[tristanm]

I think that bursts of technological progress follows more from the model of individualized intelligence, whereas continuous progress follows from the distributed, networked model of intelligence.

A promoter of the distributed model of intelligence might argue that Einstein was only able to produce the general theory of relativity because of the knowledge already contained within society, such as the mathematics and physics that had already been built up to that time. All the stuff from Euclid to Newton to Gauss to Poincare and Minkowski that Einstein's work relied upon.

Does that imply that Einstein wasn't really smart? If you narrow your focus to just the innovation Einstein made, where did that come from? Did it come from the "hivemind" or was Einstein himself doing something special that allowed him to develop the insight?

More individualized intelligence would predict that we would see smaller intervals between bursts as society increases in size and connectedness (more chances for Einsteins to appear, more likelihood that they can work together). But if intelligence is somehow an emergent process from the network of all humans itself, then as society grows we shouldn't see many bursts at all, just a fairly continuous increase in knowledge as little bits and pieces get absorbed and distributed.

[icebraining]

I think you're making too many assumptions about the inner workings of "the brain".

If we look at actual brains - including Einstein's - are they not bursty? Don't people have periods of greater intellectual output with lulls in between? Seems to match pretty well.