The Science of Conjecture: Evidence and Probability Before Pascal

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[amazonsearch]The Science of Conjecture: Evidence and Probability Before Pascal[/amazonsearch]

 

Shot in the dark. Does anyone have a copy of this? If so, would you be willing to let me borrow it? It's $70 for paperback on Amazon and not available at the local library.

 

Also, for those of you who were curious, this is what Taleb has to say about it:

 

5.0 out of 5 stars Indispensable August 31, 2013

By N N Taleb

Format:Paperback

As a practitioner of probability, I've read many book on the subject. Most are linear combinations of other books and ideas rehashed without real understanding that the idea of probability harks back the Greek pisteuo (credibility) and pervaded classical thought. Almost all of these writers made the mistake to think that the ancients were not into probability. And most books such "Against the Gods" are not even wrong about the notion of probability: odds on coin flips are a mere footnote. If the ancients were not into computable probabilities, it was not because of theology, but because they were not into games. They dealt with complex decisions, not merely probability. And they were very sophisticated at it.

 

This book stands above, way above the rest: I've never seen a deeper exposition of the subject, as this text covers, in addition to the mathematical bases, the true philosophical origin of the notion of probability. In addition Franklin covers matters related to ethics and contract law, such as the works of the medieval thinker Pierre de Jean Olivi, that very few people discuss today.

 

 

[rkbabang]

$12.

 

I've never ordered from this site before, I found it with a Google search.

 

[prunes]

No luck

[jschembs]

Wow, Taleb's promotion must have wiped out nearly all of the excess supply. I bought it used (like new) for $11 a couple weeks ago on Amazon. It's pretty dense thus far, focused on legal theory and the art of determining guilt prior to probabilistic-based methods.