"Every civilization carries the seeds of its own destruction, and the same cycle shows in them all. The Republic is born, flourishes, decays into plutocracy, and is captured by the shoemaker whom the mercenaries and millionaires make into a king. The people invent their oppressors, and the oppressors serve the function for which they are invented." -Mark Twain

Our blindness to what these words are telling us is really astounding. My first time to fully comprehend the contradiction came from an experience while I was teaching at Harvard in 1969. The medical community in the Boston area put together a “Health University” which was a sixteen week course contributed by health care professionals at every level. At the end they distilled what the many discussions and brainstorming sessions had produced and came up with a set of wonderful proposals.

This may seem like a contradiction, but once you accept that comprehension depends on being able to approach the real world with your own world view it is actually very clear. Complex systems defy classical logic especially in the realm of causality.