new . morning
Sun, 23 Dec 2007 20:15:23 -0800
Despite Off's brilliant satires of one-dimensional ranting fanatics, there actually is a world of wonderful science going on.
And its growing, doubling actually at astonishing rates. Though there are various estimates of the pace of that rate of growth, it could currently be 12-18 months. " Because of the information explosion: information is doubling faster all the time. It took from the time of Jesus to the time of Leonardo for one doubling of knowledge. The next doubling of knowledge was completed before the American Revolution, the next one by 1900, the next one by 1950, the next one by 1960. You see how [it keeps] moving faster? Now knowledge is doubling every eighteen months." http://www.positiveatheism.org/writ/rawilson.htm (good interview by the way) "Computers and networking have gained adherents partly because they enhance the skills considered necessary to survive in the twenty-first century. In the nineteenth century, it took about fifty years to double the world's knowledge. Today, the base of knowledge doubles in less than a year. The digital age creates new opportunities to access information in ways that transform work and play. The emerging workforce does not need "knowers" as much as it needs "learners." http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:x-u4uZBne1YJ:www.emory.edu/TEACHING/Report/AppendixD.html+knowledge+doubling&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=6&gl=us&client=firefox-a Some implications and questions If one's own knowledge is not doubling as fast, then the percent of all knowledge that we personally know is diminishing. Even if the acceleration of the rate slowed and remained on average of about 1 year (not likely), in a lifetime of 80 years knowledge will have increased 2^80 times. Thats a big number. 2^12 is 4096. In 12 years knowledge increases 4096 times. since 1995 how much has your knowledge increased? What happens when the rate accelerates to a doubling every month. Then knowledge will increase by 4096 times every year.