Slides from Lecture L04 Adjacent Possible
In Reykjavík University course New Technology 2014
Technology evolves by exchange of ideas. With speciality began prosperity. After one idea comes another idea, by combining ideas into new ideas. In this lecture we look at the fundamental reason for technological progress and it is similar to that of how species evolve in nature.
At any given time, with all the knowledge we have, new knowledge can emerge. We call this the adjacent possible. It explains why new inventions are invented when they are, and why they are not possible before their time.
4. Moore’s Law
Number of transistors on
an integrated circuit will double "
in about 18-24 months
5. The Law of Accelerating Returns
Evolution applies positive feedback in that the more
capable methods resulting from one stage of
evolutionary progress are used to
create the next stage"
""
"As a result, the rate of progress of an evolutionary
process increases exponentially over time
6. Ideas build upon Ideas
Every generation of technology
becomes a source for new
innovations
13. "Left to his own devices he couldn’t build a toaster.
He could just about make a sandwich
and that was it."
Mostly Harmless, Douglas Adams, 1992
14.
15.
16. “And that was something that reoccurred
throughout the project, was, the smaller the
scale you want to work on, the further back
in time you have to go”
- Thomas Thwaites
17. The Law of Disappearing Technology
When some technique is
mastered, it will “disappear” as
something obvious and trivial, and
other more useful things that are
built on top of it
20. Adjacent Possible
...a kind of shadow future, hovering
on the edges of the present state of
things, a map of all the ways in
which the present can reinvent itself
Steven Johnson
29. Kontrativ Wave
Wave
Years
1
First Industrial Revolution
1787–1842
2
Railroad and Steam Engine Era
1842–1897
3
Age of steel, electricity and internal combustion 1897–1939
4
War and Post-war Boom: Suburbia
1939–1982
5
Post Industrial Era: Information Technology
1982? – ??
Source:
Wikipedia,
Kondratiev
Wave
30. The Prevailing Technology Trap
Current
and
dominant
technology
will
highly
influence
and
restrict
new
innovations
34. Two Waves of Products Development
In the first wave the product
is restricted by the
prevailing technology, but in
the second, there is
something new