Dead or alive. Fun interesting people, influential role models, mortal enemies, the bourgeoisie, whatever you think will make for an interesting conversation.
I've got two picks: Danny Porush, I think he'd be fascinating to talk to about his time with Stratton Oakmont and Jordan Belfort, from an employee's perspective.
John Romanowski, former NFL linebacker, known for breaking his teammate's eye socket for taking too long with a microwave, Listening to him give interviews now, the crazy has subdued, but if I could go back 20 years, I think he’d make for a fantastic coffee date, barring we don’t get thrown out.
I've already got a list.
The OLD Kanye West (2010ish), would love to really pick his brain about his earlier music and understand what he was thinking when he made MBDTF.
Buffet no doubt to understand his way of life and how/why the hell he doesn't spend any of his money.
Jay-Z, no need to explain.
One enemy man that is tough but may have to say Madoff (if you consider that an enemy). Just to hear what he was going through when that whole thing was happening.
Happy to chat.
You mean pre Kardashian Kanye?:D
Awesome list, old RIP to old Kanye. 99% he was abducted by aliens and they sent down some godawful replica.
Bill Romanowski? I know of the eye socket incident on the field, but not involving a microwave. Dude was roided out and dirty as fuck.
I'd love to have a coffee or whiskey with General George Patton.
I can appreciate the "psycho" aspect of top performing athletes as much as the next guy, but Romanowski seems like an overall shitty dude.
Yeah, he seems like a complete douche.
Mine would be Ray Dalio. Having a conversation not only about investing, starting your own firm, but also about how he instilled the "radically transparent" culture at his firm, where it's okay to tell somehow exactly how you feel about something without drastic repercussions (which is exactly what we see so much of these days all across the U.S.)
emily rata
I'm with ya
Can't settle on one... Nikola Tesla, KRS-ONE, Arthur Cashin, Cornell West, Tie Domi and Helen Mirren.
SB for KRS One
Gotta represent the Boogie Down in Boogie Down Productions! ;-)
Art Cashin is easy, head down to bobby van's on broad street around lunchtime. He's at the bar every day
Jim Carrey, George Clooney. I think everyone in this thread will name someone of interest, tbh.
easy...James Simons
Came here to say the same.
Mike Tyson Jordan Peterson Christopher Hitchens Timothy McVeigh Ben Shapiro William F Buckley Gore Vidal Thomas Sowell Hunter S Thompson
Mike Tyson? Might need a pair of these:![]()
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Hitchens all the way. Probably a better conversationalist than anyone else named. Someone as well read as he was would be fascinating to talk to.
Marcus Tullius Cicero would be the other
Drinks on me at the bar of your choice if you can get Buckley and Vidal to come hang out with us.
McVeigh but not Professor Ted?
Jordan Peterson would be nice but he gets so deep and might make fall asleep. Thomas Sowell and Ben Shapiro definitely
Mike Tyson indeed. Seriously interesting life. I heard an interview with him and was riveted.
He is a complex person, who was both a douchebag who beat up women, as well as a real survivor of a terrible childhood, who became an Olympic gold medalist at 16.
Complex indeed.
Top 5:
Karl Marx - I'd really try to further understand the reasoning behind such a flawed ideology. Carl Icahn - He seems like a really outside of the box kind of guy that can give you a new perspective on many things. Shimon Peres - Just an overall interesting life he had.
Buffett - for obvious reasons.
Pope John Paul II - To learn about his faith, his life, and his work against communism in Europe.
Read 'Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy' by Schumpeter to satisfy the Marx curiosity
I'll definitely check it out. Thanks!
What a book mate!!!!
If you were to meet Icahn, I wouldn't do it over dinner.
I worked at a restaurant and waited on Carl Icahn, his wife, and two others before. I wanted to ask him something market related, but I couldn't get past all the shredded lettuce he had all up in his facial hair. No joke.
One of the sloppiest eaters I've ever seen.
Because he's a beast. A lion does not care about the blood in his mane. He devours his salad like a predator.
Margot Robbie, Scarlett Johansson, Jessica Alba, Eva Mendes, Kate Hudson, Megan Fox, Blake Lively, Gal Gadot.
I'd really enjoy picking their brains about astrophysics and the philosophy behind the periodic elements
Hey don't knock my girl Margot Robbie, did you see her breaking down MBS in the Big Short?
