PREDICTIONS – 10 Years Later - Santa Fe Institute

3. INANIMATE PRODUCTION LIKE ANIMATE REPRODUCTION
fill up their niche in society. Confirmation of this hypothesis, however,
can only come from the real data.
The data on cars registered in the US since 1930 show that the annual
number grows along an S-curve identical to that of fly populations mentioned
earlier (Appendix C, Figure 3.1). There are two differences. One
is the time scale; instead of reaching the ceiling in a matter of weeks, it
takes decades. The other is that having a much larger sample of cars than
flies, the statistical fluctuations are smaller and the agreement between
the data points and the curve is even more striking for cars than for flies.
It is remarkable that world-shaking events like the two oil shocks—
one in 1974 and another in 1981—left no mark on the smooth pattern of
the growing number of cars, vehicles so intimately linked to the availability
of oil and the general state of the economy. Many indicators,
including oil prices, flared up and subsided during this time period. Car
production echoed the economic shocks, but not the number of cars on
the streets. Even World War II made only a minor dent in the evolution
of the growth pattern. During difficult times people deferred buying new
cars to save money in the short term. They simply held on to their old
cars longer. The number of cars in use kept growing in the normal pattern.
This number is dictated by a fundamental social need and is not
affected by the economic and political climate. In this light, events that
produce big headlines may shake the world, but they do not significantly
influence the pattern of growth of the number of cars on the street.
It should be noted that the S-curve in Appendix C Figure 3.1 refers to
the major part of car diffusion in the U.S. following World War II. The
curve approaches completion in the 1990s. The early diffusion of cars in
America around the beginning of the twentieth century—coinciding with
the rapid substitution of cars for horses that we will examine in detail in
Chapter Six—would involve a smaller S-curve not shown in the figure.
Ten Years Later
It cannot be excluded that the U.S. car population undergoes
a third (most certainly small) S-curve in the future. It
would mean that special conditions open up a microniche, or a
niche-within-a-niche, permitting further growth in the number
of cars. Something like this happened with the Italian car
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