Individuals typically fit in with the fashions of their time rather than entirely invent their own. What happens to be popular during our lifespans, and especially our younger lives when we more often seek fashionable options, is a matter of luck. Most of us have only a slight impact on these decisions. What are the unintended consequences that can follow? Continue reading “Victims of Fashion”
Vultures and Ventures (Structure of Growth and Decline)
Vultures: Why are vultures dying in large numbers around the world? What else happens when the vultures decline? And let’s ask the question few are comfortable asking: How much is a species worth?
Ventures: Why do well-funded, fast-growing startups die? What else happens when they die? And let’s ask the question that is often ignored: Who wins in the process? Continue reading “Vultures and Ventures (Structure of Growth and Decline)”
Eradication’s Good Intentions (Mosquitoes & More)
While AIDS, cancer, and heart disease get the headlines, malaria still kills large numbers of people. An estimated range of annual deaths from malaria is 435K to 720K a year (2015), with 90% of deaths located in Africa. These numbers have decreased significantly in the last 10 years but also note that 70% of deaths are from the under 5-year old age group.
Unlike the other diseases mentioned above, the way people get malaria and the way the disease spreads is different. That means when it comes to considering eradicating the many species of single-celled plasmodium parasite that cause malaria, some plans actually call for the eradication of mosquitoes — the vector carrying the parasite and infecting humans.
This post is speculative since malaria and mosquito eradication have not been tried except locally. But there are proposals for global or regional mosquito eradication. In a connected global ecosystem, where connections are not well-understood (or are they?), where do you take a risk? Would the decision to eradicate mosquitoes already have been made if malaria deaths were mostly based in other parts of the world? What could be unintended consequences of mosquito eradication? Continue reading “Eradication’s Good Intentions (Mosquitoes & More)”
Acquiring Ignorance
Ignorance is one of the causes of unintended consequences listed by Robert Merton in “The Unanticipated Consequences of Purposive Social Action” (the others being error, short-term vs long-term interests, basic values, and the self-defeating prophecy).
Let’s look at what ignorance is, what causes ignorance, effects of ignorance in society, and how it impacts us in unexpected ways. Continue reading “Acquiring Ignorance”
A City Too Familiar (the Spread of Disease)
The impact of diseases and epidemics on human life is as old as humanity. Disease is mentioned in texts thousands of years old, its presence changed political and economic history, cultural habits, and even morality. But often we think of disease as a stranger. It’s something that comes from somewhere else. But the systems that are in place affect how easily disease moves among us.
Let’s look into how disease impacts us with unintended consequences. First, a view from fiction. Continue reading “A City Too Familiar (the Spread of Disease)”
Origins of Error
A source of unintended consequences is error.
But where do errors come from? What kinds of errors are there? What can we do to minimize exposure to error?
This is one of the causes of unintended consequences listed by Robert Merton in “The Unanticipated Consequences of Purposive Social Action” (the others being ignorance, short-term vs long-term interests, basic values, and the self-defeating prophecy).
Destructive Collection (How We Destroy Things)
Some destruction is accidental. Some is intentional. Destruction works in different ways. And for different reasons.
These are types of destruction I’ve cataloged. I arranged this list according to what each type of destruction means, methods to achieve, first-order effects, second-order effects, and examples.
(Reminder: first-order effects are the direct, commonly noticeable changes. Second-order effects are the effects of the effects and often not obvious.)
Note that there is a lot of overlap between categories. I didn’t attempt a mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive list. That just felt unrepresentative of the messiness of life.
This is a destructive collection that I hope will change the way you think. Continue reading “Destructive Collection (How We Destroy Things)”
Food Follows Function (Why we eat what we eat)
I’ve kept these early posts focused on issues that many people can relate to, rather than going into systems theory, complexity, chaos and more. Second-order effects touch the common things we consume, not just the esoteric.
Second-order effects are everywhere — even in the choice of what we eat. But who chooses the choices? Some varieties of crops cannot easily be shipped far or produced for large markets. Other varieties are at risk of shocks and therefore put their focused producers and consumers at risk.
Continue reading “Food Follows Function (Why we eat what we eat)”
Under a Spell – The Armistice at 100
In under a week it will be the 100th anniversary of the armistice that ended hostilities during World War I. While WWI is distant enough in the past to no longer be a constant comparison to the present, those years of conflict still echo today. The war was a relatively short period when many things changed.
Thousands of others have already written at length about the first modern war and its consequences. These works fill entire libraries. Instead, here I look at what enduring technologies and strategies WWI gave opportunity to arise.
Categories of Unintended Consequences
There are many frameworks with which to evaluate unintended consequences. So far in my writing here I’ve looked at examples arranged around a theme (species introduction, food, government policy, human behavior etc) where there is a somewhat clear relationship between cause and effect (even if sometimes only in hindsight). I haven’t yet touched frameworks of complexity and won’t do so until I go deeper into more second-order effects.
This week I step back and look at basic categories of unintended consequences and call out potential new areas of exposure to second-order effects.
