Explain how exchange networks can act as drivers of innovation.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Humans exchange goods and ideas through exchangenetworks. It is a reasonable assumption that more informationwill be exchanged and stored in a community of 1 million people than in a community of 100 people. Mathematically,this can be expressed by saying that, as the numberof “nodes” (i.e., people) increases within a network, thenumber of possible links between the nodes (or exchangesbetween people) increases much faster. [Forthe mathematically inclined, if the number of nodes in a networkis n, then the number of links (l) = n * (n 2 1)/2.] So,as a general rule, peopleshould expect rates of innovation (thegeneration of new ideas, whether religious, artistic, ethical,or technological) to be much faster in large than in smallcommunities. That explains why, at large scales, populationgrowth itself tends to encourage Collective Learning.

We also expect that greater diversity in the communitiesexchanging information should increase the likelihoodof new ideas being generated within an exchange network.If everyone is a forager, people will probably talk mostlyabout what they already know. But if foragers meet agriculturalists,both sides may learn something entirely new. SoCollective Learning is expected to work more powerfully inlarge and complex societies with diverse internal structuresand extensive connections between regions with differentresources, technologies, and cultures.

Cities (particularly trading cities) offer environments inwhich people from very different backgrounds can meetand exchange ideas and information as well as merchandise.Where many cities are connected over large areas,the possibilities for such exchanges are magnified. So,as a rule of thumb, peopleshould expect more innovation incomplex societies where goods, people, and ideas traveland are exchanged over large areas. In Afro-Eurasia, tradingcity-states often pooled information from across vastregions through networks such as the Silk Roads, which isone reason why, 1,000 years ago Central Asian cities suchas Bukhara and Samarkand were major centers of worldscience and technology.