Comment by shadowofneptune
4 years ago
That appears to be the point of the comparison, no? If you are operating a machine so complex and unpredictable you don't truly know how it works (a Roman Empire, in this case), you'll never know which way to pull the lever until you have already done so.
Just speculation, but I think complexity provides decisive advantages, at least initially, and that's why we see complex societies dominate. Human groups that can avert catastrophe by adding complexity will do so, and those who do not may be unknown to history.
If civilization survival were as simple as KISS, we probably wouldn't struggle with it as much. We need smart, strategic complexity, and humans are limited in their strategic smarts.
Also short term beneficial choices may be long term bad choices.
The industrial revolution was great for humanity for well over a century. The standard of living in industrial countries advanced farther and quicker than ever before. But that same industrial activity had long term effects that we (as a society) are only just starting to accept and are still in disagreement about how to handle.
I think it’s even simpler:
We have a cognitive bias that undervalues “negative design” — removing things from a design — and so our social structures ratchet towards more complexity until they break.
We encounter that in software or mechanical design as well.
This. But I'd also suggest couching it in different psychological terms.
We have a "cognitive bias" (fear) against relinquishing control. Therefore our social structures ratchet towards more bureaucracy and rigidity until they snap. A skidding car, careening this way and that, needs the driver to stop over-steering. Alternately pulling the wheel the wrong way in a desperate frenzy to take control is the problem.
Many things just work out when you take your hands off the levers. But we also have a political and commercial class who are way too proud to do so. That would seem to invalidate their "scientific management" ideology [1]. The Wizard of Oz would be exposed as a fraud.
I think what's going on in the digital realm shows we've already entered that phase of overcompensation, because so many technologies simply go against common-sense survival instinct, and we seem stuck in cycles of solutionism, adding ever more layers of sticking plasters to fix the stuff we broke last week. We know we are building dangerously brittle and irresilient systems such as a "cashless society". It is this fetish for control that contains the seeds of breakdown.
[1] pretty much the thesis of Adam Curtis's "All Watched Over...", "The Trap" and "Hypernormalisation"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Curtis
We don't like negative interest rates because of loss aversion. We would rather be fooled into believing that we have something that doesn't decay, rust or rot and then be surprised that it is gone at some point instead of seeing and being fully aware of much we are losing over time.
For example, suburban sprawl tries to cover up the negative yield of suburban roads, at some point growth is no longer possible, suddenly, the negative yield of underutilized and overbuilt infrastructure rears its ugly head. The local government is now bankrupt.
It is also the same with capitalism. We need endless growth of the population and the economy. To paper over the fact that each individual ages and their body decays over time, the same applies to a lot of physical capital which rusts, rots or decays in another way. The moment growth stops you will have an aging population, your short lived physical capital will disappear.
The ancient Egyptians understood decay, that is why they tried to make their civilization immortal, that is why they invested in extremely long lived capital, capital that survived four thousand years. The pyramids.
Can you suggest any reading about this?
This is a fascinating concept and I'd like to learn more.
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