Frozen Accident

All manner of phenomena - epidemics, traffic, even politics - move through tiny choke points, seemingly inconsequential bottlenecks that may shape the very direction of history. They are points in history where small shifts cause huge effects. A single event can cause huge effects for several reasons: it can trigger for example a major conflict or war which was already "in the air", or it can be multiplied by some kind of amplification. Frozen accidents occur if a process is [[Path Dependence|path-dependent]] and are often the result of positive feedback. Small fluctuations or accidents at the beginning can be reinforced through the positive [[Feedback|feedback]] process to large, unpredictable deviations, until they are finally conserved for a long time in the resulting frozen '''lock-in state''', where one product dominates and allocates the entire system (for example a market).

All manner of phenomena - epidemics, traffic, even politics - move through tiny choke points, seemingly inconsequential bottlenecks that may shape the very direction of history. They are points in history where small shifts cause huge effects. A single event can cause huge effects for several reasons: it can trigger for example a major conflict or war which was already "in the air", or it can be multiplied by some kind of amplification. Frozen accidents occur if a process is [[Path Dependence|path-dependent]] and are often the result of positive feedback. Small fluctuations or accidents at the beginning can be reinforced through the positive [[Feedback|feedback]] process to large, unpredictable deviations, until they are finally conserved for a long time in the resulting frozen '''lock-in state''', where one product dominates and allocates the entire system (for example a market).

== Frozen Accidents and Complex Systems ==

== Frozen Accidents and Complex Systems ==