynes

Unbelievable.

Never have I read something so powerful.

Mr. Hawkins, thank you.