A common thread to these Malthusianisms is that you can't understand dynamic phenomena by assuming they're static. Something like the number of hours in a work

A common thread to these Malthusianisms is that you can't understand dynamic phenomena by assuming they're static. Something like the number of hours in a work week isn't just a fixed number; it's got a history behind it and driving forces on it that are needed to make sense of its current and future values. Aaronson implies that he thinks about these situations by trying to figure out what Nash equilibrium they might settle to, but I think even that concept's not general enough. In the real world, people don't make their minds up once and then stay the same afterwards -- they'll change their behavior over time, and not always towards any equilibrium state.