Story Worlds

These shaped how I think about power as something systemic rather than personal — where leadership, religion, economics, and information interact in ways no single actor fully controls.

What endures is the long view: civilizations shaped less by heroes than by structure, incentives, and timing.

Very different stories, united by the same question: what happens when complex systems are pushed beyond their limits.

Both are reminders that failure is often emergent, not obvious — and that competence and preparation don’t guarantee safe outcomes once conditions change.

These explore why people behave the way they do — individually and collectively.

One operates at the interpersonal level; the other zooms out to civilizations and shared myths. Together, they underscore how much decision-making is shaped by psychology, narrative, and social structure.

These are studies in leadership under real constraint.

They focus less on idealized decisions and more on tradeoffs, personality, and historical momentum — where leaders operate with incomplete information and no clean options.

These were formative early on.

Beyond the story itself, they explore institutions, loyalty, moral choice, and the misuse of authority — themes that shaped how I think about power and responsibility long before I had formal language for them.