- Societal collapse
- Nine Reasons Why Detroit Failed
- Adapting to Change: Utility Systems and Declining Flows
- American Fighter Pilots Give Up
All complex systems age. Even the universe ages, though I suppose we won’t have to worry much about the effects of that. We all tend to think such aging has no relevance to us. Our society is so big, and our concerns are so local.
In a sense that was true in the past, but no more. Our larger system affects our lives in important ways every day, and the impact seems to be expanding and accelerating.
We have to understand the contours of this aging in order to make reasonable choices about our future and to preserve our flexibility for those parts of our future that we can’t predict or control.
Once we give up the idea that complex, adaptive systems are machines, we must confront the reality of system aging.
