When the next big problem comes online, be it the Euro crisis, nuclear proliferation, an overstretched Internet, a killer flu, or any of the other possibilities I consider in X-Events, we will suffer a complexity overload.
John L. CastiTrying to solve the problem by creating more debt is analogous to trying to stop being an alcoholic by going on a bender down at the corner bar.
John L. CastiWe see an ever-increasing move toward inter and trans- disciplinary attacks upon problems in the real world ... The system scientist has a central role to play in this new order, and that role is to first of all understand ways and means of how to encode the natural world into "good" formal structures.
John L. CastiIn fact, the very nature of an X-event is that it is both rare and surprising. So I would not say that any specific X-event is likely. What I would say, though, is that some X-event is not only plausible, but very likely in a time scale of a few years.
John L. Casti