 First edition (Australia) | |
| Author | Mark Roeder |
|---|---|
| Country | Australia, United Kingdom, China |
| Language | English, Chinese |
| Publisher | Virgin Books (Random House), Harper Collins |
Publication date | 2011 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback) |
| Pages | 300 |
| ISBN | 0753539373 (first edition) |
| OCLC | 555723 |
| 302 22 | |
| LC Class | HM1043 .G63 4201 |
The Big Mo: Why Momentum Rules Our World is a book by Mark Roeder, first published by HarperCollins in 2011 [1] [2] It explores the phenomenon of large-scale momentum and how it impacts society.
The book suggests that the rapid integration of digital technologies, communications and markets, has accelerated the velocity at which events unfold – and generates momentum on a massive scale (Big Mo). Roeder warns, 'As our world becomes more efficient and automated, there is less ‘friction’ to slow the momentum, which can lead to catastrophic results.’ The book examines the impact of Big Mo on finance, media, politics, wars, religion and science. Roeder, an ex-executive at UBS, bank, argues that momentum played an instrumental role in the Global Financial Crisis, and that it distorted decision-making in the lead up to the second Iraq War. He suggests that momentum ‘has become the zeitgeist of our time’
The Big Mo was described by the Financial Times as ‘A compelling book that journeys seamlessly from finances to the Iraq war, from oil prices and climate change to religion and pop culture in an effort to explain how we behave and why we are so easily led.’ [3] The Australian broadcaster Phillip Adams, wrote, ‘In our personal, political and economic lives we seem to be swept along by circumstances. Our attempts to change direction are doomed. The Big Mo explains why.’ [4] [5]
The Guardian’s Steven Poole criticized the book for 'overstretching the Newtonian-physics analogy'. [6] Steven Matcham, writing in The Australian, said, ‘Speed and size define the events of our age. As news travels ever faster, its impact increases. The strength of [Roeder’s] book is the idea that momentum’s effects can be felt right across society, including in the media, where 15 minutes of fame is possible on a scale unimaginable a decade ago.’ [7] [8] [9] [10]
The Big Mo was first published by HarperCollins Australia (2011), Random House (Virgin books) UK, Europe & USA (2011) and Xinhua Publishing House, Beijing, China (2012).
In physics, a force is an influence that can cause an object to change its velocity, i.e., to accelerate, meaning a change in speed or direction, unless counterbalanced by other forces. The concept of force makes the everyday notion of pushing or pulling mathematically precise. Because the magnitude and direction of a force are both important, force is a vector quantity. The SI unit of force is the newton (N), and force is often represented by the symbol F.
Tidal acceleration is an effect of the tidal forces between an orbiting natural satellite and the primary planet that it orbits. The acceleration causes a gradual recession of a satellite in a prograde orbit, and a corresponding slowdown of the primary's rotation. The process eventually leads to tidal locking, usually of the smaller body first, and later the larger body. The Earth–Moon system is the best-studied case.
In theoretical physics, particularly in discussions of gravitation theories, Mach's principle is the name given by Albert Einstein to an imprecise hypothesis often credited to the physicist and philosopher Ernst Mach. The hypothesis attempted to explain how rotating objects, such as gyroscopes and spinning celestial bodies, maintain a frame of reference.
Atmospheric circulation is the large-scale movement of air and together with ocean circulation is the means by which thermal energy is redistributed on the surface of the Earth. The Earth's atmospheric circulation varies from year to year, but the large-scale structure of its circulation remains fairly constant. The smaller-scale weather systems – mid-latitude depressions, or tropical convective cells – occur chaotically, and long-range weather predictions of those cannot be made beyond ten days in practice, or a month in theory.
In astrophysics, dynamical friction or Chandrasekhar friction, sometimes called gravitational drag, is loss of momentum and kinetic energy of moving bodies through gravitational interactions with surrounding matter in space. It was first discussed in detail by Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar in 1943.
The Newton's cradle is a device, usually made of metal, that demonstrates the principles of conservation of momentum and conservation of energy in physics with swinging spheres. When one sphere at the end is lifted and released, it strikes the stationary spheres, transmitting a pressure or sonic wave through the stationary spheres, thereby creating a force that pushes the last sphere upward. The last sphere swings back and strikes the nearly stationary spheres, repeating the effect in the opposite direction. The device is named after 17th-century English scientist Sir Isaac Newton and was designed by French scientist Edme Mariotte. It is also known as Newton's pendulum, Newton's balls, Newton's rocker or executive ball clicker.
