Chapter 1 (552)

1. I found it interesting how truly obvious a system is. I thought it would be more complicated but I found that I was noticing systems all around my room as i was reading the chapter. 

2. The idea that the elements of a system can change almost seamlessly without changing the purpose of a system. It seemed like the elements were an integral part and with them changing it would make the system different but I now understand that the main function of the system wouldn't be changed with the elements, this idea made complete sense to me after the football team analogy. 

3. Meadows talked about changing the outflow to increase the inflow. I thought this was a really cool idea, with the bathwater example it made so much sense that increasing the inflow was not the only way to fill the tub faster but also to decrease the outflow. Another example which was really helpful was the idea of instead of hiring more people to increase business size, merely decrease firing and quitting rates. 

4. My favorite part of this chapter was the question at the last page that said "if A causes B, isn't it possible that B causes A." I thought that was a really good way to end the chapter it got me thinking and questioning if that was possible.

5. My last interesting fact from the chapter is that not all systems need interference to balance themselves out, some of the balancing occurs on its own. I thought that was a really cool idea that nature tends to balance itself. 

Questions:

1. Why do people tend to focus more on stocks? If they are concerned with the input or output wouldn't it make sense to focus on that instead of just the stock?

2. What if B could cause A? How would that affect a system if an result caused an action?