The Crash Course, Revised Edition

CHAPTER 8Complex Systems

I'm a generalist. A systems guy. I like to see things from 30,000 feet before I zero in on the details. That's been my superpower these past few years, and I'd like to share this way of thinking with you. It rests on understanding what systems are and a few properties of how they behave.

The dictionary says a system is “a set of things working together as parts of a mechanism or interconnecting network.” So, your cell phone is part of a system that routes and stores information. Your body is a system housed within the solar system. Humans in groups, especially nation‐sized groups, operate as a system.

What we call the economy and the environment are also each a system, but a special kind of a system called a “complex system.” There are huge insights that come from understanding complex systems, so we're going to spend a far too brief moment here going over complex systems.

Usually there's plenty to learn and nothing wrong with listening to experts. But sometimes they cannot see the forest for the trees. If you want to know about a particular tree, ask a tree expert. But if you suspect there's a forest fire on the way, you need to understand the whole forest, and quickly!

Systems—Open versus Closed

There are two types of systems: open and closed. An open system is one that can transfer energy between the system and its surroundings. A closed system cannot.

The universe is a closed system. There is no “outside” the universe, no other system beyond its ...