Re Questioning Authorities

Thank you, Charles, for this great link. It is a good synopsis of how the study of chaos and complexity explain the collapse of vertically-structured systems [more than just a metaphor in the WTC example] and the emergence of horizontal networks based on interconnectedness [of which the marketplace is the most prominent example].

I spoke with a man whose friend worked on one of the higher floors of the WTC on 9/11. The word came down to her office from on high: “stay where you are!” Her coworkers did just that. She, on the other hand shouted at them to “wake up” to what was happening. She quickly left the building. She survived, while her coworkers all died.

I spoke with a woman who had been in one of the WTC buildings when it was hit. She, too, acknowledged the quiet, peaceful, and helpful manner in which people left the building. Her boyfriend – who worked a few blocks away but had seen the attack – went over to the WTC, knowing his friend was inside. He could not find her [she had already left] and was insistent upon staying to look for her. After refusing their orders for him to leave, two policemen physically picked him up and carried him from the building, just as the part of the building in which they had been standing collapsed. In his words: “there are two cops in New York City who owe their lives to my obstinacy!”

The Best of Butler Shaffer