I don't much mind the populurization of these terms or making people think in more novel ways. Even if it's seen as BS by those more informed, I'm glad such books are written and communicators like Taleb exist. Without him, I wouldn't have discovered a bunch of tangential things. I will admit, it gives my brain a satisfying itch too, as I realise that academia is often just the refined encoding of pretty mundane everyday truths, so when someone is able to come in and re-extract that and share it widely, even with a bit of gentle-re-branding, I think it's still net-positive.
As you point out; "making people think in more novel ways" (or making them think at all given the amount of parroting in the education system) is the usp of Taleb's books. People need to stop focusing on the attributes of the author (arrogant etc.) but instead need to learn to focus on the content of their writings.
