Idea Ripper // ArchiveCards: 1555 [Live] | Updated: 2026-10-14
Card #c77IR // #c77Synthesis

Possibilities do not merely add up; they multiply.

— In our words · Source: The Second Machine Age (Erik Brynjolfsson & Andrew McAfee)

[Use when]

When someone argues we've run out of big ideas.

[Why it matters]

Romer's recombinant engine, adopted as the book's theory of innovation: digital networks let ideas combine and recombine without limit, so the innovation pool compounds instead of depleting.

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