The Aftermath of Preparing People and Groups Improperly

commentary by Roger Erickson

Design is Dead!

Much of the military discussion that proceeds in this particular essay reminds me of the unnecessary battle between operations and theory in economic policy formation. Just think of theory as "process design," and operations as "adjustable personal/group habits."

Given those analogies, would it be simpler to say the following?

Dealing with distributed, initially uncertain options requires adequately distributed initiative, communications, flexibility and imagination? That's how groups discover and select successful patterns of behavior.
[To be specific, by "flexibility," I mean degrees of freedom, to act in any way demanded by context.]

The sack of molecules we call an amoeba can do this. Obviously, human networks can do amazing things ... if we let them practice beforehand.

Why on earth waste time arguing over what might or might not occur, in situations where we have zero predictive power, i.e. uncertainty? Why not just find out, ASAP, by practicing use of our impressive selective power?