Exponential times
I was at a staff development day today, and the ‘shift happens – did you know’ power point was shown early in the proceedings. The presentation is thought provoking, but I do have a problem with the slide above.
Exponential growth is impossible for any length of time, just try a growth rate of 2% per year for a couple of thousand years to see what I mean. Sooner or later, a limiting factor will kick in and the curve will flatten out into an ogive. The ‘demographic transition’ in the Industrial West is a typical example.
I suppose the issue is the form that the limiting factor takes – soft or hard, saturation or boom-bust?