I wonder if the chinese bred rats flies mosquitoes & sparrows...

..."The four pests to be eliminated were rats, flies, mosquitoes, and sparrows. The extermination of sparrows resulted in severe ecological imbalance, prompting Mao to end the campaign against sparrows and redirect the focus to bed bugs.

..."Non-material rewards were given to those who handed in the largest number of rat tails, dead flies and mosquitoes, or dead sparrows.[4]"

..."With no sparrows to eat them, locust populations ballooned, swarming the country and compounding the ecological problems already caused by the Great Leap Forward, including widespread deforestation and misuse of poisons and pesticides.[9]Ecological imbalance is credited with exacerbating the Great Chinese Famine, in which 20–45 million people died of starvation.[10][11]

wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Pests_Campaign
...
The whole article worth a read. Rock album, childrens book written about it also.

Q: how do we embed the cobra / rat effect (eradication effect) in decision makers so we don't have to keep repeating the same mistake!

1A: I'd say a campaign to decide on name and publisise so it is widely known. Any takers? Technical name... Eradication Effect Law. "Avoid invoking the EEL!". And make it LAW!

Note: not sure if this will get posted  to group. Cle listmaster please check.

Kind regards friends,


m: 0404 874 588
-------- Original message --------
From: "Richardson, George P" <xxxxxx@albany.edu>
Date: 27/09/2017 3:57 am (GMT+10:00)
To: cle_k-12xxxxxx@simplelists.com
Subject: CLE K-12 Discussion: Unintended consequences -- the "Cobra Effect"

Hi friends,

Check out 


Worse-before-better, better-before-worse have classical forerunners!  Who knew?

The WikI article has some links that probably provide other rich examples.  They’d all provide nice practice in sketching fixes that fail or compensating feedback.

…George

Thanks to my friend Bob Knisely for providing the link to me.

George P Richardson
Professor Emeritus
University at Albany, SUNY
http://www.albany.edu/~gpr/