Want to know how to solve our most perplexing problems? Rebecca uses logic and pragmatism to tackle seemingly intractable issues in her column, THE FIX. Now available on Newsmax! CLICK HERE
Image of Content Image Leftcontent top
 
Image of Rightbar top

Articles

January 26, 2014

Rebecca Costa on Complexity

Image of Press Release #231

I wrote this book because of my own encounters with complexity. And as I looked around, it wasn't just me. Everyone was having trouble with how complex the world was getting. I'll give you a small example. On my computer I have a bunch of icons at the bottom of my computer and I don't really know what they're for. They represent software applications and I don't know what they are; I don't need them, and I'm not going to use them. But when someone suggested I should take them all of, I said, "No, no, just leave it alone," because I have some fear that they're going to affect the things that work fine on my computer. Worse yet, about a week ago I got a window that said I needed to order upgrades for these software programs that I don't use and really don't want. And I found myself ordering them! And I knew this was a nonsensical thing but I had fear, I was afraid it would affect my other work. And when I talked to other people, they have lots of software on their computers that they will never use but they're afraid to take off.

So that's just one little ridiculous example of complexity. But let's say that I have a problem and I want to stop a check at my local bank. If I call my local bank now, I can't reach my branch. I go to an 800 number clearinghouse in some foreign country where they speak a different language and don't really know me, or my account, or my problem. And the truth of the matter is, that it takes me a long time to explain to them what it is that I want to do. In fact, it's faster for me to get in my car and drive to my local bank so that I can talk to somebody and they could probably straighten it out in 10 seconds, rather than me trying to explain to someone in a foreign country.

What if that bank is going out of business? There's a global banking crisis and suddenly I need to get a hold of somebody and take some action quickly. That's a whole other level of complexity. And all of us are facing these kinds of things. Whether it's problems with climate change, nuclear proliferation,or a pandemic virus. It's getting really, really hard to collect the facts that will allow me to act responsibly. And perhaps the greatest example of this was when we, as a country, made the decision to go into the Iraq war. Now I'm a very responsible person and it occurred to me that because I didn't go out and collect facts, and I didn't become an informed citizen, I allowed my president to lead me into a war that I frankly don't believe we should have gone into in retrospect. So in order to make a more informed decision, I took it upon myself to go to the FBI site to find more about who these terrorist groups are and why they would want to kill me, and what we should maybe do about it. But I found out there were 18 active terrorist groups. And I spent about 60 days trying to understand what their history was and what their agendas were.  In fact there are about six groups with the word "jihad" attached to them, but they don't like each other. It's not like the United States is their only enemy, they're enemies against each other as well. And they're in all different areas of the Middle East.

The point I would make is I'm a retired writer and I could afford 60 days to really go in depth and do research, it's what I do. But at the end of that 60 days, I realized if tomorrow my president said, "We're going to have to escalate the war in Iraq," I would have to trust my president. It has become impossible to collect the information and the knowledge for me to make a responsible decision - whether it's banking, whether I should travel, or if there's a pandemic virus alert. I don't even understand what the security codes are at the airport! I think orange is better than yellow, but I don't know what to do when it's orange or yellow, and nobody that I sit with at the airport with really knows. So the world has gotten extremely complex.

What happens when the rate at which our brains evolve is significantly slower then the rate at which we manufacture complexity and make new scientific discovery?



Video








 
Image of Content Image Leftcontent bottom
 
Image of Rightbar bottom
Articles > Rebecca Costa on Complexityback to top