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed is a 2005 book by academic and popular science author Jared Diamond, in which the author first defines collapse: "a drastic decrease in human population size and/or political/economic/social complexity, over a considerable area, for an extended time." He then reviews the causes of historical and pre-historical instances of societal collapse—particularly those involving significant influences from environmental changes, the effects of climate change, hostile neighbors, trade partners, and the society's response to the foregoing four challenges. It also considers why societies might not perceive a problem, might not decide to attempt a solution, and why an attempted solution might fail.
General relativity is a theory of gravitation developed by Albert Einstein between 1907 and 1915. The theory of general relativity says that the observed gravitational effect between masses results from their warping of spacetime.
Planetary migration occurs when a planet or other body in orbit around a star interacts with a disk of gas or planetesimals, resulting in the alteration of its orbital parameters, especially its semi-major axis. Planetary migration is the most likely explanation for hot Jupiters. The generally accepted theory of planet formation from a protoplanetary disk predicts that such planets cannot form so close to their stars, as there is insufficient mass at such small radii and the temperature is too high to allow the formation of rocky or icy planetesimals.
Earth's rotation or Earth's spin is the rotation of planet Earth around its own axis, as well as changes in the orientation of the rotation axis in space. Earth rotates eastward, in prograde motion. As viewed from the northern polar star Polaris, Earth turns counterclockwise.
Friction of distance is a core principle of geography that states that movement incurs some form of cost, in the form of physical effort, energy, time, and/or the expenditure of other resources, and that these costs are proportional to the distance traveled. This cost is thus a resistance against movement, analogous to the effect of friction against movement in classical mechanics. The subsequent preference for minimizing distance and its cost underlies a vast array of geographic patterns from economic agglomeration to wildlife migration, as well as many of the theories and techniques of spatial analysis, such as Tobler's first law of geography, network routing, and cost distance analysis. To a large degree, friction of distance is the primary reason why geography is relevant to many aspects of the world, although its importance has been decreasing with the development of transportation and communication technologies.
The black swan theory or theory of black swan events is a metaphor that describes an event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect, and is often inappropriately rationalized after the fact with the benefit of hindsight. The term is based on an ancient saying that presumed black swans did not exist, until they were discovered in Australia in 1697, and it then became reinterpreted to mean an unforeseen and consequential event.
The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable is a 2007 book by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who is a former options trader. The book focuses on the extreme impact of rare and unpredictable outlier events—and the human tendency to find simplistic explanations for these events, retrospectively. Taleb calls this the Black Swan theory.
Boundary currents are ocean currents with dynamics determined by the presence of a coastline, and fall into two distinct categories: western boundary currents and eastern boundary currents.
In astronomy, CENBOL is a model developed by the astrophysicist Sandip Chakrabarti and collaborators to explain the region of an accretion flow around a black hole.
The Big Mo is behavioral momentum that operates on a large scale. The concept originally applied to sporting events in the 1960s in the United States, as momentum appeared to have an effect on a team's performance. Successful teams were said to have "The Big Mo" on their side. This has since extended situations in which momentum is a driving factor, such as during political campaigns, social upheavals, economic cycles, and financial bubbles.
The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined is a 2011 book by Steven Pinker, in which the author argues that violence in the world has declined both in the long run and in the short run and suggests explanations as to why this has occurred. The book uses data simply documenting declining violence across time and geography. This paints a picture of massive declines in the violence of all forms, from war, to improved treatment of children. He highlights the role of nation-state monopolies on force, of commerce, of increased literacy and communication, as well as a rise in a rational problem-solving orientation as possible causes of this decline in violence. He notes that paradoxically, our impression of violence has not tracked this decline, perhaps because of increased communication, and that further decline is not inevitable, but is contingent on forces harnessing our better motivations such as empathy and increases in reason.
Mark Lewis Mendick Roeder is an Australian-British author and cultural commentator. He has written The Big Mo (book): Why Momentum Rules The World (2011), and Unnatural Selection: Why The Geeks Will Inherit The Earth (2013). Roeder's books and articles explore social phenomena and the impact of technology on human behaviour.
Unnatural Selection: Why The Geeks Will Inherit The Earth is a book by Mark Roeder, first published by ABC Books in 2013
Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst is a 2017 non-fiction book by Robert Sapolsky. It describes how various biological processes influence human behavior, on scales ranging from less than a second before an action to thousands of years before.