Gottfried Benn’s Ikarus is unmistakably a description of the Brueghel painting, “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus,” which is patiently described in the poem.

According to scholia on Euripides, Icarus thought himself greater than Helios, the Sun himself, and the god punished him by directing his powerful rays at him, melting the beeswax. Afterwards, it was Helios who named the Icarian Sea after Icarus.[10]

After Theseus, king of Athens and enemy of Minos, escaped from the labyrinth, King Minos suspected that Icarus and Daedalus had revealed the labyrinth's secrets and imprisoned them—either in a large tower overlooking the ocean or the labyrinth itself, depending upon the account.[1][2] Icarus and Daedalus escaped using wings Daedalus constructed from feathers, threads from blankets, clothes, and beeswax.[3] Daedalus warned Icarus first of complacency and then of hubris, instructing him to fly neither too low nor too high, lest the sea's dampness clog his wings or the sun's heat melt them.[3] Icarus ignored Daedalus's instructions not to fly too close to the sun, causing the beeswax in his wings to melt. Icarus fell from the sky, plunged into the sea, and drowned. The myth gave rise to the idiom, "fly too close to the sun." In some versions of the tale, Daedalus and Icarus escape by ship.[1][4]

In Greek mythology, Icarus (/ˈɪkərəs/; Ancient Greek: Ἴκαρος, romanized: Íkaros, .mw-parser-output .IPA-label-small{font-size:85%}.mw-parser-output .references .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .infobox .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .navbox .IPA-label-small{font-size:100%}pronounced [ǐːkaros]) was the son of the master craftsman Daedalus, the architect of the labyrinth of Crete.

Contents 1 Overview 2 Reasons for failure 2.1 Overconfidence and complacency 2.1.1 Natural tendency 2.1.2 The illusion of control 2.1.3 Anchoring 2.1.4 Competitor neglect 2.1.5 Organisational pressure 2.1.6 Machiavelli factor 2.2 Dogma, ritual and specialisation 2.2.1 Frames become blinders 2.2.2 Processes become routines 2.2.3 Resources become millstones 2.2.4 Relationships become shackles 2.2.5 Values becomes dogmas 3 The paradox of information systems 3.1 The irrationality of rationality 3.2 How computers can be destructive 3.3 Recommendations for practice 4 Case studies 4.1 Fresh & Easy 4.2 Firestone Tire and Rubber Company 4.3 Laura Ashley 4.4 Xerox 5 See also 6 References

The paradox of information systems[edit] Drummond suggests in her paper in 2008 that computer-based information systems can undermine or even destroy the organisation that they were meant to support, and it is precisely what makes them useful that makes them destructive – a phenomenon encapsulated by the Icarus Paradox.[9] For examples, a defence communication system is designed to improve efficiency by eliminating the need for meetings between military commanders who can now simply use the system to brief one another or answer to a higher authority. However, this new system becomes destructive precisely because the commanders no longer need to meet face-to-face, which consequently weakened mutual trust, thus undermining the organisation.[10] Ultimately, computer-based systems are reliable and efficient only to a point. For more complex tasks, it is recommended for organisations to focus on developing their workforce. A reason for the paradox is that rationality assumes that more is better, but intensification may be counter-productive.[11]