Joe: Here’s a wild thought: The single most important year of the 21st century so far wasn't 2001 or 2008. It was 2007. And almost nobody noticed it was happening. Lewis: 2007? I'm thinking... the financial crisis was brewing, but what makes 2007 the main event? I remember the first iPhone came out, but was that it? Joe: That's the central premise of a fascinating, and honestly, pretty massive book we're diving into today: Thank You for Being Late by Thomas L. Friedman. Lewis: Right, the three-time Pulitzer Prize winner. He’s famous for his big-picture takes on globalization, like The World Is Flat. But the title itself is kind of quirky. It actually comes from his real-life habit of appreciating when people were late for meetings because it gave him a few minutes to just... think. Joe: Exactly. And that idea—the power of the pause in an age of acceleration—is the key to the whole book. He argues we're living through this incredible storm of change, and 2007 was the year the storm really hit. It's when we entered what he calls the "Age of Accelerations."

Lewis: Okay, "Age of Accelerations." That sounds big. What exactly started accelerating in 2007? Joe: Friedman calls it a "supernova." It wasn't just one thing; it was a whole cluster of technologies reaching a critical mass at the same time. Of course, you had Steve Jobs unveiling the iPhone, which wasn't just a phone but a powerful computer in your pocket. Lewis: The device that basically runs our lives now. Check. Joe: But in that same year, Facebook, which had been limited to students, opened up to everyone and started its global takeover. Twitter also went global. A little-known company called Airbnb was conceived by two broke designers in San Francisco. And crucially, a software called Hadoop was released, which made "big data" possible for the masses. It allowed companies to analyze massive, unstructured datasets for the first time. Lewis: Huh. I never thought of all those things happening at once. It’s like the digital world we live in today was born in that single year. Joe: And it goes deeper. The cost to sequence a human genome plummeted. Intel introduced a new kind of microchip that wasn't based on silicon, giving Moore's Law a new lease on life. All these things created a new, powerful, interconnected platform. Lewis: Okay, but that feels a little too perfect. Is he just cherry-picking, or was there a genuine technological shift that made all this possible at once? Some critics do say Friedman can sometimes weave a narrative that's a bit too neat. Joe: That's a fair challenge, and he addresses it. The underlying engine for all of this is Moore's Law—the observation that the number of transistors on a microchip doubles about every two years. To make this real, he shares an incredible analogy from Intel. If the 1971 Volkswagen Beetle had improved at the same rate as microchips, today that car would go 300,000 miles per hour. Lewis: Whoa. Joe: It would get two million miles per gallon of gas. And it would cost four cents. Lewis: Okay, that's insane. That's a powerful image. So it's not just one thing, but this quiet, invisible explosion in computing power that fueled everything else. It's the engine of the hurricane. Joe: Precisely. And Friedman says this technological acceleration is just one of three massive forces, or "winds," in the storm. The second is the Market—he means globalization, the flow of trade, information, and ideas, which is also accelerating. And the third is Mother Nature—climate change, population growth, and biodiversity loss are all hitting hockey-stick curves of their own. All three are accelerating, all at the same time.

Lewis: That explains why everything feels so fast and chaotic. It’s not just in our heads. But it also feels like we, as people and as a society, just can't keep up. It's overwhelming. Joe: You've just hit on the central tension of the book. Friedman introduces this incredible concept from Astro Teller, the head of Google's X lab—their "moonshot factory." Teller drew a simple graph that explains that feeling perfectly. Lewis: I'm listening. Joe: He drew two lines. The first is for technological change, and it's an exponential curve, shooting almost straight up. The second line is for human adaptability—how fast we, our schools, our governments can adapt. And that line is just a slow, steady, linear incline. Lewis: And I'm guessing those lines have crossed. Joe: They crossed right around... 2007. Friedman argues we are now living in the gap between those two lines. Technology is accelerating away from our ability to absorb it. He calls this "dislocation," and it's the source of so much of our modern anxiety. Lewis: That's it! That's the feeling. It's like we've been given a Formula 1 car but we only have a learner's permit. And some critics do point out that Friedman can be overly optimistic. Does he actually grapple with the anxiety this gap creates? Because it feels less like an opportunity and more like a source of constant stress. Joe: He does, and he uses a great example: Uber and self-driving cars. Think about it. Cities and regulators are still struggling to figure out the rules for Uber and ride-sharing. They're years behind. But now, self-driving cars are coming, and they're going to make all those brand-new Uber regulations totally obsolete in a flash. Lewis: Right. Our social systems—education, law, politics—are all built for that slow, linear curve. They're designed for a world that no longer exists. So the political chaos, the feeling of being left behind... it's not just a feeling, it's a structural gap. We're literally not built for this speed. Joe: Exactly. Our patent system, our education system that front-loads learning in the first 20 years of life, our political processes—they were all designed for a much more static world. They're all lagging behind the technology curve.

