Not exactly what you were asking for, but Nassim Taleb's "Antifragile" might be of interest to you. It's about how many human made things e.g. machines, the economy, etc. are fragile and get weaker/collapse under stress. In contrast many organic things (e.g. muscles) are antifragile, i.e., they gain from (small) stressors. Definitely an interesting read.