A Hyper-Wicked Problem?

SUBHEAD: What is a hyper-wicked problem, you ask? You won't know until it's too late. When reality strikes it will be massive.  

[IB Publisher's note: This is a portion of a larger article available at the link below.]  

By Steve Ludlum on 30 April 2011 in Economic Undertow - 
  (http://economic-undertow.blogspot.com/2011/04/bitz-and-pieces-part-two.html) 
  
Image above: The Wicked Witch give Snow White a gift. From (http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://images.wikia.com/disney/images/2/24/Snow_white_witch.jpg). 
 

...Let's look at wicked problems: From Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem):

"Wicked problem" is a phrase originally used in social planning to describe a problem that is difficult or impossible to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements that are often difficult to recognize. Moreover, because of complex interdependencies, the effort to solve one aspect of a wicked problem may reveal or create other problems...

Seeking to generalize the concept of problem wickedness to areas other than planning and policy, Jeff Conklin identifies the following as defining characteristics of wicked problems:

• The problem is not understood until after the formulation of a solution.

• Wicked problems have no stopping rule.

• Solutions to wicked problems are not right or wrong.

• Every wicked problem is essentially novel and unique.

• Every solution to a wicked problem is a 'one shot operation'

• Wicked problems have no given alternative solutions.

Problem examples: Classic examples of wicked problems include economic, environmental, and political issues. A problem whose solution requires a great number of people to change their mindsets and behavior is likely to be a wicked problem. Therefore, many standard examples of wicked problems come from the areas of public planning and policy. These include global climate change, natural hazards, healthcare, the AIDS epidemic, pandemic influenza, international drug trafficking, homeland security, nuclear weapons, and nuclear energy and waste. In recent years, problems in many areas have been identified as exhibiting elements of wickedness - examples range from aspects of design decision making and knowledge management to business strategy.

A wicked problem has solutions that are themselves problems, which may be of greater consequence than the original problem ... and there is no way to know if this is so until the solution is attempted. Of course, there may be no solution at all rather an expansion or amplification of the original problem or a cascade of successive unsolvable problems. A hyper-wicked problem is not a large wicked problem but rather one whose existence is not perceived until it is too late for any possible solution to be attempted. Few, outside the Club of Rome in 1970, could have articulated Greer's 'hard fact'. The concept of Americans having to confront some kind of choice existing outside the boundaries of privilege was invisible at the time. It's largely invisible now, which directs a great deal of credit to the observation by Greer:

Americans ... face to face with the hard fact that they could have the comfortable and privileged lifestyles they were used to having, or they could guarantee a livable world for their grandchildren, but they couldn’t do both.

The observation of Greer's insight within our shared present is not a critique of Greer. He brilliantly rearranges the inscrutable past coherently and by doing so exhumes the hyper-wicked in its frightening dimensions. Unfortunately, the dim light of realization has not penetrated much farther than Greer's circle of readers and hard-core anti-establishment cynics like myself. Americans -- and 'American wannabes' worldwide -- are still reaching for the Kool-aid. When reality strikes it will be massive ... and far too late to contemplate solutions outside those the problem itself has already begun to impose. This has to be John Lennon's fault ... Meanwhile, if you haven't already shoot over to The Oil Drum are read Jeremy Grantham's 'Inflection Point' article (http://www.theoildrum.com/node/7853). Grantham is a trend-follower who sees that the road has forked and that the 'old rules' of industrialization do not apply. It IS different this time ...

Time to Wake Up: Days of Abundant Resources and Falling Prices Are Over Forever The purpose of this, my second (and much longer) piece on resource limitations, is to persuade investors with an interest in the long term to change their whole frame of reference: to recognize that we now live in a different, more constrained, world in which prices of raw materials will rise and shortages will be common. (Previously, I had promised to update you when we had new data. Well, after a lot of grinding, this is our first comprehensive look at some of this data.)

It's a grim article. Grantham boots mathematicians, I'm not sure why. Any decent mathematician would understand that 3000 years of 4% annual compounded growth of anything would pretty much fill a large part of the observable universe. Keep in mind that Grantham's insistence on higher prices does not mean inflation. What matters is the cost of fuel versus the return on its use.

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