Rare events

Rare events = uncertainty

The gap between what you know and what you think you know becomes dangerously wide

Our world is dominated by the extreme

The unknown and the very improbable

Note please how the very improbable impacts this planet

The improbable is what really flattens us

Often but not always events from nature

Financial crisis - man made

Tsunami - nature

Volcano = ash clouds - nature

Earthquakes - nature

And yet and yet society spends most of it's energy and time engaged in small talk focusing on the known and the repeated

A switch is required in our thinking because the improbable is becoming more frequent

We need to use the extreme event as a starting point and not treat it as an exception

While both human nature and social science seem to conspire to hide the knowledge from us

Our times demand that we acknowledge that the improbable is becoming more common

Response is one thing

Anticipation quite another

Being flattened by a tsunami is a catastrophe

Being aware of the possibility another step up

Being warned in time yet another

Planning and building sensibly even more intelligent

More and more extreme weather is our new experience

Our new reality

The unexpected is to be expected

Shock, horror, surprise will no longer do

The unexpected is the norm that we need to think about, not ignore until it flattens us again