Defender Talk: OCTAgility?

Grandad was a tough old chap. A man of few words. Grumpy. Grandad always gave the impression that he knew everything about the world, but didn’t want to talk about it. He’d say things like: ‘Hmm … yeah.’ or ‘Hmm … nah.’ And he’d tell his crying grandson, sitting on the ground in the garden next to the swing: “Stop whingeing. What doesn’t kill you just makes you tougher.” That’s not really the done thing these days. But yes, that was just Grandad for you.

In his 2012 book Antifragility, Nassim Nicholas Taleb introduced a distinction that goes beyond simple resilience. There are fragile systems that are damaged by stress. There are robust systems that survive stress unscathed. And there are antifragile systems that improve as a result of stress. He uses the Hydra from Greek mythology as an illustration: if you cut off one of its heads, two new ones grow in its place. A muscle grows under strain; a bone becomes denser under pressure. And only in this way, Taleb argues, can an idea become stronger if it incorporates its own flaws into the next version. From a philosophical perspective, Taleb thus approaches a realisation that Grandad imparted to his crying grandson with his down-to-earth remark: what gets you down doesn’t necessarily have to weaken you; it can also be the start of an improvement.

It is important to note that a physical object cannot actually achieve this third category. A car that is hit by a stone today does not become stronger as a result; it is damaged. Or it becomes a claim for the insurance company. It depends on the scratch. At best, therefore, it is robust and well-built. Antifragility only arises when a system learns from its mistakes over time and uses them to create a better version next time.

This is precisely where the name of the new Defender OCTA comes in. It is derived from the octahedral shape of a diamond, that purest of crystal structures in which carbon, under enormous heat and pressure, becomes harder and harder until it becomes the hardest naturally occurring substance on Earth.

The individual OCTA rolling off the production line today cannot, in its own right, fulfil this principle, for the very reasons Taleb describes. At best, it can be robust, sturdily built and designed with a margin to withstand stresses that would damage other vehicles. But the idea behind it – the Defender as an ongoing concept since 1948 – operates according to a different logic. Tested over seven decades in desert sand, mud, mountain gravel and city centres, in real-world use by people who have driven the vehicle to its limits and beyond, every breakdown and every broken component every bent wheel rim has become a piece of information that has fed back into the next design. Under pressure, the concept has not only held up; it has become more robust. The OCTA could not, therefore, have a more fitting name.

A 40-metre jump and the massive cloud of dust that an OCTA rally car creates in the desert are not just inspiration for a good headline; they prove something about the vehicle itself: that it was actually where it claimed to have been. The name OCTA reveals something about the idea behind it: that seventy years of such moments have shaped this concept. Taking part in the Dakar Rally is therefore both proof and verification, as well as a promise for the future to continue taking this idea seriously. 

Or, as Grandad would probably say: “Hmm… yes.”