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Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

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Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#11

Post by kalid »

redorb wrote: post #7
jackowayed wrote: post #2

The best illustration of the concept, imo, is that with sustained 1.3%/year world population growth, we'll reach a population density of 1 person per square meter of land in only 780 years.

give me some context; how many meters per a person are we at currently? / Then give me some focus; what will it be at in my life span... 50 years?

Just for fun, I made a quick calc for you: http://tinyurl.com/3xl32bx

In 50 years at 1.3% growth we'll basically double our population, and go from about 8000 m^2 per person to 4000 m^2 per person. After 780 years, the growth starts adding up, you can play with the numbers.

Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#12

Post by Empact »

tibbon wrote: post #9

I'm curious what the average price of gall bladder surgery is now. In it his students project 25K by 2000, which we are obviously quite a way past. If you're uninsured, this amount sounds about right likely these days. Great video. I'm on part 2 and I'll finish the rest in the morning.

The HealthCare Blue Book tells an interesting story:

* $16,435 for traditional gall bladder removal, somewhat below the estimate http://healthcarebluebook.com/page_Results.aspx?id=75&da...

* $6,934 for the modern minimally invasive equivalent, far below the estimate http://healthcarebluebook.com/page_Results.aspx?id=74&da...

More evidence that projecting trends without considering technical progress is bound to result the sort of overly pessimistic results that Malthus made famous.

For example, Dr. Bartlett's two-column view on population assumes that people will need some certain number of square feet of land. But why wouldn't we build up, ala NYC? Or settle the ocean (http://seasteading.org/)? Or colonize the stars? Or perhaps even transfer our consciousness to some more efficient representation?

Yes, exponential growth presents problems, but exponential progress in technology has the power to solve them. That's where we (and others like us) come in.

Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#13

Post by jackowayed »

redorb wrote: post #7
jackowayed wrote: post #2

The best illustration of the concept, imo, is that with sustained 1.3%/year world population growth, we'll reach a population density of 1 person per square meter of land in only 780 years.

give me some context; how many meters per a person are we at currently? / Then give me some focus; what will it be at in my life span... 50 years?

The population will increase by a factor of exp(.013780) = 25336.5

So we should be at roughly 25,336 meters / person currently. (But remember that plenty of that is more-or-less unlivable--Siberia and the like.)

In 50 years, the population will have increased by a factor of exp(.013 50) = 1.91554, so in the next 50 years population will roughly double, so that number will go down to about 13k meters/person.

Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#14

Post by prodigal_erik »

I'm not usually a fan of long talking-head videos but this was absolutely worthwhile. What's most chilling is the story of the bottle and the bacteria, and the realization that somehow finding a whole new planet would only tide us over for a couple more generations, after which we'd need two more....

Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#15

Post by jackowayed »

kalid wrote: post #11
redorb wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

give me some context; how many meters per a person are we at currently? / Then give me some focus; what will it be at in my life span... 50 years?

Just for fun, I made a quick calc for you: http://tinyurl.com/3xl32bx In 50 years at 1.3% growth we'll basically double our population, and go from about 8000 m^2 per person to 4000 m^2 per person. After 780 years, the growth starts adding up, you can play with the numbers.

Wow, instacalc is pretty awesome.

Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#16

Post by rjett »

redorb wrote: post #7
jackowayed wrote: post #2

The best illustration of the concept, imo, is that with sustained 1.3%/year world population growth, we'll reach a population density of 1 person per square meter of land in only 780 years.

give me some context; how many meters per a person are we at currently? / Then give me some focus; what will it be at in my life span... 50 years?

Using data from the 2000 US Census, Manhattan, the United States' most dense city, had 25,836 people per square km or 0.025836 people per square meter.

Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#18

Post by fleitz »

jackowayed wrote: post #3

I've thought about his point that lowering the death rate makes the problem of population growth worse a lot, especially in the context of Africa and the like. "Oh they're starving because they get almost no rain, so that land really shouldn't support anywhere near as many people as are there. Let's give them food aid." 10 years elapse, and say they're getting 7% per year growth thanks to food aid keeping them from s…

"We" won't need to give "them" food aid forever, population growth levels off as wealth increases. Possibly the best thing that could be done for Africa is to end farm subsidies and argicultural tarrifs in the developed world.

Here is a great link to the farm subsidies recieved in Manhattan, it's odd how one never notices the wealth of family farms surrounding central park. http://wildgreenyonder.wordpress.com/2007/10/

Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#19

Post by zemaj »

prodigal_erik wrote: post #14

I'm not usually a fan of long talking-head videos but this was absolutely worthwhile. What's most chilling is the story of the bottle and the bacteria, and the realization that somehow finding a whole new planet would only tide us over for a couple more generations, after which we'd need two more....

But it's all considered in a vacuum. Even though the majority of the population don't understand the problem, this is ok. We have an economic system that benefits those who predict impending needs and place themselves in situations to provide for them.

Take a look at the green industry ramping up. In the not too distance future, I think most of us here expect oil replacement to be highly profitable.

I disagree with these doomsday predictions from pure arithmetic. It seems to me that the reverse is true - exponential "problems" provide the core drive for our economy. What drives the entire start-up industry? I'd say it's identifying profitable exponential growth scenarios and providing for them. To me, this explains how primarily capitalist countries tend toward stability, until them become strangled by ever increasing regulation (that's not to say I'm against regulation in general, but I think we need to be as proactive about removing it as we are about adding it [wow, I went off topic there]).

Re: Our greatest shortcoming is our inability to understand the exponential function

#20

Post by chaosmachine »

Empact wrote: post #12
tibbon wrote: post #9

I'm curious what the average price of gall bladder surgery is now. In it his students project 25K by 2000, which we are obviously quite a way past. If you're uninsured, this amount sounds about right likely these days. Great video. I'm on part 2 and I'll finish the rest in the morning.

The HealthCare Blue Book tells an interesting story: * $16,435 for traditional gall bladder removal, somewhat below the estimate http://healthcarebluebook.com/page_Results.aspx?id=75&da... * $6,934 for the modern minimally invasive equivalent, far below the estimate http://healthcarebluebook.com/page_Results.aspx?id=74&da... More evidence that projecting trends without considering technical progress is bound to resul…

If you watch the video, you'll see why "find more land" isn't a sustainable solution. Ultimately, population growth just needs to stabilize at 0% to solve the running out of space problem (but not the running out of resources problem, which is where technology is more likely to help).
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