Take-off may need 15% productivity gain per capability point, Anthropic survey suggests 9%

ben_j_todd · x · 2026-09-29

A discussion of quantified AI take-off thresholds, drawing on the Elasticity Institute paper: reaching r = 1 (self-accelerating R&D) requires roughly 15% more research productivity per point of extra capability (ECI). Ramez's reading of recent Anthropic surveys puts the current figure at about 9%, leaving a gap to the take-off threshold. Ben Todd also questions whether this elasticity-based approach is more grounded than past work measuring software R&D inputs vs outputs directly.

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