geoffrey on scaling
geoffrey west on scaling
103 min video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyJJPuKF814] via michel bauwens tweet [https://x.com/mbauwens/status/1828378977754587404]:
Universal constant for scaling applied to human life, is that conceivable ?
SFI Community Lecture – Geoffrey West – “Why do we stop growing, live for 100 years, and sleep eight hours a day? Why do all companies and people die, whereas cities keep growing and the pace of life continues to accelerate? Are cities and companies “just” very large organisms? And how are all these related to innovation, wealth creation and the sustainability of the planet? Although life is probably the most complex and diverse phenomenon in the universe, many of its characteristics scale with size in a surprisingly simple fashion: for example, metabolic rate (the 2,000 food calories you need each day) scales in a systematically predictive way from cells to whales, while time-scales, from lifespans to growth-rates, and sizes, from genome lengths to tree heights, likewise scale systematically. Remarkably, cities and companies also exhibit systematic scaling: wages, profits, patents, crime, disease, and roads all scale in an approximately “universal” fashion.”
notes/quotes:
6 min – geoffrey starts
7 min – diff way of looking at global sustainability.. as a physicist asking for the possibility of getting an analytic/quantitative/predictive theory underlying what the future of the planet might be in its grandest terms
of math and men.. graeber violence/quantification law.. graeber unpredictability/surprise law.. the dance begs sans any form of m\a\p
9 min – we live in an exponentially expanding universe.. yet don’t articulate that we live in an exponentially expanding socioeconomic universe.. every metric of our socioecon lives is expanding.. ie: population in urban rising to majority.. 2050.. 75% of planet.. urbanizing 1.5 mill people/week.. at present we are actually 3mill/week.. every 2 mos new metro area.. adding city of san fran every 5 days.. or a santa fe every 12 hrs..
16 min – fruits of innovation/techs has led us to this phenom/successful stage.. the question is .. is it sustainable.. this open ended growth.. fate of planet bound up in fate of our cities.. all we face.. are generated by urbanization because that’s where the people are.. so inherent upon us to understand this phenom.. how did it happen and where is it going.. so.. can we make a science of this (city) system
18 min – attraction of cities: job opps, access, lively, good ed, etc.. i’m going to talk about it in a physics context.. where it can’t be supported w/o a supply/transformation of energy
19 min – 2nd law of thermo: if use energy to create/maintain order in a system.. somewhere you create disorder.. so price to pay called: entropy.. i’ll call it socio economic entropy.. price we pay for bringing great order: crime, disease, et al
i think we have that wrong.. ie: carhart-harris entropy law et al
22 min – cities are for people,. a machine to bring people together for social interaction to produce ideas.. create wealth and well being
need a nother way.. in the city.. as the day
how we gather in a space is huge.. need to try spaces of permission where people have nothing to prove to facil curiosity over decision making.. because the finite set of choices of decision making is unmooring us.. keeping us from us.. ie: whatever for a year.. a legit sabbatical ish transition
there’s a legit use of tech (nonjudgmental expo labeling).. to facil a legit global detox leap.. for (blank)’s sake.. and we’re missing it
ie: imagine if we listened to the itch-in-8b-souls 1st thing everyday & used that data to connect us (tech as it could be.. ai as augmenting interconnectedness)
28 min – again .. what i mean by doing science is quantitative, based on principles, predictive.. ie: the eclipse not so amazing but that we can predict when it will happen.. can we have such a framework for talking about cities et al.. no.. can’t be precise about these things..
30 min – is conceivable .. where we can’t make accurate predictions.. but average predictions
33 min – to what extend are cities/companies just big orgs..
to me.. not in this sense.. because need organism as fractal for living things.. ie: why are we destined to die but cities aren’t
35 min – mammals vary in size.. evolve by natural selection.. each evolve in own way.. ie: mouse 2g, blue whale 200000000g ..
36 min – metabolic rate graph.. how much energy/food needed to stay alive..
45 min – circuitry system of any system that has a beating heart.. ability to quantify.. ie: growth of human
50 min – departing bio to talk about scaling in cities: a) dominated by systematic predictable non linear scaling laws b) economies of scale (bigger you are less you need) sublinear c) pace of life systematically slows w increasing size d) growth is sigmoidal reaching a stable size at maturity e) finite lifespan e) explained by dynamics of networks
54 min – we’re modular.. we form modular groups.. we live in 2d.. each person has to be somewhere connected with someone who is also somewhere.. we are bound to place.. so social network can’t be independent of spatial network.. city accomplishes an integration between info and physical frameworks
56 min – do we scale.. ie: of number of gas stations… see sublinear double size of city need less than twice.. et al
59 mim – to wages, et al, patents, et al.. so innovation, crime, police, taxes, restaurants, have same slope.. on avg when doulbe size of city.. increase all good and bad by same 15% regardless of city and save 15% on all infra..
1:07 – graphs of underlying dimension of human interaction
to me.. cancerous distraction.. because all to date is whalespeak.. not about the dance
1:08 – in bio.. bigger you are slower it is.. social networks produces opposite.. because positive feedback.. which is continually increasing the pace of life.. origin of super linear
still whalespeak
black science of people/whales law
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need: infinitesimal structures approaching the limit of structureless\ness and/or vice versa .. aka: ginorm/small ness
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be you. 