The Mountains We’ve Seen

In his seminal work, Antifragile, Nassim Nicholas Taleb introduces the concept he calls "The Lucretius Problem." This problem addresses a critical flaw in human reasoning about risk and uncertainty: our persistent underestimation of worst-case scenarios. Taleb argues that what we typically label as a "worst-case" scenario is rarely deserving of that title; rather, this designation is anchored to our limited historical experience.

The error is not a lack of imagination. It is a category mistake. We treat an observed boundary as if it were an actual boundary.

In practice, our understanding of risk is retrospective, framed by events we have already witnessed or can currently conceptualise. Each new disaster or unprecedented event redefines what we believe to be possible, surpassing our previous benchmarks.

A genuine worst-case scenario is likely far more severe, complex, and unpredictable than anything we have yet encountered or even imagined.

Taleb attributes the name of this cognitive pitfall to Titus Lucretius Carus, a Roman poet born in 99 BC. Paraphrasing Lucretius, Taleb writes:

“The fool believes that the tallest mountain in the world will be equal to the tallest one he has observed."

In other words, the greatest dangers are precisely those we fail to anticipate, simply because they lie beyond the horizon of our past experience.

The Other Side of Lucretius

While the Lucretius Problem is typically understood through the lens of "worst-case" scenarios, its fundamental logic equally applies to "best-case" scenarios. Just as we underestimate potential catastrophes, we also limit our perception of extraordinary potential by anchoring to past achievements.

Our understanding of what's possible is always constrained by our most impressive historical reference points. Yet, these reference points are merely snapshots of temporary markers that can be dramatically surpassed.

Put differently, there are two limits. The first is epistemic. It is what you cannot yet see. The second is institutional. It is what you refuse to admit, even when you have seen it, because admitting it would force a change.

My claim is that modern rugby is often constrained by an institutional limit, not an epistemic one.

The Mountains I’ve Seen

One of my weaknesses as a coach is that I’m overly optimistic about what can be achieved in a short period of time.

That optimism isn’t a personality quirk. It’s an artefact of exposure. After you’ve seen a few “improbable” outcomes up close, your internal ceiling shifts upward.

The downside is that you start to assume others can see the same mountain range you can, and when they can’t (or won’t), it creates friction and frustration.

To make that concrete, here are a handful of calibration points. They are not exhaustive and they are not a guarantee. They are simply the experiences that shifted my priors about what programs can become.

• Every program I get involved in, even on the periphery as a consultant, wins more games than before. The flip side is that some of these programs sink like stones after I leave, and that’s not something I’m proud of.
• I have taken players across multiple organisations, age groups, and position groups from novice to international representative in less than 10 weeks.
• In a two-year window, nearly 44% of the players I coached achieved international representative selection (under-18s, under-20s, 7s, or Test match rugby). Only one player had meaningful representative history prior to this window. This reflects development, not a program built on importing established representatives.
• I have coached in some of Australia's strongest rugby nurseries. In each of them, teams that I have been involved in coaching hold the record for the greatest number of representative players developed.

A fair objection is that outcomes like these depend on resources, talent pools, and context. Agreed. But that is exactly what makes these results informative. They were achieved in environments that were under-resourced relative to their peers. That means the usual explanation, “they had advantages,” does not apply. The standard most programs defend is often not a constraint. It is a choice.

Exposure changes what you take to be plausible, and plausibility is the real constraint in most programs. Reference points shape plausibility, and plausibility shapes behaviour.

Experiences like these recalibrated my sense of what is realistic. I don’t treat the default standard as inevitable, because I’ve seen it exceeded too many times.

This is where the conversation gets uncomfortable, because once your reference points change, you hear certain statements differently. You notice how often people defend a ceiling they do not truly believe in. Not because they are unaware of higher standards, but because admitting those standards would require a different kind of program.

The Absurdity of Modern Rugby

There is a meme online featuring Steve Rogers, Captain America. The joke is simple: Steve Rogers believes in one God and one God only. He is a monotheist.

That belief is familiar in our world. It becomes completely absurd in his.

In the Marvel universe, Steve Rogers is not merely aware of other gods. He has fought alongside them. He has met them. He has seen evidence that contradicts his stated belief, repeatedly, at close range. And yet the meme treats his monotheism as a fixed point, not a conclusion.

The reason is not that Steve Rogers is making a careful assessment of reality. It is that he is playing a role. Captain America is a character from a certain era with a certain moral identity. A shift in belief would not be framed as “updating to new evidence.” It would be framed as “betraying the character.”

That same psychology shows up in modern rugby, except the belief is not theological. It is about what is possible.

The absurdity is that administrators and coaches will look you dead in the eye and claim that Mount Kosciuszko is the tallest mountain on Earth. They know taller mountains exist. Some have seen them. Some have even briefly stood on them.

But acknowledging those mountains would force a change in standards, a change in decisions, and a change in accountability. Higher peaks change what counts as competence. They also change who is exposed when performance plateaus. That is why they are resisted.

So the smaller mountain stays “the tallest,” not because it is true, but because it is convenient.

This is not always laziness. Often it is self-preservation. It is easier to manage a program whose goals fit inside last year’s reference points than one that admits the ceiling is much higher.

The Responsibility of Seeing

I understand the temptation to keep the mountain small. I have lived inside programs where “realistic” was treated as a virtue and ambition as a liability.

But once you have been exposed to higher peaks, you inherit a responsibility. You either tell the truth about what is possible, or you help everyone keep pretending that Kosciuszko is Everest.

Most people choose pretending. That is the absurdity.

The question is whether you are building a program that goes looking for higher peaks, or one that exists to deny they exist.