For the last few hundred years we’ve been living in a period of exponential growth- in population, in scientific understanding, in production of all sorts. Tha

For the last few hundred years we’ve been living in a period of exponential growth- in population, in scientific understanding, in production of all sorts. That was never going to last forever. Every exponential growth process eventually reaches its limit. The exponential turns into a logistic curve as the limit is approached. It’s not the end of the world by any means. But what I think is inaccurate is posing the regime of exponential growth as a normal state of affairs that can be returned to. Clearly that period was totally unique in all human history. If you assume it was going to last forever you get mathematically absurd results. For example if you assume 3% per year growth in wages over the next 1000 years then every worker is going to be making 274 quadrillion dollars per year. In 2000 years they are making 1.89x10^30 dollars. In 3000 years they are making 1.23x10^43 dollars. In 4000 years it’s 9x10^55 dollars, which is enough money to buy each atom that makes up the planet earth at a price of $100000 per atom. These are silly numbers, but that’s the point: exponential growth ends.