Ben Todd asks: where does AI sit on the technological Richter scale, 8 or higher?
ben_j_todd · x · 2026-10-09
Ben Todd (co-founder of Effective Ventures) is running a discussion based on the "Technological Richter Scale" concept from Nate Silver's On the Edge, popularized by Zvi on LessWrong. The logarithmic scale benchmarks: 10 = the Holocene (asteroid that killed the dinosaurs, aliens on Earth); 9 = agriculture, fire, printing press; 8 = electricity, vaccines, internet, cars. He asks readers where 2026-era AI belongs, with links to detailed level descriptions — a framing for comparing AI's historical significance with epoch-defining technologies.
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