Singapore : : World Scientific Publishing Company, , 2011.

1 online resource (368 p.)

Description based upon print version of record.. - Contents; Cover Photograph Anak Krakatau; Prologue Chaos, Crisis and Catastrophe; Chapter 1 Natural Hazards; 1.1 Causation and Association; 1.2 Extra-Terrestrial Hazards; 1.2.1 Solar storms; 1.3 Meteorological Hazards; 1.3.1 Tropical cyclones; 1.3.2 Tornadoes; 1.3.3 Extra-tropical windstorms; 1.4 Geological Hazards; 1.4.1 Earthquakes; 1.4.2 Volcanic eruptions; 1.5 Geomorphic Hazards; 1.5.1 Landslides; 1.5.2 Debris flows; 1.6 Hydrological Hazards; 1.6.1 River flooding; 1.6.2 Storm surges; 1.6.3 Tsunamis; Chapter 2 Societal Hazards; 2.1 Political Violence; 2.1.1 The wave theory of terrorism. - 2.1.2 Cyber attack2.2 Infectious Disease Pandemics; 2.2.1 Vaccination; 2.2.2 SIR analysis; 2.3 Industrial and Transportation Accidents; 2.3.1 The learning curve; 2.4 Fraud Catastrophe; 2.4.1 Ponzi schemes; 2.4.2 Operational risk; Chapter 3 A Sense of Scale; 3.1 Size Scales of Natural Hazards; 3.1.1 Tropical cyclones; 3.1.2 Tornadoes; 3.1.3 Volcanic eruptions; 3.1.4 Earthquakes; 3.1.5 Tsunamis; 3.1.6 River floods; 3.1.7 Space weather; 3.1.8 Extra-terrestrial impacts; 3.2 Hazard Spatial Scales; 3.2.1 Tropical cyclones; 3.2.2 Earthquakes; 3.2.3 Volcanic eruptions; 3.2.4 Environmental pollution. - 3.2.5 Debris flows3.2.6 Landslides; 3.2.7 Tsunamis; 3.2.8 River floods; 3.2.9 Extra-terrestrial impacts; 3.3 The Human Disaster Toll; 3.4 Models of a Fractal World; 3.4.1 Model representations; 3.4.2 Landscape models; 3.4.3 Uncertainty in model depictions; Chapter 4 A Measure of Uncertainty; 4.1 The Concept of Probability; 4.2 The Meaning of Uncertainty; 4.3 Aleatory and Epistemic Uncertainty; 4.3.1 Wavelets and aleatory uncertainty in seismic ground motion; 4.4 Probability Ambiguity; 4.4.1 Knightian uncertainty; 4.4.2 Subjective probability; 4.5 The Weighing of Evidence. - 4.5.1 Bayesian epistemology and Black SwansChapter 5 A Matter of Time; 5.1 Temporal Models of Hazards; 5.1.1 Poisson processes; 5.1.2 Markov processes; 5.1.3 Waiting for the next event; 5.2 Long-Term Data Records; 5.2.1 River discharges; 5.3 Statistics of Extremes; Chapter 6 Catastrophe Complexity; 6.1 Emergent Catastrophes; 6.1.1 Conspiracies; 6.1.2 Infrastructure cascade failure; 6.2 Financial Crashes; 6.2.1 Complexity of a financial market; 6.2.2 Financial market bubbles; 6.3 Ancillary Hazards; 6.3.1 Tipping points; 6.3.2 Randomness and order; Chapter 7 Terrorism; 7.1 A Thinking Man's Game. - 7.1.1 Targeting7.2 Defeating Terrorist Networks; 7.2.1 Plot interdiction; 7.3 Counter-Radicalization; Chapter 8 Forecasting; 8.1 Earthquake Forecasting; 8.1.1 Stochastic triggering model of earthquake occurrence; 8.1.2 Tsunamis generated by earthquakes; 8.2 Verification; 8.3 River Flows and Sea Waves; 8.3.1 Sea waves generated by extreme storms; 8.4 Accelerating Approach to Criticality; 8.5 Evidence-Based Diagnosis; Chapter 9 Disaster Warning; 9.1 Decision in the Balance; 9.1.1 Hazard advisory; 9.2 Evacuation; 9.2.1 Landfalling hurricanes; 9.2.2 Volcanic eruptions; 9.2.3 River floods. - 9.2.4 Terrorist attacks. - Calculating Catastrophe has been written to explain, to a general readership, the underlying philosophical ideas and scientific principles that govern catastrophic events, both natural and man-made. Knowledge of the broad range of catastrophes deepens understanding of individual modes of disaster. This book will be of interest to anyone aspiring to understand catastrophes better, but will be of particular value to those engaged in public and corporate policy, and the financial markets. The author, Dr. Gordon Woo, was trained in mathematical physics at Cambridge, MIT and Harvard, and has made h

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