bits and atoms

Peter Thiel argues innovation has overly focused on digital tech (“bits”) not physical (“atoms”). Natural analogies suggest value in gradual physical progress:

• Evolution’s incremental physical adaptations.
• Animals’ fine-tuned physical abilities.
• Ecosystems’ balanced chemical/material exchanges.

Now that “software has eaten the world,” much digital low-hanging fruit picked. But hard physical tech challenges remain.

Nature offers abundant innovation in physical forms/functions. Though digital moves fast, patient physical progress still vital. Must balance dazzling software innovations with improving concrete reality of “atoms.”