Tony Jeff: Exponential Growth Concept Fascinating

527_thumbPosted by: Contributing columnist, CLARION LEDGER FEATURE, BUSINESS, September 8, 2015:

In last week’s article, we examined Moore’s Law and the tremendous vision that Gordon Moore had in making such a bold prediction — that computing power would double and prices would drop by half every two years.

Ray Kurzweil, in a now- famous 2001 essay called “The Law of Accelerating Returns,” made an even bolder prediction — that not just computers, but rather all technology and innovation, is growing exponentially. Essentially, he claimed that all things in the hands of technology and innovation will follow Moore’s Law.

In contrast, consider that while we as humans continue to push the boundaries of what we are capable of, we simply don’t run a 4-minute mile one year, a 2-minute mile two years later, and a 1-minute mile two years after that. Our runners do continue to break records, but many of those are only marginal improvements over many years or even decades. Interestingly, biomechanical studies have even shown that joint acceleration is actually pretty similar between Usain Bolt and Jesse Owens. That means that the improvements in race times between those two runners can mostly be explained by knowing that in 1936 Owens dug his own starting holes in a soft cinder track while Bolt used precision starting blocks and ran on an engineered polymer surface.

So, if humans aren’t improving according to Moore’s Law, is Kurzweil’s Law even believable? Kurzweil would argue that it seems far-fetched because of our “intuitive linear view,” which is wrong.

Humans expect things to be like they are now, just a little different. That view was supported by the experiences over an average lifetime up until probably the late 1800s. Exponential growth, like Moore and Kurzweil are suggesting, would be very difficult to detect until the later years — when the acceleration would become faster and changes would become much more obvious.

To better understand how it might be possible, let’s look at what Kurzweil studied. A person living prior to 1800 would have seen very little change over their lifetime and except for changes due to migrating to a new location, their lives wouldn’t vary much from their parents and grandparents. By 1900, though, rail lines crossed Europe and the United States, and steamboats moved people and loads on inland waterways. The first 20 years of the 1900s saw the horse and buggy — the method of transportation for 2,000 years — be replaced by the automobile, and humans took flight for the first time.

This was the beginning of change that was visible within a human’s lifetime, but it was really just a continuation of the change that had begun much earlier. If graphed, the changes would look like a long flat period with a giant “hockey stick” on the right going up. If you lived during the relatively flat part, you just didn’t live long enough to see the changes that were already happening.

To jump forward to the last 30-40 years, we can, like our parents did, tease young people about how they don’t understand how different the world was when we were young. The joke isn’t really as funny as it used to be, though, because even high school students can remember a time before a smartphone if they think about it.

I give a presentation to groups where I use a “really old video” from 2006 and ask the audience to tell me the things that have changed since then. While audiences over the age of 30 usually chuckle at that reference to 2006, it’s interesting to note that 2006 was “the year of MySpace,” and the year before the first iPhone was introduced. So instead of a 100- or 200-year cycle, we’ve seen nearly everything that we do go through significant changes during the last 10 years.

I don’t doubt Kurzweil’s Law is real and is applying every day to the world around us. To me, however, the more fundamental question is whether Moore’s Law is just a small part of the continuation of accelerating growth that Kurzweil describes.

If you are interested in more information, you can find much of Kurzweil’s original writings, including his 2001 article, online. He’s also written several thought-provoking books, including “Live Long Enough to Live Forever.”

Tony Jeff is the president and CEO of Innovate Mississippi. He can be reached at tjeff@innovate.ms.