What’s amatta – you apes wanna live forever?

You are going to die! As the old saying goes no-one gets out alive (apologies to Woodrow Smith and Duncan McCloud – please skip to the next paragraph –all others read on).  Every day you take risks just by existing. Assuming a life expectancy of 80 years and an even probability of death each day you have a 1/29200 chance of biting the big one TODAY! (this is VERY loose statistics, I know that – please don’t email to tell me so; its just an example of the BEST case scenario).  As Worf once said in answer to ‘how do you prove you are mortal’ – "DIE!"  Risk is inherent in everything we do – and so are rewards.  Most of you reading this are likely pilots or you want to be.  Each time you fly there are risks involved.  A major part of learning to be a pilot is managing those risks.  Why do you fly – because there is SOME benefit to it; some reward.  Perhaps only you can quantify or qualify that benefit – but it is there.  But the risk and reward connection goes much deeper.  It is not just personal – it is a force of the universe.

Risk/Rewards Yin-Yang

Risk and reward are linked; really they are two aspects of the same thing – a ying-yang relationship.  Although I have not yet developed rigorous mathematics to prove this – it seems that risk and reward are entropically correlated. Increased rewards are relatable to more and higher "energy states being accessible – this accessibility is obtained by putting more "energy" i.e. risk into the system. [OK Weeble –that’s it. You’ve had enough – I’m cutting you off the adult beverages for tonight!!] Ok, Ok - the mathematics isn’t important right here.  Most of us instinctively know this relationship.  Millennia ago our forbearers learned this.  The hunter who risked more by going after the more dangerous game got the better choices of meat.  Likewise the gatherers who climbed the higher cliff or wadded the deeper swamps got the better fruits and nuts.  They also tended to survive better and breed together and voila – modern humanity.  But what happens when we eliminate the possibility of risk; when we manage it away. Sometimes this is good but sometimes NOT.

Oh well – enough ramblings about plenty of nothing for now – next time boys and girls we will learn that statistics make poor armor but excellent headstones and that "Run in circles scream and shout" is NOT really risk management.

Weeble Out.