Editing 1007: Sustainable
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This is a simple scatterplot showing how often the word "sustainable" has been used in English texts in the US each year. As can be seen, the y-axis is given a logarithmic scale, meaning that the apparently linear trend is actually exponential. [[Randall]] [[605: Extrapolating|humorously attempts to extend the graph]] to the point the frequency exceeds 100% about a century from now, which is obviously impossible (hence the quip that the word's usage is itself "unsustainable"). | This is a simple scatterplot showing how often the word "sustainable" has been used in English texts in the US each year. As can be seen, the y-axis is given a logarithmic scale, meaning that the apparently linear trend is actually exponential. [[Randall]] [[605: Extrapolating|humorously attempts to extend the graph]] to the point the frequency exceeds 100% about a century from now, which is obviously impossible (hence the quip that the word's usage is itself "unsustainable"). | ||
| β | The use of the word "sustainable" has been increasing as people become more aware of the steadily increasing use of nonrenewable resources and need to ensure that the Earth's resources do not become totally exhausted, through sustainable development. {{w|Sustainable development}} refers to the practice of using resources that simultaneously aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present time, but also for generations to come. | + | The use of the word "sustainable" has been increasing in use as people become more aware of the steadily increasing use of nonrenewable resources and need to ensure that the Earth's resources do not become totally exhausted, through sustainable development. {{w|Sustainable development}} refers to the practice of using resources that simultaneously aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present time, but also for generations to come. |
More realistically, the actual use of "sustainable" is likely to be logistic rather than exponential growth. A logistic curve (not to be confused with "logarithmic") describes a trend that at first appears to behave exponentially, but then tapers off and reaches a cap, as it is actually a curve leading up to an arbitrary mid-point 'origin' part way through the track and then levels back off again (in a doubly-reflected manner, typically) to reach a new plateau. This is demonstrated by the [https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=sustainable&year_start=1940&year_end=2014&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Csustainable%3B%2Cc0 Google ngrams graph of word usage for "sustainable"] ([https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=sustainable&year_start=1940&year_end=2019&corpus=en-2019&smoothing=3 updated link]). Logistic growth is commonly used to model data that naturally increases exponentially but has a limiting factor, which in this case is the meaningfulness of text consisting entirely or mostly of a single word. Until we actually reach the logistic midpoint (''possibly'' at 50% usage, but very much depending upon other confounding factors and likely somewhat less in this actual case) the data might indeed look like they fit a log-plotted exponential curve. | More realistically, the actual use of "sustainable" is likely to be logistic rather than exponential growth. A logistic curve (not to be confused with "logarithmic") describes a trend that at first appears to behave exponentially, but then tapers off and reaches a cap, as it is actually a curve leading up to an arbitrary mid-point 'origin' part way through the track and then levels back off again (in a doubly-reflected manner, typically) to reach a new plateau. This is demonstrated by the [https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=sustainable&year_start=1940&year_end=2014&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Csustainable%3B%2Cc0 Google ngrams graph of word usage for "sustainable"] ([https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=sustainable&year_start=1940&year_end=2019&corpus=en-2019&smoothing=3 updated link]). Logistic growth is commonly used to model data that naturally increases exponentially but has a limiting factor, which in this case is the meaningfulness of text consisting entirely or mostly of a single word. Until we actually reach the logistic midpoint (''possibly'' at 50% usage, but very much depending upon other confounding factors and likely somewhat less in this actual case) the data might indeed look like they fit a log-plotted exponential curve. | ||
