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I believe a lot of this thinking arises from our perception of time and history. We often perceive the past only as "things that happened" and forget about all the things that could have happened. There was an article posted recently about "near-miss" analysis of events that almost-happen which discussed something very similar.

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Yes - makes me wonder how much of the perception of time and history is influenced by teaching and testing methods such as being required to memorize the dates of events (e.g., 25-Oct-1415) rather than the chains of causation (Why were Henry V and the French fighting, and how did they get there, and what else could have happened).

Also the "near-miss" analysis reminds me of seeing smart companies requiring reporting of near-misses, not only of accidents -- that kind of more nuanced analysis is more likely to prevent accidents even before the first one happens, rather than losing at least one finger/hand/person to a problem type.

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