I’ve looked mostly at progress from an energy lens, and I think the upper bound constraint for progress is relevant there too.
Coal was restricted largely to space heating until the steam engine, which itself was restricted to stationary applications until the steam locomotive. Oil’s first beachhead was kerosene lamps, decades before internal combustion engines were commercialized. Electricity needed the build out of vast, centralized grids and large coal and hydro power stations. I wrote more about this in this section of a recent long read.
I’m also very interested in the question of how to best accelerate the “dark matter” ecosystem and fast track the next AlexNet in whatever domain it happens to be. I too would be interested to see examples of domains that require minimal infrastructure and dark matter.
I’ve looked mostly at progress from an energy lens, and I think the upper bound constraint for progress is relevant there too.
Coal was restricted largely to space heating until the steam engine, which itself was restricted to stationary applications until the steam locomotive. Oil’s first beachhead was kerosene lamps, decades before internal combustion engines were commercialized. Electricity needed the build out of vast, centralized grids and large coal and hydro power stations. I wrote more about this in this section of a recent long read.
I’m also very interested in the question of how to best accelerate the “dark matter” ecosystem and fast track the next AlexNet in whatever domain it happens to be. I too would be interested to see examples of domains that require minimal infrastructure and dark matter.