1968 was an interesting year. In these parts where I live was a fatal fire that spread across the Victorian terraces houses from inside the roof spaces.Resulting in those spaces being bricked up and Ladders placed in the passage ways of the adjoining homes.
It was also a very interesting time in Mathematics, Edward Norton Lorenz was discovering that small changes in conditions can have big impacts on forecasts and outcomes. You have probably heard the idea that a butterfly can flap its wings in Africa causing a hurricane in America sort of thing. It sounds implausible but the maths behind it is solid.
This presents us with a big problem, the world is highly unstable and unpredictable. Not what we and especially our politicians want to hear. Lorenz's theory swept through the physical sciences. Engineers toughened up areas in critical systems making sure if one part of the system failed the other part continued to operate. When you fly across the arctic or oceans you do so in a Jet that's engines are independent of each other. The words and terms Fail-safe, Backup and stress test entered our vocabulary. Our world is not without risk but those risks are greatly reduced thanks to Edward Lorenz ground breaking work, we owe him a debt.
Strangely enough across campus the "social scenitists" carried on with their ideology that the world was wholly knowable and predictable. Safety in numbers they concluded, pool our power ect. They even invented managerialism to calmly steer their preferred predictable courses emasculating the democratic wishes of the people they were supposed to serve. A Common Purpose made any moral difficulties disappear.
Economists concluded that risk was now a thing of the past and as such encouraged financial institutions to take bigger and bigger risks. Politicians and Mandarins took banking regulation away from the Bank of England and invented the FSA to tick box its way to golden age of illusionary wealth. The "science" of politics ignored the physical unpredictable world of the butterfly.
And then a fire that burnt its way through the roof spaces of the worlds economies, and still alight and dangerous today. You would have thought the Social Scientists would notice that the world changed, Trail and error had come and gone and they been found to be at fault? Nope scapegoat the Bankers and continue in pooling and building the power bases.
So did the EU political elites learn their lessons? Nation states as backups, Currencies as firewalls? nope they wish to build an even bigger political system, a bigger currency system. They will take the power for themselves just in case of trouble and sort it out, they can still predict the future they think, They will be there next time.
So it seems we might be thankfully be given a choice in all this. A top down system of rules and regulations set from the centre with clever humans directing the course of events or a bottom up system of defuse power bases where good practice can be copied across the system, where a fire or problem in one part can be quickly identified and addressed so the other parts don't suffer damage. A system where human frailty is excepted and is part of the learning curve of the system. A new system for a new digital mass communication age.
I really do love my Neighbors, I could have easily left many years ago if it was not for their kindness, civility and humour, but I am mighty glad that those roof spaces are sealed between us and I have fire alarms.
2008 was an epic year, we are still to appreciate its importance. Its the year the world changed. three years after the 68 fire President Nixon closed the US Federal bank gold window and the super cycle of credit creation began which unleashed great wealth and growth which ended with the banking crash of 2008.
We now have to build truly robust systems around strong institutions. The world is a much less sure place than it was it seems, but it was never the case in the first place. There is no stronger institution on earth greater than the nation state don't let the social scientists and politicians kill it, you will regret it, sovereignty is much more than the Queens head on a coin its the moat around the castle, the bricked up roof space too.
Links
Butterfly Effect
Managerialism
Nixon Shock
