Covid-19 in an Age of Dogma and Triviality The Story of the Logistic Function
Exponential (Compound) Growth
An example of a “runaway” process is that of a human body when its temperature increases much above 42⁰C. Positive feedback takes over with chemical reactions making the body’s metabolism (chemical reactions) go faster, which in turn increases the body’s temperature further, which in turn increases the pace of these chemical reactions. A human’s cells work only within a narrow temperature range, and this rapid, spiraling increase in body temperature ends up killing cells and results in death.
Garrett Hardin, in “Living Within Limits,” explains that this “runaway” process is nothing other than the exponential “compound interest.” Hardin also illustrates how such compounding cannot continue forever. The chart on the left illustrates Hardin’s point. For example, the quantity of population or pollution or Covid-19 infections, if they keep growing in a compound interest manner, go off the chart, off the page, off our measuring scales, and is not sustainable.
