Bad stuff happens. It’s how you respond and adapt to that bad stuff that matters.
Nassim Taleb coined the term Anti-Fragile in his latest book, Anti-Fragile: Things That Gain From Disorder. It’s a concept worth remembering.
I recognized anti-fragility around the time of Enron. While people were wringing their hands about how something like Enron could happen, I pointed out that corruption, deceit and failure happen all the time in every form of society.
The results are not pretty. But, we were lucky in capitalism that it was contained to a small segment of the economy and didn’t have much impact on overall society. In fact, the economy was resilient enough that it was hardly a blip.
Not only that, but we learned from it.
People learned the important anti-fragile lesson of not putting all your eggs in one basket, as many Enron employees had done by investing all of their 401k’s in Enron stock.
We also learned to be even more skeptical of things that seem too good to be true.
Those are good lessons in any form of society.
Contrast that with the Soviet Union. When it went down, the whole ship sunk.
As we make government more central in our lives, we should recognize that we also make society more fragile, less anti-fragile.
Our Dinner Table 