For individuals, log-transforms make sense on their own merits as giving a better estimate of the utility of that money, but does that logic really apply to a whole country?
The argument would be that additional intelligence multiplies the per-capita wealth-producing apparatus that exists, rather than adding to it (or, in the smart fraction model, not doing anything once you clear a threshold).
Why can't the GDP be 0 or negative?
There's no restriction that b be positive, and so those are both options. I wouldn't expect it to be negative because pre-industrial societies managed to survive, but that presumes that aid spending by the developed world is not subtracted from the GDP measurement of those countries. Once you take aid into account, then it does seem reasonable that places could become money pits.
The argument would be that additional intelligence multiplies the per-capita wealth-producing apparatus that exists, rather than adding to it (or, in the smart fraction model, not doing anything once you clear a threshold).
That's the intuitive justification for an exponential model (each additional increment of intelligence adds a percentage of the previous GDP), but I don't see how this justifies looking at log transforms.
...There's no restriction that b be positive, and so those are both options. I wouldn't expect it to be negative because pre-industri
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