History of Earth

[TruePaige]

Originally posted by: GodlessAstronomer

Originally posted by: NanoStuff

Originally posted by: Locut0s

Originally posted by: NanoStuff

Originally posted by: Jeff7
Technology's growth is exponential, or at least something like that.

It's more of a higher level logarithmic function, one which is subtle enough to not be easily deducible within a limited period of time but drastically obvious over extended periods.

If technology were exponential, people 500 years ago would experience the same relative changes over, say, 20 years as we do over 20 years. In reality, people back then would have possibly not been witness to anything new at all over their entire lives, let alone 20 years.

In other words, the doubling time in this exponential venture is shortening, and perhaps even the rate of shortening is in itself exponential. A recursive acceleration of sorts.

Um no that's linear growth or at best a low order power growth. What you are talking about is in fact the very definition of exponential growth.

Um yes, look at that graph. From one integer to the next, the relative proportions remain the same across the entire scale. It's always 2x the previous.

Get the fuck back to school and learn maths.

LOL..seriously. It's true. I think he has no idea of what exponential means.

This could be an English failure as well.

 

[ElFenix]

Originally posted by: bunnyfubbles
yeah, there was a reason we had a period known as the "dark ages"

it's called dark more because we know so little about it than anything else. we're in the dark with regard to a lot of what happened.

 

[OverVolt]

We aren't any smarter than our ancestors. All technology is just tied to the energy we get from oil. That's what makes us "better" than our ancestors, burning oil.

 

[TruePaige]

Originally posted by: OverVolt
We aren't any smarter than our ancestors. All technology is just tied to the energy we get from oil. That's what makes us "better" than our ancestors, burning oil.

Not true!

In fact many of our ancestors had a much lower cranial capacity and less knowledge to base their research and growth off of as well.

 

[geno]

Originally posted by: OverVolt
We aren't any smarter than our ancestors. All technology is just tied to the energy we get from oil. That's what makes us "better" than our ancestors, burning oil.

We're smarter in the sense we're armed with more knowledge out of the gate (i.e. it's common knowlege the Earth orbits the Sun, etc etc.). Smarter in terms of brain capacity / cognative ability? I can't comment on that.

 

[nerp]

Originally posted by: TruePaige

Originally posted by: OverVolt
We aren't any smarter than our ancestors. All technology is just tied to the energy we get from oil. That's what makes us "better" than our ancestors, burning oil.

Not true!

In fact many of our ancestors had a much lower cranial capacity and less knowledge to base their research and growth off of as well.

Not homo sapiens.

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: Kalvin00
Yep..earth on a geologic time scale makes us look pretty damn insignificant.

Another thing that kinda boggles me is that humans roamed for thousands of years...and then, suddenly, in a span of ~150 years, we go from primitive beings to having all the luxuries that we enjoy today. Kinda weird.

Same thing will probably be said in another 150 years.

 

[JTsyo]

Originally posted by: TruePaige

Originally posted by: GodlessAstronomer

Originally posted by: NanoStuff

Originally posted by: Locut0s

Originally posted by: NanoStuff

Originally posted by: Jeff7
Technology's growth is exponential, or at least something like that.

It's more of a higher level logarithmic function, one which is subtle enough to not be easily deducible within a limited period of time but drastically obvious over extended periods.

If technology were exponential, people 500 years ago would experience the same relative changes over, say, 20 years as we do over 20 years. In reality, people back then would have possibly not been witness to anything new at all over their entire lives, let alone 20 years.

In other words, the doubling time in this exponential venture is shortening, and perhaps even the rate of shortening is in itself exponential. A recursive acceleration of sorts.

Um no that's linear growth or at best a low order power growth. What you are talking about is in fact the very definition of exponential growth.

Um yes, look at that graph. From one integer to the next, the relative proportions remain the same across the entire scale. It's always 2x the previous.

Get the fuck back to school and learn maths.

LOL..seriously. It's true. I think he has no idea of what exponential means.

This could be an English failure as well.

Nano is right. exponential means a constant raised to a power. If that constant is 2 then the value of the function doubles with each integer.

Example:
2^2 = 4
2^3 = 8
8/4 = 2

2^10 = 1024
2^11 = 2048
2048/1024 = 2

Now say you're sorry and play nice.