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Linear time: Short term: 1 week - 1 quarter Medium term: 1 quarter - 1 year Long term: 1 year - 5 years Eternity: > 5 years Exponential time: Short term: 1 week Medium term: 2 weeks Long term: 3 weeks Eternity: > 4 weeks
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Whatever your opinion of tech, it does one invaluable thing I’ve never learned any version of from liberal arts education: a visceral sense of exponential regimes. The closer you’ve worked to semiconductors, the deeper this exponential literacy gets.
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Words fail on exponential regimes. Numbers and log scales are your only friends. Exponential regimes lack words the way outer space lacks an atmosphere to breathe in. Innumeracy is death.
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I have never seen so many math-avoiders do so much math in such a short period. That’s a small silver lining here. People are doing at least basic arithmetic. Some are even learning about log scales 😱
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Reminds me of a recent UK-irony. During Brexit everyone in the UK suddenly learnt, in detail, exactly how the EU works. Prior to the vote to leave nobody, on either side, really knew.