Interview with gwern

> I love the example of Isaac Newton looking at the rates of progress in Newton's time and going, “Wow, there's something strange here. Stuff is being invented now. We're making progress. How is that possible?” And then coming up with the answer, “Well, progress is possible now because civilization gets destroyed every couple of thousand years, and all we're doing is we're rediscovering the old stuff.”

The link in this paragraph goes to a post on gwern website. This post contains various links, both internal and external. But I still failed to find one that supports claims about Newton's views on "progress".

> This offers a little twist on the “Singularity” idea: apparently people have always been able to see progress as rapid in the right time periods, and they are not wrong to! We would not be too impressed at several centuries with merely some shipbuilding improvements or a long philosophy poem written in Latin, and we are only modestly impressed by needles or printing presses.

We absolutely _are_ impressed. The concept of "rapid progress" is relative. There was rapid progress then, and there is even more rapid progress now. There is no contradiction.

Anyway, I have no idea how this interview got that many upvotes. I just wasted my time.

That works in reverse too. While I am in awe of what humanity already achieved - when I read fictional timelines of fictional worlds (Middle-Earth or Westeros/Essos) I am wondering how getting frozen in medieval like time is even possible. Like, what are they _doing_?

> I am wondering how getting frozen in medieval like time is even possible. Like, what are they _doing_?

Not discovering sources of cheap energy and other raw inputs. If you look carefully at history, every rapid period of growth was preceded by a discovery or conquest of cheap energy and resources. You need excess to grow towards the next equilibrium.

1400s Age of Explanation? 1200s Mongol Conquest? BC 100s Roman conquests of the Mediterranean?

None match that thesis