Predicting tragedies, accidents, errors and failures using a learning environment

Failures in technological systems are dominated by the properties of the ‘human material’ component more than those dueto the physical material. As we introduce new technology into our technological systems, we take the risk of failure that is dependent on our experience. We present the facts behind the integral contributionof human error to accidents and risk and provide the theoretical analysis of outcome rates based on the Learning Hypothesis. The importance of the accumulated experience on the learning rate, and the depth of experience on the distribution of outcomes is presented. The implications are given for predicting the outcomes, and alsofor the safety of the human material embedded and used in homo-technological systems (HTS).