On the Survival of Rats in the Slush Pile | Page 5

None of which would have happened if Clift had decided to play any of the parts himself.
I even compressed my idea about circumstance into a mathematical formula, or expression (of sorts):
S :: C
This formula holds true, I suggested, where S = Success (however defined), and C = Circumstance (as defined above). The symbol :: was introduced by William Oughtred in 1631, and it means 'varies as to'. S :: C is therefore a compact way of saying that
Success varies according to Circumstance.
Both Taleb and I, therefore, approaching matters from wholly different directions, have concluded that success in the arts, and particularly success as experienced by writers, is a random event. It is not determined by hard work, who you know, or talent (not, at any rate, above a certain level).
You, the reader, will probably resist the Taleb/Allen conclusion at this point; but you at least are thoughtful enough to be reading this essay, so please reserve final judgement on the causes of the black-swan phenomenon until you have read the rest of the argument.
Taleb and I are not alone in reaching our conclusion about the effects of randomness aka circumstance.
In his autobiography Nudity in a Public Place, the actor John Nettles quoted a friend of his whom he described as 'a great literary figure and a major celebrity'. This individual remarked to Nettles: 'Nothing is more common today than successful men with no talent.... Success and celebrity do not necessarily depend on talent in these dog days and it is a good thing you never ever believe they do, otherwise you might miss out on the joke of the century.'
On a less elevated level than John Nettles's friend, one of the former Spice girls recently spoke with some awe about the popularmusic business; she was amazed, she said, that 'so many people with so little talent are making so much money.'
The remainder of this essay will enlarge on the idea that huge literary and/or commercial success for writers, who are not already famous names, comes (if it ever does) in the form of a black swan, or a random event. The discussion will then be used as the basis for generating strategies which might be adopted by those who work in the book trade. The strategies will, however, be of particular importance to writers - especially if they wish to avoid lasting psychological, and hence physical, damage; and if they wish to avoid allocating scarce resources (e.g. time and energy) to an almost certainly futile project.
Part 2: The experiment with rats
The experiment described
Taleb is under contract to produce a book on black swans; and, at the time of writing this essay, he has posted a draft chapter from the book on his web site. The present title of the chapter is 'On the Invisibility of the Drowned Worshippers', which is a reference to the work of Francis Bacon in the seventeenth century.
Bacon, it seems, was once shown a set of portraits of men who had survived shipwrecks; these portraits had been commissioned by the Church authorities. The subjects of the portraits were all good Christians: before embarking on a voyage they had taken the steps recommended by the Church for those in peril from the sea; these preparations no doubt included going to communion, spending a great deal of time praying, and, I imagine, making a substantial contribution to Church funds.
The result of these Christian preparations was that, when their ship sank, lo and behold, God rewarded them by saving their lives: hence their portraits, which were presented by the Church authorities as an example to others.
It was Francis Bacon who asked one of those questions that you're not supposed to ask. Where, he enquired, were the portraits of those mariners who, before their voyage, had also gone to communion, said their prayers, and made a contribution to Church funds, but had nevertheless drowned? These were the 'drowned worshippers' who had become invisible. The Church, through some oversight, had not mentioned them, or commissioned their portraits.
The drowned worshippers constitute a phenomenon which will often be mentioned in this essay: survivorship bias. We human beings are fallible creatures, and we have a habit of seeing only the survivors of a set of experiences. This, Taleb tells us, is an error in thinking which can get us into serious trouble.
In the course of his draft chapter from the book on black swans, Taleb sets out to describe several other kinds of erroneous thinking. In order to illustrate these errors, he asks us to imagine an experiment with rats. (And since this is a hypothetical experiment I can give an absolute assurance that no animals were harmed during the writing of this essay.)
Suppose, Taleb says, that we have access to a city full of rats: rats of all kinds, fat, thin, sickly, strong,