Lewis: So if we can't slow down the technology, what's the answer? This is where the "optimist's guide" part of the title comes in, I assume. Joe: It is. And this is where the book gets really personal and, I think, profound. Friedman says we can't slow down the hurricane, so we have to get better at building an "eye"—a source of stability that moves with the storm. Lewis: And how do we do that? Meditate while the world burns? Joe: Not exactly. For Friedman, the 'eye' of the hurricane is a healthy community. And to understand this, he goes on this very personal journey back to his hometown, St. Louis Park, Minnesota. It's this suburb of Minneapolis that, fascinatingly, also produced the Coen brothers and Senator Al Franken. He tries to figure out what was in the water there. Lewis: I can already hear the critics who say he gets too nostalgic about his "Minnesota nice" upbringing. Can a small town's values really be the answer to global-scale problems like AI and climate change? Joe: He uses it as a model for what he calls the "topsoil of trust." But the idea really comes to life in a story that actually inspired the whole book. It's about a man named Ayele Bojia. Lewis: Okay, tell me. Joe: Friedman is in a parking garage in Bethesda, Maryland, and the parking attendant, Bojia, recognizes him. Bojia, an Ethiopian immigrant, tells Friedman that he's also a writer—he runs a political blog about Ethiopia. Friedman is intrigued, checks it out, and is blown away. This parking attendant is a serious, passionate, global political commentator. Lewis: That's amazing. Joe: They meet for coffee, and Bojia says something that hits Friedman hard. He says, "I am not trying to write for the writing sake... I have a cause to promote." He was a political exile fighting for democracy in his homeland. And Friedman realizes this is a perfect microcosm of the age of accelerations. A moment of pause—waiting in a parking garage—leads to a human connection. That connection reveals the power of technology—a parking attendant can have a global voice—and the importance of having a cause, an anchor, to ground you in all this chaos. Lewis: I like that. It brings it down from these huge, abstract forces to a human level. It's not about a grand government plan, but about the 'topsoil of trust' in a community, and the meaning you find in your own 'cause'.

Joe: Exactly. And that's Friedman's ultimate answer. The 'eye of the storm' isn't a shield to hide from the world. It’s a dynamic source of stability. It’s the trust and connection in a community that gives you the confidence to adapt, to learn, to take risks, and even to fail, without completely falling apart. Lewis: So in an age of dizzying technological change, our most powerful tool is still... a trusting human community. It’s about being anchored so you have the freedom to sail. That’s a surprisingly profound and hopeful idea. Joe: It really is. He argues that national governments are too big and slow to keep up. The real innovation has to come from the bottom up, from healthy communities that can be agile and resilient. It’s about building that local 'eye' so you can handle the global storm. Lewis: It's a powerful reframe. The solution to going too fast isn't to slow down, but to get more grounded. Joe: And it leaves us with a powerful question to reflect on, which is really the heart of the book's title. In this hurricane of change, what is your anchor? What is your 'eye'? Lewis: A great question for our listeners to ponder. We'd love to hear your thoughts on what anchors you. Find us on our socials and join the conversation. Joe: This is Aibrary, signing off.