The massive force that is 'Change'

It can be said that Change is a natural force, like gravity, but it is little discussed. If Change is the difference in appearance over time, what is it that drives change, what makes it, where does the force gather it's strength from?

Change is arguably one of the most powerful and pervasive forces in the universe and our own humanity. It affects every aspect of life and it seems that it is irresistable. With change comes uncertainty ('...The only certainty is uncertainty' ..Mark Douglas) and uncertainty can be difficult to bear/manage, but with Change being such a strong and ubiquotous force, uncertainty is in effect a constant. Why then are we so ill-equiped to deal with Change/uncertainty, and even surprised that it comes, even though it is a constant?

In financial markets, uncertainty causes volatility and it is this volatility which gives rise to trading opportunities, but still as a whole financial markets dislike uncertainty, although some profit massively from it. In Financial markets serious attempts are made to understand the consequences of change and ways to profit /protect oneself from the consequences of it, but here like other fields whilst we know it is inevitable and to some extent we can forecast it's consequences (in whatsoever form,) I'm unaware of any serious attempt to understand the theory behind Change itself-the force/phenomenon. This is strange as the consequences of not understanding that change is coming in both financial and other fields can be catastrophic.


Change is a wide and interesting subject and one which should probably be better/more widely understood.

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For those interested in the subject of Change as a pervasive force I recommend The Tipping Point -Malcolm Gladwell and Why most things fail - Paul Ormerod as good general reading.

Perhaps it is in our genes to adapt to change, since during most of evolutionary time, we were hunter-gatherers, and although our way of life may not have changed much, we needed to follow where the game was, and also retreat beyond the ice during the ice ages.

Once we became agriculturalists, grew and became more settled, culturally speaking, adapting to change became less important. We probably became more conservative in outlook, although as ever, the more adaptable groups or individuals would fare better (e.g. dealing with or avoiding crop failures, etc).

What I am saying is that fundamentally, humans must be adaptable to change, but culturally, we can become used to what we have, expecting things to continue as before, and are vulnerable to sudden changes in circumstance that can throw us out of kilter.

time for change

over to another thread