Structure. We love it. We pursue it. In our children we try to develop it as soon as we can and consider ourselves inferior parents if we can not. And we admire it everywhere, from Legos to sports teams to government. The opposite of structure is disorder. Entropy. Disintegration. Chaos. The enemy of civilization. It sounds like "planning," and who could object to a plan?
Yet there is a yang to this yin. Nature uses disorder to develop. Tightly integrated entities like military units or growing corporations seem to get congested, lose energy and creativeness and fail more than looser, more adaptive entities. And evolution seems to reward variety, not rigidity.
Nassem Taleb wrote a small article recently published in the WSJ with a twist on this thesis: Order can be the opponent of development and advancement. "Nothing fails in vain." Failure is creative (it makes for good restaurants.) Bottom up government--like the Swiss canton versus the top down autocratic infrastructure of Russia, Iraq and Syria--allows for creation. And survival. He points out the great minds of the Golden Age of English Science--Darwin, Cavendish, Parsons and Bayes--were not locked into a rigid disciplines, they were hobbyists. A free hand and a free mind. Intervention by leadership--especially government--should be an emergency, not maintenance.
Risk. Disorder. Failure. The creative force. And the enemy of politicians who, through lobbyists or ambition or arrogance or empathy, can not abide it.
Yet there is a yang to this yin. Nature uses disorder to develop. Tightly integrated entities like military units or growing corporations seem to get congested, lose energy and creativeness and fail more than looser, more adaptive entities. And evolution seems to reward variety, not rigidity.
Nassem Taleb wrote a small article recently published in the WSJ with a twist on this thesis: Order can be the opponent of development and advancement. "Nothing fails in vain." Failure is creative (it makes for good restaurants.) Bottom up government--like the Swiss canton versus the top down autocratic infrastructure of Russia, Iraq and Syria--allows for creation. And survival. He points out the great minds of the Golden Age of English Science--Darwin, Cavendish, Parsons and Bayes--were not locked into a rigid disciplines, they were hobbyists. A free hand and a free mind. Intervention by leadership--especially government--should be an emergency, not maintenance.
Risk. Disorder. Failure. The creative force. And the enemy of politicians who, through lobbyists or ambition or arrogance or empathy, can not abide it.
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