A seesaw on a playground. Either side will come back down again if it’s perturbed a little (given it’s reasonably well oiled etc).
People sitting on it and literally kicking with their feet is enough to kick it into a different state. Random noise due to wind is not strong enough, except maybe in a heavy storm.
The handle of a window (usually). Pointing in one direction when closed and another when open. It will stay in either position unless explicitly moved (which makes it different from a door handle).
The activation energy required to kick it depends on whether it’s oiled or rusty etc.
The ruling party / coalition in a democracy. (In general multistable, but in the US you might call it bistable). One type of perturbation are attempted coups, which will be squashed when not strong enough.
Elections are kicks. But only when the elected party is actually different, which might happen when the voters are dissatisfied with the previous one strongly enough, or the election campaign was just better, etc. Another kick would be a successful coup.
A seesaw on a playground. Either side will come back down again if it’s perturbed a little (given it’s reasonably well oiled etc).
People sitting on it and literally kicking with their feet is enough to kick it into a different state. Random noise due to wind is not strong enough, except maybe in a heavy storm.
The handle of a window (usually). Pointing in one direction when closed and another when open. It will stay in either position unless explicitly moved (which makes it different from a door handle).
The activation energy required to kick it depends on whether it’s oiled or rusty etc.
The ruling party / coalition in a democracy. (In general multistable, but in the US you might call it bistable). One type of perturbation are attempted coups, which will be squashed when not strong enough.
Elections are kicks. But only when the elected party is actually different, which might happen when the voters are dissatisfied with the previous one strongly enough, or the election campaign was just better, etc. Another kick would be a successful coup.
#3 is definitely a useful frame, probably lots of insights to be pumped from that one.