Skip to Main Content
The Only Three Questions That Count: Investing by Knowing What Others Don't
book

The Only Three Questions That Count: Investing by Knowing What Others Don't

by Kenneth L. Fisher, Jennifer Chou, Lara Hoffmans
October 2008
Beginner content levelBeginner
480 pages
13h 23m
English
Wiley
Content preview from The Only Three Questions That Count: Investing by Knowing What Others Don't

Chapter 1. QUESTION ONE: WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE THAT IS ACTUALLY FALSE?

If You Knew It Was Wrong, You Wouldn't Believe It

It's safe to assume if you knew something was wrong, you wouldn't believe it was real and true in the first place. But in a world where so much of industry applied craft has morphed into long-held mythologies, much of what everyone believes is false. This isn't any different from long ago when humanity believed the world was flat. You needn't beat yourself up if you fall prey to false mythologies. Pretty much everyone has and does. Once you know and accept that, you can begin gaming everyone else.

If sorting false mythology from fact were trivial, there wouldn't be so many false truths. While this isn't trivial, it isn't impossible either. One inherent difficulty is this approach requires being skeptical about all your prior beliefs, something most humans dislike. In fact, most humans hate self-questioning and prefer spending time convincing themselves and others their beliefs are right. Effectively you can't trust any conclusion you thought you knew.

To think through false mythologies, we must first ask: Why do so many people believe things that are false? And why do false truths persist—getting passed down the decades as if they were fact? It comes back to the same point: People persist in believing things that are wrong because, individually, people rarely investigate their own beliefs, particularly when what they believe makes sense intuitively—even more so when ...

Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
and much more.
Start your free trial

You might also like

The Only Three Questions That Still Count: Investing By Knowing What Others Don't, 2nd Edition

The Only Three Questions That Still Count: Investing By Knowing What Others Don't, 2nd Edition

Kenneth L. Fisher, Jennifer Chou, Lara Hoffmans
The Ten Roads to Riches, 2nd Edition

The Ten Roads to Riches, 2nd Edition

Kenneth L. Fisher, Elisabeth Dellinger, Lara W. Hoffmans

Publisher Resources

ISBN: 9780470292679Purchase book