Wednesday 10 April 2013

Future Economics

 


Page history last edited by Melanie Swan 3 years, 1 month ago


Future Economics wiki

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Analysis: economics principles applied to technology advance.

The idea of applying economic principles to technology growth areas has not really been done and would be very helpful to people in these industries for planning purposes. For example, applying economic principles / economic analysis / taking an economic approach to biotechnology (specifically, genetic scanning/personalized medicine and synthetic biology (for example, what if we could produce all food and energy from basic materials in a lab like Craig Venter proposes, what does this mean economically? What if people become immortal, how would this change the propensity to have children and what would this mean economically?), nanotechnology and easy cheap 3d object printing (fascinating example: http://www.contourcrafting.org/), artificial intelligence, the 3d Internet, and/or other disruptive technologies. What does transformative technology change mean from an economics perspective?

Work in Future Economics

  • "1012: A Check on the Earth Carrying Capacity for Man" - Cesare Marchetti, 1979

Notes

  • As of 1970, the past four hundred years of materials processing (raw materials of all types: sand, gravel, coal, oil, metal ores, etc.) had grown constantly at 6 percent annually, which is a 12 year doubling period. Roughly every 12 yeasrs since the 1600s there had been a doubling in the amount of raw materials that had been mined, processed and used. (Earth-based materials only) (Source: Dave Criswell, Great Mambo Chicken, p. 222)

To assess a technology's capability for economic change, check for

  • Rapid phase change capability
  • Quick doubling times
  • Magnitude - can cause the whole economy to double?
  • General purposeness of the technology

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