The big question for this segment is,
what can be distilled from our examination of complex cultural systems?
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Humans represent a new form of complexity that generates systems that are,
in many ways, more complex than what came before us.
This is due to the emergent property of culture,
which evolved from biological evolution,
which in turn evolved from the chemical and stellar evolution that came before it.
Humans have the ability to accumulate thousands,
if not millions, of adaptations with every single passing generation.
This is what has delivered humans from stone tools to skyscrapers
in just 200,000 years, in an evolutionary blink of an eye.
Due to faster adaptations, the pathways are more numerous and
more difficult to predict than ever before.
Newly emerged complex systems tend to disturb feedback cycles and
make it difficult for an ecosystem to find its way back to equilibrium.
Humans completely alter the landscape of our rapidly changing world.
These breakthroughs have also happened at a smaller scale throughout human history.
Depending on the industry, career path, or set of problems, this succession of upsets
and breakthroughs may happen on the scale of decades or even daily.
Due to the propensity of complex systems to produce breakthroughs and to upset
the equilibrium, we must understand the larger context in which they happen.
And regardless of the sector or station,
anticipate the numerous pathways in which these unforeseen breakthroughs may tend.
There are two primary generators of all human innovation.
The number of potential innovators, those buzzing human brains
that could generate a minor or earth-shattering innovation at any time.
And the connectivity between those brains to exchange information and
build upon each other's innovations.
A proper understanding of those two main drivers not only allows us to anticipate
future evolutionary pathways for human culture and technology.
It also allows us to better harness their complexity-generating power.
Right now, we live in a world of 7 billion people, where only a fraction of them
possess full and unfettered access to extensive education and
also information networks like the internet.
Now imagine a world full of 7 billion potential innovators with
all potentially useful information and collaboration at their disposal.
Increase the number of potential innovators
addressing a particular problem.
And increase the connectivity and
efficiency of information transfer between them.
And you increase your odds of another breakthrough.
But with every breakthrough comes a potential upset
to the ecosystem from which it emerged.
Complex systems are highly dependent on extremely fragile networks,
which they require some form of energy flow to sustain.
In the next module, we shall investigate
the other side of the coin, decline and collapse.
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