SIMPLEXITY, A groundbreaking new concept that reveals the hidden ways the world really works.

In recent years, cutting-edge studies in fields such as economics, genetics, stock-market analysis and child development have hit on a startling new theory - ’Simplexity’. To put it simply, simple things can be more complicated than they seem, and complex things more simple. The evidence is before our eyes: in your elaborate network of household plumbing actually run on a very basic mechanism, or the crystal paperweight on your desk, spectacular in its complexity.

SIMPLEXITY, A groundbreaking new concept that reveals the hidden ways the world really works.

In recent years, cutting-edge studies in fields such as economics, genetics, stock-market analysis and child development have hit on a startling new theory - ’Simplexity’. To put it simply, simple things can be more complicated than they seem, and complex things more simple. The evidence is before our eyes: in your elaborate network of household plumbing actually run on a very basic mechanism, or the crystal paperweight on your desk, spectacular in its complexity.

As Simplexity moves from the research lab into popular consciousness it will challenge our models for modern living. You’ll never unknowingly whack the TV again and you’ll understand just how much it means to smile at your child. This high-octane history of everything will have you rethinking the rules of business and pleasure.

  Prologue

1 Why is the stock market so hard to predict?

Misled by everyone else

2 Why is it so hard to leave a burning building or an endangered city?

Misled by instincts

3 How does a single bullet start a world war?

Misled by social structure

4 Why do the jobs that require the greatest skills often pay the least? Why do companies with the least to sell often earn the most?

Misled by payoffs

5 Why do people, mice and worlds die when they do?

Misled by scale

6 Why do bad teams win so many games and good teams lose so many?

Misled by objective

7 Why do we always worry about the wrong things?

Misled by fear

8 Why is a baby the best linguist in any room?

Misled by silence

9 Why are your cell phone and camera so absurdly complicated?

Misled by flexibility

10 Why are only IO percent of the world’s medical resources used to treat 9o percent of its ills?

Misled by false targets

11 Why does complexity science fall flat in the arts?

Misled by loveliness

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments