Search Results for: disasters are nonlinear

“Linear problems are all the same. Nonlinear problems are all different.” – Robert Hooke (1918-2003) My father, a mathematician, once shared this offhand remark, at a time when I was still in school. He certainly wasn’t claiming this to be … Continue reading →

“You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that [is] it’s an opportunity to do things that you think you could not before.”– Rahm Emanuel (Wall Street Journal interview, November 19, 2008) Covid-19 … Continue reading →

Picking up from the previous LOTRW post: Okay, Bill, where does the covid-19-as-vaccine concept come in? Convince me. Start close. Covid-19 is proving deadly. But it’s a mere “cowpox” compared with other more serious disease threats that have concerned public health officials … Continue reading →

Today the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a special report on climate change and disasters that has been years in the making. It has a lengthy but descriptive title: Special Report on Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and … Continue reading →

Reality: The Earth does much of its business through extreme events. The reason that the Arctic and Antarctic aren’t even colder? And that the equator isn’t warmer? In the winter hemisphere, about half of the heat transport from equator to … Continue reading →