, Holling thinks the world is reaching "a stage of vulnerability that could trigger a rare and major pulse of social transformation." Humankind has experienced only three or four such pulses during its entire evolution, including the transition from hunter-gatherer communities to agricultural settlement, the industrial revolution, and the recent global communications revolution.
Today another pulse is about to begin. "The immense destruction that a new pulse signals is both frightening and creative," he writes.
"The only way to approach such a period, in which uncertainty is very large and one cannot predict what the future holds, is not to predict, but to experiment and act inventively and exuberantly via diverse adventures in living."
Credit: Thomas Homer-Dixon, Our Panarchic Future
I agree, in a complex world, it is impossible to predict or to plan the future -- we need to experiment and learn what works and what does not work and continually modify our actions accordingly.
