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Autorentext

Byrne Hobart is an investor, consultant, and writer. He is the author of The Diff, a daily newsletter covering inflection points in finance and technology.

Tobias Huber is a writer and angel investor. He has a background in philosophy and holds a doctor of science degree from ETH Zurich.

Klappentext

A timely investigation of the causes of technological and scientific stagnation, and a radical blueprint for accelerating innovation.




From the Moon landing to the dawning of the atomic age, the decades prior to the 1970s were characterized by the routine invention of transformative technologies at breakneck speed. By comparison, ours is an age of stagnation. Median wage growth has slowed, inequality and income concentration are on the rise, and scientific research has become increasingly expensive and incremental.




Why are we unable to replicate the rate of progress of past decades? What can we do to reinvigorate innovation?




In Boom, Byrne Hobart and Tobias Huber take an inductive approach to the problem. In a series of case studies tracking some of the most significant breakthroughs of the past 100 years—from the Manhattan Project and the Apollo program to fracking and Bitcoin—they reverse-engineer how transformative progress arises from small groups with a unified vision, vast funding, and surprisingly poor accountability. They conclude that financial bubbles, while often maligned as destructive and destabilizing forces, have in fact been the engine of past breakthroughs and will drive future advances. In other words: Bubbles aren’t all bad.





Integrating insights from economics, philosophy, and history, Boom identifies the root causes of the Great Stagnation and provides a blueprint for accelerating innovation. By decreasing collective risk aversion, overfunding experimental processes, and organizing high-agency individuals around a transcendent mission, bubbles are the key to realizing a future that is radically different from the present. Boom offers a definite and optimistic vision of our future—and a path to unleash a new era of global prosperity.

Inhalt

Introduction: Doom and Boom



Part I: Stagnation 



Chapter 1: The Ideology of Stasis



Chapter 2: From Bust to Boom: Bubbles as Innovation Accelerators





Part II: Acceleration 



Chapter 3: The Manhattan Project 



Chapter 4: The Apollo Program



Chapter 5: Moore’s law



Chapter 6: The Golden Age of Corporate R & D


 

Chapter 7: Fracking



Chapter 8: Bitcoin





Part III: Escape



Chapter 9: Unleashing Prometheus? Technology as Salvation





Acknowledgments



About the Authors



Bibliography



Index