Compared to 1910-1960? Surely you jest.
Compared to 1910-1960? Surely you jest.
I believe it is expanding exponentially and will continue to do so.
I did a presentation to my daughters class in the late 1980’s on technological change. I brought props and pictures. I showed them how my tennis racket from 1973 was pretty much the same as a tennis racket from 1890. Then I showed them a new carbon fiber tennis racket. Did the same with pictures of bicycles.
I then showed them one of our 12” data laserdisks in a sleave (looks like a giant floppy) and compared it to the 8” floppy from just a few years before.
I did a lot more to bring the point home. The point was this: Two things increase the speed of progress:
1. The speed and efficiency of communication.
3. The speed and efficiency of modeling.
And computers have dramatically increased both, giving us wild improvements in old items as well as new items we never dreamed of.
The invention of the printing press was one. The invention of the computer was another. But at the time of my presentation there was no such thing as the internet - ther greatest of all.
Between 1910 and 1960, most changes were mechanical. Computers were mechanical at the beginning but they went to relays and finally tubes. We had TV in 1960, but it has nothing in common with what we call “tv” today other than they both work on electricity.
And there is not much difference, really, between a Model T and a 1960 Chevy, technology-wise. But look at what we have today. Computers that allow a car to tell you what’s wrong with it. Computer manufactured cars. 200,000 mile dependability. Air conditioning that barely affects gas mileage.
And then there is satelite tech. Bluetooth, Wi-fi, Graphene, Nanotech, etc.
It is absolutely exploding all around us. The world literally changes as much in a month as it did back then in several years. And it will soon change the same amount in a week, and then a day.
It’s why we feel today like we live in the future. It changes too fast but it is constantly changing faster than it did the year before. People will snap. People ARE snapping.