Innovation Richter Scale: How Much Do Technology and Ideas Change World History?
What really matters to humanity and what is just noise? How to rank the impact of a given invention, innovation or technology on humanity and the wider world.
How to Change the World: The History & Future of Innovation · Samuel Webster Harris
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Show Notes
Innovations have huge impacts on humanity. But which ideas matter the most?
Sam W. Harris builds out a system to rank world change and compare the impact of technology and inventions.
It's easy to tell that the invention of Writing itself is more important than Velcro. But...
- Is Netflix more important than Baseball?
- Has TikTok changed the world as much as the Longbow?
- Was Steve Jobs more impactful than Henry VIII?
History has opinions. It's time to sense check what matters to humanity and the future and what is just noise.
Headlines are beyond useless when everything seems so important these days:
- This war will BREAK the economy
- If you feed your toddler THIS, you don't deserve to be a parent
- A new iPhone update changes EVERYTHING...
So it's time for a scale to measure global impact.
The Innovation Richter Scale: A 1 to 10 rating system to rank anything you can think of; from a Gillete safety razor to the future of AI
NOTE - This episode expands on the Technological Richter Scale proposed by Nate Silver.
ABOUT
How to Change the World is an independent podcast documenting the entire history of innovation. One world-changing event at a time. In the process we are building out frameworks and mental models to think more coherently about global change and the future of technology.
Learn more and contact us - ChangeTheWorldPod.com
Written, edited, recorded, and produced by Sam Webster Harris. (incl the music)
Help from:
Designs - Francisca Correia (available to hire)
Mentorship - Jeremy Enns (available to hire)
References
Nate Silver - One The Edge (2024)
Nate's book is about risk analysis and the future of AI. The final chapter proposes a Technological Richter Scale, with a page on how to use it.
Zvi Mowshowitz - AI and the Technological Richter Scale (2025)
A good summary of Nate's ideas, on how the scale applies to AI. Also quotes Nate's page guide for each level and argues a few changes.
Chapters:
00:00 Innovation Richter Scale
01:47 Why create a Scale?
03:47 Earthquake Metaphor
06:16 Invention, Innovation, Technology
06:56 Ranking Magnitude not Morality
08:08 The Innovation Richter Scale - Level 1 - 10
08:11 Level 1 - Shower thoughts
08:29 Level 2 - Actioned Idea (In private)
08:49 Level 3 - Public ideas (Not popular)
10:17 Level 4 - Popular and commercial ideas
11:08 Level 5 - Defining Brand
12:38 Level 6 - Innovation of the year
15:59 Level 7 - Innovation of the Decade
18:19 Level 8 - Innovation of the Century
21:29 Level 9 - Innovation of the Era
23:53 Level 10 - Species Epoch
28:31 Part 2 - Using the scale
29:45 Weapons & Tools of Death - Brands, Categories and Concepts
33:58 Politics & Population Impact - Local, Continental and Global
38:00 Questions without answers
38:38 Sports & Religion - Emotional Impact and Purpose
41:01 Peter Thiel and Chess
41:47 Religion and Personal Beliefs in interpreting the scale
43:33 Roundup conclusions
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