Most Have No Idea What’s Coming. And Soon.

Humanity does not intuitively grasp the concept of exponential growth, and so it’s psychologically ill-prepared for what’s about to happen and, especially, the speed with which it’s about to happen. Due to exponential growth trends in technologies, all of which have continued uninterrupted for decades now, you will experience more change over the next decade than humanity has experienced in...the last 100 years! Such is the nature of exponential growth.

Exponential growth appears inconsequential at first because it starts from such a small base. But there are many, many exponential growth trends that have just recently achieved (or are just now achieving) 1% adoption or market penetration. For instance, in the US, solar energy achieved 1% penetration in 2017 and is more than doubling EVERY YEAR (as it has been for decades). It’s tempting to think “wow, it’s taken us DECADES to get to 1% solar, so it’ll take another hundred years or more to get anywhere close to 100%.” Right? WRONG!!!

Once a exponential technology achieves 1% penetration, it’s only 7 doublings way from 100%! (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 100). At its historical growth trend (which is actually accelerating, not decelerating), clean, reliable, decentralized solar will provide virtually all of the world’s needed energy in only...7 years (AT MOST!). By 2025, virtually all of your concerns about “Peak Oil”, carbon emissions, etc. will be a thing of the past. And this will happen naturally as a consequence of long-established growth trends and not as a result of some government program or subsidy (though politicians will no doubt try to claim credit).

Solar is just one example of many other technologies that recently achieved (or soon will achieve) 1% penetration after decades of growing exponentially. Blockchain (bitcoin) is another. Robotics is another. Virtually reality is another. Artificial Intelligence is another. And fast on their heels are self-driving cars, nanotechnology, gene editing (CRISPR), 3D Printing (which will make us all both producers and consumers of much of what we want and need), and many, many more.

As a consequence of them, your life will be completely remade over the next decade. Like...completely. These technologies will solve many of our most intractable problems (for instance, by providing unlimited supplies of cheap, clean energy) while also no doubt creating new ones (the “Rise of the Machines”?). Entire industries will be decimated (finance and banking by blockchains, manufacturing by ubiquitous 3D printing, medicine by AI doctors and robotic surgeons, trucking and taxi driving by self driving cars, etc.).

If you don’t see these changes coming and prepare for them now, you’ll be decimated by them. For instance, you’ll waste enormous amounts of energy fighting demons that have already effectively been slain, like by “fighting” for clean energy. There’s no need to fight for clean energy. Fighting for clean energy today is like fighting to install telephone “land lines” in Africa in the early 1990’s. Doing that would have been a total waste and actually counterproductive—today most everyone in Africa has access to a mobile phone!

Clean energy will be here very, very soon, and there’s nothing that anyone can really do to stop it or to accelerate it. By wasting time, energy and money “fighting” for that issue, you’ll be ill-prepared for the world that’s about to be.

By contrast, if you do see these exponential changes coming, then you can spend your energy on things that can really make a difference to your future and the world’s. If you do that, then you’ll experience a Golden Age of an unprecedented degree.

If you’re under the age of 60 (and certainly if you’re under 50), please take the time to read what Silicon Valley has been trying to tell us. Read every book by Ray Kurzweil. Read “Zero Marginal Cost Society” by Jeremy Rifkin. Read “Zero to One” by Peter Thiel. Read everything you can about bitcoin and blockchain. Do everything you can to get your mind around the significance of exponential growth. EVERYTHING YOU CAN.

Shit’s about to get real, ya’ll. Real real.