The problem with exponential growth is not that it happens so fast, it is that it starts off so slow. When people think of exponential growth they think of a curve shooting off to infinity. If that was all it did, humans might be psychologically better able to stop it. Is this tiny but persistent uptick, this small — apparently inconsequential — rise, the beginnings of an untroubling ripple? Or is it the same phenomenon that we saw in September last year, when Boris Johnson was being urged not to worry: the start of a crashing tsunami?

Source: The Times May 31, 2021 11:04 UTC