Doyne Farmer will give a talk at ETH on January 19th
On Tuesday, January 19th at 10.15 J Doyne Farmer will give a talk at ETH on "Predicting Technological progress and economic growth".
Tuesday, January 19 at 10.15 - 11.45
RZ F21, Clausiusstrasse 59, 8092 Zürich
J Doyne Farmer on Predicting technological progress and economic growth
Abstract:
Technological advancements are fundamental to our existence, and a major driver of economic growth. While technology is all around us, in many ways we understand the evolution of dinosaurs better than we understand the evolution of technology. Nonetheless, technological progress displays striking empirical regularities that are as yet not well-explained in fundamental terms. Although the details of technological breakthroughs are unpredictable, different technologies improve at different rates and the broad trends are fairly reliable. Because technologies are built recursively from other technologies their behavior is interlinked and is naturally thought about in ecological terms. I will present a theory for technological improvement that focuses on the network relationships between technologies, and demonstrate that it is very useful for understanding economic growth.