Popular Mechanics Article, Black Swan Events

majamin

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majamin
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I recently read a Popular Mechanics article, "How The Blowout Happened" (October 2010), which described the events culminating in the destruction of BP's Deepwater Horizon oil rig. It also listed this disaster amongst others (Chernobyl, Challenger, Three Mile Island) as a Black Swan event. Black Swan events are 'unknown unknowns' that are rare and have an extreme impact. I would classify all of the BP, Chernobyl, Challenger, and Three Mile Island accidents as being rare, and having an extreme impact, but I'm not satisfied that they can be described as being 'unknown unknowns'.

In at least the BP, Chernobyl, and Challenger events (perhaps not Three Mile Island), there was knowledge that upped the measure of risk, but that was ignored. That is, backup and safety systems (BP), O-ring design (Challenger), and unauthorized safety tests (Chernobyl).

Since there was knowledge of potential problems prior to the incidents (unlike the Black Swan analogy, where there was no idea of the possibility), shouldn't these events be called "known unknowns"? Although very rare and serious, my contention is that these events cannot be called true Black Swan events. I wanted to post this here, because I'm intending to write a sincere letter to the editor, but I wanted to get my ideas straight before I did so.

What do you think? Are these said events true Black Swans?
 
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I agree with you, and a similar thought occurred to me when I was reading the article.

However, I would suggest checking out the wiki page on the Black Swan Theory, it puts the term in its proper context.
 
I doubt any of them qualify other than as a stretch of the concept.

The basis of the Black Swan paradigm was that all swans were white.

The discovery of a black swan species destroyed that conclusion entirely. ie falsification of a premise held to be ENTIRELY true.
The inverse is that IF it's black, it can't be swan was also held sacrosanct. White and swan were a bonded pair.

The discovery of a black swan broke that premise entirely....

I can't see it in any of the examples....all that changed was a re-assessment of risk.

The closest to a Black Swan recently was inverse relationship between solar activity and atmospheric temperatures.

Study sheds new light on how the sun affects the Earth's climate
6 Oct 2010 ... The sun's activity has recently affected the Earth's atmosphere and climate in ... inverse is also true and that in periods when the Sun's activity increases, ... on radiative forcing of climate" Nature, 7 October 2010 ...
www.eurekalert.org/pub.../2010-10/icl-ssn100610.php
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this "looks" as if it completely overturns conventional wisdom on the relationship of solar activity and atmospheric temperature.

Cold fusion reality would be a Black Swan.

Continental drift was a Black Swan.

The Montana badlands - enormous canyon carved in a single short period - discovery was a Black Swan.

The Missoula Flood - ALLGlacier.com
The Missoula Floods would sweep periodically across western Montana ... The ice dam that held it back finally broke from the pressure, flooding down the Columbia ... Badlands National Park Bryce National Park Canyonlands National Park ...
www.allglacier.com/area_info/missoula_flood.php
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That took a lifetime to be accepted.

So in this case accepted wisdom was "if it's a massive canyon it's geologic in time frame."
That was shown to be entirely wrong.
So large scale canyon and geologic time frame can no longer be paired.

Getting risk assessment incorrect is hardly a Black Swan.
If the nuclear fire in Chernobyl suddenly winked out on it's own....THAT would be.
An uncontained meltdown acted mostly as expected. ( Chernobyl )
A contained meltdown acted mostly as expected. ( 3 mile )
Neither could be classified as a Black Swan in my view.
 
Thanks macdoc, excaza. Is there perhaps a bit of sensationalism going on in this article, or true misapplication of the idea? I truly don't know, but I think I'll send them an email with my two cents anyway.
 
As far as I'm concerned - this is the heart of the matter

The term black swan was a Latin expression — its oldest known reference comes from the poet Juvenal's characterization of something being "rara avis in terris nigroque simillima cygno" (6.165).[1] In English, this Latin phrase means "a rare bird in the lands, and very like a black swan." When the phrase was coined, the black swan was presumed not to exist. The importance of the simile lies in its analogy to the fragility of any system of thought. A set of conclusions is potentially undone once any of its fundamental postulates is disproven. In this case, the observation of a single black swan would be the undoing of the phrase's underlying logic, as well as any reasoning that followed from that underlying logic.
Juvenal's phrase was a common expression in 16th century London as a statement of impossibility. The London expression derives from the Old World presumption that all swans must be white because all historical records of swans reported that they had white feathers.[2] In that context, a black swan was impossible or at least nonexistent. After a Dutch expedition led by explorer Willem de Vlamingh on the Swan River in 1697, discovered black swans in Western Australia[3], the term metamorphosed to connote that a perceived impossibility might later be disproven. Taleb notes that in the 19th century John Stuart Mill used the black swan logical fallacy as a new term to identify falsification.
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and Mill was most correct and Taleb is widening the envelope.....incorrectly in my view.

If anything those events fall more into this framework.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unintended_consequences
 
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macdoc said:
As far as I'm concerned - this is the heart of the matter



and Mill was most correct and Taleb is widening the envelope.....incorrectly in my view.

If anything those events fall more into this framework.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unintended_consequences
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I'd say that Taleb is trying to coin a new phrase, as he is trying to distinguish his usage from the prior with his insistence on capitalization. Not a great branding idea, and horribly confusing, but that seems to be his intent. However misguided.

So, the real question is whether PM meant to use the Taleb term, the Mill term, or the classic term.
 
Three Mile Island was pretty much a non-event as far as disasters are concerned. It was contained and little radiation was released into the environment. The main problem there was that the techs were taught how to work the controls, but not how the controls worked. The result was that when equipment didn't do what the controls told it to do, the techs didn't know how to tell. Also, the indicator lights on the panels simply displayed what the position of the controls were, not the condition of the item being controlled.

The take-away of all this was get the techs a more in depth knowledge of the reactor and give them better feedback about the condition of the equipment.

It was a wake up call, but hardly a black swan.
 
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Dragonrock said:
Three Mile Island was pretty much a non-event as far as disasters are concerned. It was contained and little radiation was released into the environment. The main problem there was that the techs were taught how to work the controls, but not how the controls worked. The result was that when equipment didn't do what the controls told it to do, the techs didn't know how to tell. Also, the indicator lights on the panels simply displayed what the position of the controls were, not the condition of the item being controlled.

The take-away of all this was get the techs a more in depth knowledge of the reactor and give them better feedback about the condition of the equipment.

It was a wake up call, but hardly a black swan.
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Highlighted: Exactly and exactly. I don't even know why Three Mile Island was mentioned in the article... so many other horrible tragedies have happened since then, much more worthy of attention.
 
I wonder if the Titanic could be considered a Black Swan as it was considered unsinkable.

and the Ardennes Forest as impenetrable to armour.

Germanic tribes would never unite.

Much hinged on those, much changed after them.
 
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majamin said:
Highlighted: Exactly and exactly. I don't even know why Three Mile Island was mentioned in the article... so many other horrible tragedies have happened since then, much more worthy of attention.
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I think public perception is that Three Mile Island turned a large part of Pennsylvania into a glowing crater. That facts that it didn't, that it should be used as an example of how safe US reactors are, and that it's still operating today would probably be a shock to the majority of the country.
 
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