Robots will over the next decade become as ubiquitous  as the smartphone
But you probably wont be able to see most of them, or even consider them to be a Robot

You may have heard the term 'Exponential Technologies (xT)?'

If you haven't it is technology the improves in terms of price-performance faster and faster. And exponential trend improvement curve starts out flat, but suddenly at the knee point takes off like a rocket.

Some say when a technology becomes digital it compounds in performance improvement. But that is not the whole story.

What drives exponential technology is 'Interconnections; or Connectivity'

Synergy comes about as the by-product of growing, interconnecting networks. Which of course we are experiencing today in every quarter of our lives. This is driven by the increase in the number of nodes, or here Robots in a network. As the number of nodes in a system increases in a linear fashion; so the increase in the number interconnection possibilities goes up in an exponential mode!

Here is an equation that begins to show the logic behind exponential growth in networks:

Pn=Na(Na -1)/2

Where Pn equals the potential total network and where Na is the number of nodes or agents. As the number of nodes accumulate linearly, the number of interconnection possibilities goes up geometrically. 

For example, take 4 nodes added in series: 1+1+1+1=4. You get a linear sum of 4.

Only, if you interconnect each node to each other, you begin to see a nonlinear synergy: 4a(4a-1)/2=6. As the number of nodes go up in linear series, a surprising number of interconnections possibilities emerge.

10a(10a-1)/2 = 45 connections possibilities.

100a(100a -1)/2 = 4,950

1000a(1000a-1)/2 = 299,500

10000a(10000a-1)/2 = 49,995,000

100000a(100000a-1)/2 = 4,999,950,000

Interconnect 1 million nodes, and: 1,000,000a(1,000,000a-1)/2 = ~4.99¹¹. One-million nodes would add up to over 499 billion interconnections.

The Laws of the Speed of Technological Innovation.

Moore’s Law, Nielson’s Law, Kurzweil’s Accelerating Returns Law, are enabled by the underlying mechanics of the space of innovation possibilities: Pn=Na(Na -1)/2.

To be brief, Moore’s Law; describes the constant that the number of potential transistors doubles every 18 months within the same geometric space until the scale begin to hit the weird world of the quantum space (10^-19 mm).

Nielsen’s Law says that the amounts of packaged bytes that can be sent down a line will double every 18 months.

Ray Kurzweil’s Law of Increasing Returns; says that technological evolution will accelerate by an exponent over time.

Harris’s Law of Increasing Diversity (me); says that technological and biological diversity expands in proportion to the number of potential interconnections. The richer the source of interconnections, the higher potential for innovation, the richer the potential for yet more nodes, and so on and so on.

Yet all of these laws are empowered by Pn=Na(Na -1)/2.

As Robots become interconnected via the Internet, they will form complex ecologies of Robots. As that happens, the number of Robots, along with price-performance, will grow and improve exponentially, whilst at the same time shrink toward the invisible.

Read at your leisure, this interesting article by By Matt Kwong: 'The Dawn of the Invisible Robot: Minuscule machines with big-data capabilities at the heart of the smart tech' revolution.' 

Matt is freelance journalist who writes about technology, science, and has written a fascinating and well-researched look at robotics in the Internet of Things:

'Bill Gates, the architect of the PC revolution, made a bold declaration not long ago forecasting another disruptive technology. “A Robot in Every Home,” his 2006 op-ed for Scientific American, described the kind of future in which bionic nurses care for the bedridden, wireless automatons do the yard work and service robots tidy up the household à la Rosie, the Jetsons’ humanoid maid. But in an age of WiFi and the ever-diminishing scale of microchips, personal automation doesn’t have to look like a robot with a feather duster.

It may not, in fact, look like anything at all.

“It could become invisible,” said John Horn, president of RACO Wireless, a company specialising in M2M (machine-to-machine) communications. “You’ll be able to embed this connectivity into just about anything in our lives. We’re seeing thousands of products communicating in real time, with modules so small they can fit on dog collars or wrist watches.”'

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