You really have to wonder if senescence and potential (or probable and plausibly inevitable) catastrophic collapse is as necessary in this context as is the endless production of entropy as a corollary of complexity.
Any specific system (or system of systems) can only ever maintain sustainable continuity through the offset and displacement of its own internal entropy to its environment (think – dissipative systems), and beyond assorted material or thermodynamic and energy-processing shenanigans, we see nation states do this all the time – offset or displace their own sociopolitical and economic complexity to their adversaries and collaborators in destructive (and occasionally constructive) ways.
What happens when the system of systems is the unified totality of natural (environmental), biosystemic and human sociotechnical systems on this planet – when there is no non-trivial causally-connected “external” environment to which an endemic entropy can be effectively offset?
I expect there are probably clever solutions in this space but they are in the realm of base ontologies and logical concepts that seem quite unlikely to successfully percolate through the conventional cultural and political systems we find ourselves inhabiting
Daedelus Kite 