Systems Thinking in the Age of AI

The Dishwasher Was Not the Problem Years ago, my family and I lived in a small townhouse. One night, we were doing the dishes. We had just finished loading the dishwasher, put the soap in, closed the door, and pressed the buttons to start it. But nothing happened. No lights. No noises. Just dirty dishes and a sudden increase in cortisol. The dishwasher was not working. So we started troubleshooting. Was the power on? Yes. Did a circuit breaker flip? No. Is there something wrong with the dishwasher? Well, who knows? Eventually, through the suggestion of a cousin, we found that one of the GFCI outlets had tripped. We reset it. One press of a button later, we were once again on our way to clean dishes. Why share this story? Because the visible failure was not the root failure. The dishwasher was fine. The problem lived in the electrical system that supported it. Until we zoomed out and looked at the larger system, we kept blaming the wrong component. Systems are everywhere. And the more c