The Value of Getting Closer to the Work

Scaling The core problem of scaling a team is that not everyone can know everything. Scaling is the work of systematizing that – so that things are understandable, knowable. It’s turnin…

Donald MacKenzie · AI’s Scale

AI’s scale doesn’t matter just to specialists. The rest of us are being taken on a ride along the logarithmic curve...

"Greedflation" and the Profits Equation

The assumption behind the "greedflation" thesis is that companies are choosing to squeeze volumes because they care more about unit margins than total profits. There are other possibilities.

Misperception of Exponential Growth: Are People Aware of Their Errors?

Previous research shows that individuals make systematic errors when judging exponential growth, which has harmful effects for their financial well-being. This study analyzes how far individuals are aware of their errors and how these errors are shaped by arithmetic and conceptual problems. Whereas arithmetic problems could be overcome using computational assistance like a pocket calculator, this is not the case for conceptual problems, a term we use to subsume other error drivers like a general misunderstanding of exponential growth or overwhelming task complexity. In an incentivized experiment, we find that participants strongly overestimate the accuracy of their intuitive judgment. At the same time, their willingness to pay for arithmetic assistance is too high on average, often much above the actual benefits a calculator provides. Using a multitier system of task complexity we can show that the willingness to pay for arithmetic assistance is hardly related to its benefits, indicating that participants do not really understand how the interplay of arithmetic and conceptual problems shape their errors in exponential growth tasks. Our findings are relevant for policymaking and financial advisory practice and can help to design effective approaches to mitigate the detrimental effects of misperceived exponential growth.

Capacities

Capacities turns your ideas into connected objects. Think naturally, find everything instantly.

The Productivity Is Real. The Scaling Isn't.

What running an AI agent team taught me about why organizations can't do what one person can.

Medium Maximization

Abstract. A medium—for example, points or money—is a token people receive as the immediate reward of their effort. It has no value in and of itself, but it

The End of No Code - exe.dev blog

Writing custom software used to be expensive. Coding agents changed the math.

The shape of a knowledge worker

In a recent post, I threw around the term 'cognitive exponent' a bunch. Today I'd like to talk about a thing that might help us frame our investigation of what puts someone on the right side of that exponential graph.

Small Telescopes - Uri Simonsohn, 2015

This article introduces a new approach for evaluating replication results. It combines effect-size estimation with hypothesis testing, assessing the extent to w...

How I estimate work as a staff software engineer

There’s a kind of polite fiction at the heart of the software industry. It goes something like this:

8.3M views · 981K reactions | As a great designer and developer, I...

As a great designer and developer, I try to always find the easiest solutions to problems like this 💁🏽‍♀️ thank you for your suggestions haha #coding #codinglife #codingmemes #webdeveloper...

Google's TPU Paradox

Why the massive Anthropic deal ($50-80 billion over six years) is a map to a thousand-customer problem.

Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist | Do the Math

[An updated treatment of some of this material appears in Chapter 2 of the Energy and Human Ambitions on a Finite Planet (free) textbook, also mirrors a 2022 article in Nature Physics..]

If you aren’t used to staring at math, Poisson’s equation looks a little intimidating: