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There's also such a thing as over-building. Robustness, per se, is good, but it comes at a price, including the opportunity cost. My city, Toronto, has never known a serious earthquake, though there is a fault zone in nearby Ottawa. Should we build all our skyscrapers to match the building code of, say, Seattle?

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This strikes me as a false dilemma.

What's troubling at face value is that the setup nudges us towards the all too common deceit of "past observations beget future outcomes" without saying anything meaningful about forward-looking risk likelihood and consequence.

The architect may think it best to assume the risk; the engineer, control it; the city planner, avoid it; the business executive, transfer it. Perhaps the risk itself lacks specificity. Perhaps mitigation incorporates a bit from all major stakeholders.

Surely there are other options to consider that have yet to be dealt.

How much more do we know about the risk other than the existence of the fault?

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