TL;DR
Success relies on understanding the world through accurate models. Philosophers, especially those who combine insight with action, can construct and realise these models quickly and at the cost of taking many walks (sometimes that involves insulting some people) by avoiding most of what is wrong with learning from experience and data. Simply put, aim for better models and watch out for influential philosophers who can fire a gun.
I am convinced that the sine qua non for success is a proper understanding of how the world works. That is the one, very complex, thing that many of us will never be able to complete, and those who come close to completion will never do so with perfection. A restatement of this one thing is to say that the sine qua non for success is to develop an accurate model of the world. Only, as you may already know if you know a little bit about models, that all models are wrong. So what is the point?
When people say, as they learned to from the Englishman George E. P. Box, that all models are wrong, they say something that leads into the answer to the “What is the point?” question. All models are wrong, but some are more useful than others. All you have to do is build a better model. Still very complex?
There is another trick; don’t try to build an everything-model, build only a model of the world that relates to the type of success you want to achieve. But still, how do you build such a model?
I listened to a friend speak for almost 30 minutes about why they hated philosophy and philosophers. We were walking, and I had mentioned Descartes without prior knowledge that the mere recognition of philosophers was a trigger for some people. As I was not in the mental state to prove a point, I kept nodding and smiling and affirming as this person went on and on about why philosophy was useless.
Of course, some philosophers and their philosophy are a good waste of the taxpayer’s money. However, the wise people know that it is prudent to fear some philosophers. I think they are most likely to build the most accurate models. Which ones?
In my view, the best answer comes from Plato’s Republic; the philosopher-king. Let’s leave plato, and put it in more contemporary terms; fear the philosopher who leads a mafia. But, why fear these sorts of people? Isn’t a gunslinging anti-philosopher more dangerous?
Plato has the best answer, and I only have a plagiarised one. Plato argues that philosopher kings are the only ones who can ever possess true knowledge and thus are best suited to lead a city or state. Now let me plagiarise Plato by simply explaining this for mafia lovers; we should fear the philosopher who is a mafia boss because his combination of superior insight and action is the closest thing to true knowledge and by extension they have the best models.
A friend who was unfortunate to sit with me through this typing-rade (as I couldn’t let them complete their assignments) rightly accused me of not having specified what I mean by philosopher. Their opinion, which I totally agree with, was that while it was totally clear the attributes of a mafia boss, the ambiguity surrounding the term “philosopher” made everything I just wrote unclear.
I prefer the aphorism Taleb uses to define a philosopher; to be a philosopher is to know through long walks, by reasoning and reasoning only, a priori, what others can only potentially learn from their mistakes, crises, accidents, and bankruptcies - that is, a posteriori.
Such a person learns at a faster and less expensive pace than most others, and if combined with the ability to act, to morph their mental models with the ability to navigate the world tactfully, get closer to Plato’s idea of true knowledge. A gunslinging anti-philosopher mafia boss will pull their gun out and commit murder at the supermarket in a way that allows the law (assuming such a thing works) to track him down, land him a life-sentence and render his threats a one time reality. A philosopher who leads the mafia knows the law and navigates it tactfully to achieve the same in a manner that still gives him another chance to threaten his “enemies”. Now go on and imagine such a philosopher who can execute with the precision and ruthlessness of a mafia boss? Wouldn’t you fear such a person?
In a world that is obsessed with data, I like that Taleb’s idea of the philosopher emphasises reasoning; it implicitly provides an answer for what type of models we should be trying to build. We live in an age of data - that is to say we are often under the curse of looking backwards and trying to see into the future. Data in itself is not bad; we must only use it under the guidance of - I expect you to get it at this point - reason!
So what is the one thing? Simple - in four words - build the better model. And why should you fear some philosophers? Simple - in six words - they may be in the mafia.