Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk

"Ambitious and readable . . . an engaging introduction to the oddsmakers, whom Bernstein regards as true humanists helping to release mankind from the choke holds of superstition and fatalism." —The New York Times

"An extraordinarily entertaining and informative book." —The Wall Street Journal

"A lively panoramic book . . . Against the Gods sets up an ambitious premise and then delivers on it." —Business Week

"Deserves to be, and surely will be, widely read." —The Economist

"[A] challenging book, one that may change forever the way people think about the world." —Worth

"No one else could have written a book of such central importance with so much charm and excitement." —Robert Heilbroner author, The Worldly Philosophers

"With his wonderful knowledge of the history and current manifestations of risk, Peter Bernstein brings us Against the Gods. Nothing like it will come out of the financial world this year or ever. I speak carefully: no one should miss it." —John Kenneth Galbraith Professor of Economics Emeritus, Harvard University

In this unique exploration of the role of risk in our society, Peter Bernstein argues that the notion of bringing risk under control is one of the central ideas that distinguishes modern times from the distant past. Against the Gods chronicles the remarkable intellectual adventure that liberated humanity from oracles and soothsayers by means of the powerful tools of risk management that are available to us today.

"An extremely readable history of risk." —Barron's

"Fascinating . . . this challenging volume will help you understand the uncertainties that every investor must face." —Money

"A singular achievement." —Times Literary Supplement

"There's a growing market for savants who can render the recondite intelligibly—witness Stephen Jay Gould (natural history), Oliver Sacks (disease), Richard Dawkins (heredity), James Gleick (physics), Paul Krugman (economics)—and Bernstein would mingle well in their company." —The Australian

The primary purpose of AGAINST THE GODS is not as an introduction to risk management. For those who buy this book expecting such, you will be heavily disappointed. Instead, this is a terrific primer about risk and its history that will pique the interest of any person who has had little formal background in the science of risk management. The main strength of AGAINST THE GODS lies in its astounding clarity which does not come at the expense of comprehensiveness. Bernstein assumes no prior experience with mathematics or risk management. It is this accessibility which makes this the first book on risk you should buy.

In summary, I highly recommend this to anyone who has at least a passing interest in chance or risk. For those with experience in risk management, the history of risk presented in AGAINST THE GODS will still be very interesting. However, do not expect any of the ideas to be new.


Mathematics for freethinkers, for gamblers, for bankers   January 9, 2004
N. Tsafos (Washington, DC)
15 out of 17 found this review helpful

Any reader who picks up "Against the Gods" for mathematical amusement will be surprised to find out that "the revolutionary idea that defines the boundary between modern times and the past is the mastery of risk." This claim, in the introduction, should be evidence enough that this book is no brainteaser, but rather the chronicle of a concept that has transformed how society thinks about the future.

Peter Bernstein, author and consultant, begins with the ancient civilizations that came close but never actually thought specifically about risk. The reasons are many-for one, absent Arabic numerals, computational mathematics were impossible. More importantly, conceiving of risk required a profound metamorphosis of the way people thought about the future: mathematicians and philosophers could only develop risk mathematics once people were convinced that the future was unpredictable and depended on their choices more so than the whims of any particular deity.

Most of the advances in the field came from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century. Often, the impetus was gambling; in fact, most of the puzzles that mathematicians tried to solve by developing probability mathematics were related to card games or craps. After that came the actuarial science, with mathematicians gripping with questions of life expectancies and illnesses.

Only in the second half of the twentieth century does risk become highly mathematical, as it enters into economics and finance, where precision and quantitative data overtake rough estimations and qualitative analysis. But with the emergence of precision have also come severe criticisms-on one end from psychologists who have cast doubt on the robustness of the rational behavior hypothesis, and on the other, from chaos mathematicians who prefer non-linear and complex explanations that go against the intellectual tradition of statisticians.

The history of risk, readers will find out, is more interesting than expected. It is a story of gamblers, philosophers, mathematicians, economists, psychologists and many others. Most of all, it is a chronicle of an ever ending dream: to anticipate or even predict the future. Whether people will ever be able to do that is doubtful; but there is no better account of that quest than Mr. Bernstein's "Against the Gods."


One of my favorite books   June 24, 2006
A. Licata (Chicago, IL USA)
11 out of 12 found this review helpful

Must confess my bias on this. I like games, gambling and investing. This book covers the gamut and does it well. What I found especially enjoyable was Bernstein's literate background. He spun a fascinating tale of 'The remarkable story of risk' (from the front cover) in a totally engaging way.

Following comes from the introduction, "The revolutionary idea that defines the boundary between modern times and the past is the mastery of risk: the notion that the future is more than a whim of the gods and that men and women are not passive before nature."

Clearly, this book covers important ground. Fortunately for us, it does so in a way that leaves no one behind.

As a student of business I found this to be totally absorbing.

Because I like to gamble, it was wonderful to learn that questions posed by gamblers in the Renaissance resulted in the groundwork in our modern understanding of risk management.

Because Bernstein writes this as a history the reader can enjoy it as such without struggling through a textbook-like treatment of this material.

I have read and enjoyed it several times.


Very interesting approach to Quantitative Analysis.. Really   October 28, 2002
Sam Simpson IV (Greensboro, NC United States)
14 out of 16 found this review helpful

I never enjoyed any of my stat. or quant. classes in graduate school, I wish I had read this book first. Bernstein is a good story teller who adeptly blends human faces and quantitative theories to tell the history of man's understanding of risk. The book drags a little in some spots and wanders in others, but is still worth the read. Against The Gods is user friendly enough for the everyday reader who might have trouble calculating sales tax, while offering the more studied students a refreshing dose of perspective to accompany their book smarts.