Three weeks ago I posted an essay here (subsequently picked up by the blog Cyborgology) entitled "RIP Roger Boisjoly: Some Underappreciated Lessons of the Challenger Disaster."
The point of the piece was to describe certain dynamics that all complex technological systems have in common, dynamics that go a long way toward explaining why malfunctions in such systems (nuclear power plants, deep-sea oil rigs, high-speed stock trading programs, etc.) are, sooner or later, all but inevitable.
An article in today's New York Times, "Japan Weighed Evacuating Tokyo in Nuclear Crisis," illustrates, perfectly and chillingly, some of those dynamics in action.
Illustration:Wikiversity
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