We're hard-wired to be linear thinkers

Futurist, inventor and author Ray Kurzweil claims that Moore's Law will always be a difficult concept for technology users to comprehend. That's because while it addresses the exponential growth of technology, we humans tend to be linear thinkers.

"Our intelligence is hard-wired to be linear because that served our needs as our brains evolved, when we were walking through the savanna 10,000 years ago," he explains. "We saw an animal coming at us out of corner of our eye, and we'd make a prediction of where that animal would be in 20 seconds. That served our needs quite well. We have a linear predictor built into our brain -- that's our intuition."

Even scientists, Kurzweil says, rely on predictive intuition, which follows a linear path. "They have an idea of what's been accomplished in the next year," he says. "And then they think about a task: 'Well, that's about 10 times as hard. It'll take about 10 years.' That's the intuition." As a result, predictions tend to be overly pessimistic or conservative, according to Kurzweil.

Even if we were better at exponential thinking, says technology advisor and SanDiego.com CEO Mark Burgess, Moore's Law is a lousy way to handle any kind of planning. "Applying Moore's Law as a planning tool in IT is a little like comparing aging to gathering wisdom," he says. "Because technology changes, [it] doesn't mean the rest of the systems and people around them can, will, should or want to change." The fastest way to slow down an office, he believes, is to upgrade it.

His advice: Forget linear growth; forget exponential growth; forget Moore's Law. Pattern decision-making after the ascending spiral model of history, "where we cover the same ground ... with small changes that move us forward." When new technologies hit, he suggests, "make sure you get 'one' as soon as anyone says they had success with it so you can start the process of figuring out where it fits."

Dian Schaffhauser is a writer who covers technology and business for a number of print and online publications. Contact her at dian@dischaffhauser.com.