CONCEPT
Network Topology Determines Fate
West's load-bearing thesis: the shape of the distribution network — not the technology, talent, or strategy — determines whether a system grows sublinearly toward death or superlinearly toward open-ended transformation.
The most consequential claim in West's framework is that the scaling exponent — which determines a system's trajectory — is set by the topology of the distribution network through which resources flow. Fractal-hierarchical networks with invariant terminal units produce sublinear scaling, biological-style mortality, and sigmoid growth curves. Open, dense, multi-pathway networks with growing terminal units produce superlinear scaling, city-like persistence, and open-ended growth. The shape of the network is the destiny of the system. This matters for AI because it identifies which organizations will thrive and which will die: not those with the best technology, the smartest employees, or the boldest strategy, but those whose network topology allows them to translate AI capability into genuine structural transformation rather than mere throughput acceleration.
In The You On AI Field Guide
The thesis is empirically grounded in three decades of research across biological and social systems. Every organism West has studied exhibits sublinear scaling, and every organism dies —