Did you not read my post?
https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-f44155e6d83093ce3cb46a37a473972f-c
Want 2 marry
The only person in this thread who really thought about the question
Sir Patrick Stewart (but we are obviously drinking Tea, Early Grey, Hot) 2Chainz (coffee with activis, I'm likely having a heart attack afterwards) Bill Ackman (we'd be drinking lemonade, per his intro to finance video) Rod Serling (we'd be drinking black coffee and smoking cigarettes at a diner in black and white)
Any hot chick. Who cares about these blokes you homos
I tend to agree. I think a lot of people on this site have never met anyone with any meaningful amount of power. It's a great deal more disappointing than you might imagine to discover that they are just people. Some may have great talent, others may have great minds, but the one thing they all have in common is great luck. While disappointing in some ways, it's also empowering. A single great idea well executed doesn't make you a genius, and it doesn't qualify you as some sort of sage. Does anyone really want to take life advice from Mark Zuckerberg? Do you honestly think that coffee with Warren Buffett would be interesting?
In all likelihood, if they were forced to sit and engage with you, it would be a one-way conversation, with you asking a question or two and them rambling through their answers. You might as well go see them give a lecture since they're unlikely to engage with you at a human level. You'd be much better served by spending time with a comedian than with Ray Dalio. I'd bet both my nuts that Ray Dalio is a boring cunt. I'd much rather have coffee with a close friend or a good-looking, interesting chick than some finance 'guru'. But if I were forced to pick any historical characters, I'd have a round table discussion with Muhammad, Jesus, Buddha, Noah and Moses. I'd explain the current state of world affairs and ask just one question, "What do you have to say for yourselves?"
ditto bro, I had the occasion of grabbing a drink with a regional Fed president, wanted to blow my brains out. great speaker, terrible conversationalist, because to your point, they just ramble on about nothing. would much rather get coffee with nick swardson after a bender or get brunch with caroline hyde in a spaghetti strap than meet ben bernanke or something
MikeFromBaruch
Bobby Axelrod (if he was a real person): to get inside the mind of that type of investor.
Michael Jordon
Bruce Lee
Jerry Seinfeld
Buffet (both Warren and Jimmy)
Any of the main protagonists in The Big Short (the real people) to learn more about what motivated them to risk almost everything to short the housing market when everyone else was long.
jimmy buffett is a good one
Great calls. Esp on Axe. That'd be a great meeting.
MonacoMonkey
Piper Perry :P
+1 for being the first post here to name a porn star as one of those people you want coffee with.
Way too many people.
To name a few - Adolf Hitler, Paul von Hindenburg, Donald Trump, Enver Pasha, Hermann Göring, MonacoMonkey, Erwin Rommel, Vladimir Putin
kim kardashian
grab a coffee and talk about her comeback story
Does that booty count as another party at the coffee? Or is it twins?
Obama, Yellen & Draghi, Blankfein, Fuld, Ackmann, Stephanie Cohen (of Goldman), Sheryl Sandberg
I'm a bit triggered by the concept of grabbing anything
The recently deceased Charles Krauthammer.
Napoleon Bonaparte.
Guess you'll just have to do it yourself. You'll value it more anyway. Rich kids rarely turn out well.
Ed Thorp
Mathematically proved that blackjack can be beaten with card counting
Invented the very first wearable computer in the 1960’s while teaching at MIT. The device was used to prove the game of Roulette could be beaten through the use of Newtonian Physics. Thorp got the idea from watching the moon and planets and thought he could calculate the speed and potential landing location of the ball while playing this “unbeatable” game. It turned out, Thorp was right, Roulette could be beat too. The device he invented went inside the shoe of the player and they had a radio transmitting device that played tones in the ear of the player to give them cues where the ball might land. He estimated a typical edge of 44% per bet.
Ed Thorp is the first modern mathematician who successfully used quantitative methods for risk taking –and most certainly the first mathematician who met financial success doing it. Since then there have been a cohort, such as the Stony Brook whiz kids –but Thorp is their dean. (As an aspiring quant, I admire what Ed did for quant finance).
Ed discovered what is known today as the Black Scholes option formula, before Black and Scholes. His derivation was too simple –nobody at the time realized it could be potent.
As a hedge fund manager for 30 years, Dr. Thorp has achieved the unprecedented 20% return per year. His personal net worth is $800 million and he has traded nearly 100 billion dollars during his career.
I'm currently reading A Man for All Markets and I recommend it to anyone who wants to learn more about Ed's life. Truly fascinating. Ed is a mathematical genius that succeeded in both academia and finance. He also seems like a nice guy, being overly modest despite his list of achievements.
