Cancer
Cancer represents growth without the three essential rules: where to grow (concentration), when to grow (responsiveness to signals), and when to stop (contact inhibition).
Uncontrolled growth is cancer. Growth without regulation, concentration, or stop mechanisms eventually kills the organism.
A cancer diagnosis is terrifying because you realize your own body is trying to kill you. Not from outside invasion - no virus, no bacteria, no external threat. Your cells. Growing. Unstoppably.
Here's what cancer actually is: cells that forgot three fundamental rules.
Rule 1: Where to grow. Healthy cells grow at specific, concentrated points - growth plates in bones, meristems in plants, stem cell niches in organs. Cancer cells grow everywhere. Every tumor is diffuse, uncoordinated growth.
Rule 2: When to grow. Healthy cells respond to signals. When nutrients are scarce, they slow down. When space fills up, they stop. Cancer cells ignore signals. Growth becomes its own justification.
Rule 3: When to stop. This is the critical one. Healthy cells have contact inhibition - they sense neighboring cells, detect crowding, and halt division. Cancer cells lost this ability. They pile up into tumors, layers upon layers of cells that should have stopped but didn't.
Business Application of Cancer
Cancer represents growth without the three essential rules: where to grow (concentration), when to grow (responsiveness to signals), and when to stop (contact inhibition). Companies that grow everywhere, ignore failure signals, and cannot stop initiatives are exhibiting cancerous patterns.