Not familiar with Ed Thorp prior to reading your post. Will have to check out the book.
Don’t know this guy, but I once turned down a job offer from Bob Metcalfe after spending some time with him. No disrespect to Al Gore, but he’s the actual inventor of the internet.
People in this thread are not being very ambitious:
Abraham Jesus Muhammad Early dynasty Egyptian Pharos - i’ll go with Narmer who supposedly integrated the two Egyptian kingdoms Nebuchadnezzar King David/Solomon Some ancient Chinese and Japanese rulers (an area where I know very little, but if we’re bringing people back from the dead - worth some research) Alexander the Great Aristotle Saladin Hannibal Ghengis Khan Leonardo da Vinci George Washington Napoleon Abraham Lincoln Winston Churchill
There’s not much in our common era that I care about from people I’d want to meet. I can’t name a single current world leader who I’d really want to meet . There are people who resonate across hundreds/thousands of years, and that really interests me. I know the first Pharos pre-date Jesus, for example.
P.S. My list is only in rough historical order and no spelling help was employed.
Martin Shkreli
Mario.
N64 Super Mario.
What did Peach do to get kidnapped and what is the mortgage on that castle? You hitting that still? Where was luigi What's your EBITDA on your plumbing business, looking for a strategic partner? What did you do with all that coin? What did those mushrooms taste like?
Brady4MVP
i had beer and tacos with him, i win this thread!
Mr Goldman or Mr Sachs. So I can ask how to break into the goldmans
The good Lord Patrick of WSO
I, for one would like to grab coffee with Erin Callan and ask her what she meant when she said "Lehman is well capitalized."
I'd also like to grab coffee with Jesse Lauriston Livermore.
Bill Murray
St. Teresa of Avila
someone funny, you guys think mentioning a finance guru or a business person makes you look smarter? sounds fu$*ng boring...
ohh wait, you will probably include it in your extracurriculars in your resume.
Steve A. Cohen
Nelson Mandela, no elaboration needed.
Silvio Berlusconi, to understand how he managed his businesses, political career, and his playboy escapades.
Audie Murphy, 1st Lieutenant -- 3rd Infantry, Company B, WWII. --or-- William Travis, Lieutenant Colonel in charge of defending the Alamo.
I'd want to ask them about their bravery and refusal to surrender, as well as truly understand what they stood for in their moments of courage, whether it be their flag, beliefs, fellow soldiers, etc.
I would love to sit down and smoke a joint with The Eagles and listen to some of the stories they have to tell. If I could pick when it would be in the late 70's at the height of their popularity.
George W Bush. Politics aside, if you read about first hand accounts, he seems like a funny dude to have a drink with.
Watch Will Ferrell - Bush & Bush if you haven't seen it. Hysterical.
Jesus Christ id like to know the truth
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Mick Jagger Liam Gallagher
Obama Silvio Berlusconi
and for the psycho/killers:
Mohammedd Atta UnaBomber
the good psycho:
Edison Gaudì
Mad respect for the Gaudi mention. Gotta love his style
He is amazing. Everything he does is done with a reason behind. And the design itself... Stunning
Christina Hendricks, Penelope Cruz, Salma Hayek, Sofia Vergara, Heidi Klum and Wendy Williams. They have such big personalities.
your type is quite obvious here
Overkill is underrated my friend.
Kind of a cop out but me 50 years from now. He could probs help with a little guidance.
Adolf Hitler.
Too often, society confuses efficacy with morality. They are 2 distinct qualities, and must be treated that way/
FWIW, my gf is Russian (and jewish). I've learned to be mentally agnostic.
Oh, I'd grab coffee with him. Then execute. He's not coming out of that meeting. Just sayin'
Action Bronson. An absolute beauty.
Alive: Julian Robertson, Stan Druckenmiller, Ken Griffin, Pres Trump (not in political sense), Silvio Berlusconi, Brian Hunter Death: Niccolò Machiavelli, Adam Smith, Sir Robert Peel, Sir Winston Churchill, Alfred Winslow Jones, Marc Rich
Realistically speaking: Margot Robbie, EmRata, or at least one random Victoria's Secret model
I'll definitely grab my husband to have coffee and I'm actually doing that most of the time.
Arbitrage Andy
Lloyd Blankfein--provided that the meeting led to a job in IB at GS
Milton Friedman
Dead people would be: Margaret Thatcher , Milton Freidman or Winston Churchill Alive people: Queen Elizabeth II
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