"Quadratic". "Polynomial", even.
From an interview with Raph Koster (found via his blog), whom I otherwise respect:
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“In computer science there’s this term — an N² problem,” explains Koster. “This is where, as you add more things to a system, each new thing interacts with all the existing things so that problems scale exponentially rather than lineally. Human behavior is a kind of N² problem.”
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Exponentially?! For crying out loud, people. I've gotten used to people abusing the word everywhere else (though I still hate it), but here he's actually being technical, and otherwise well-spoken, and... *cry*... he still misuses it.
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Wow, this is "impressive."
Abusing the word in the sense of saying, for example, "exponentially faster" versus "a shitload faster" (basically, using 'exponentially' as a synonym for 'much') may or may not bother me depending on the context. If one is not trying to make any sort of formal claim, is just doing typically exaggeration that isn't meant to be taken seriously, or something along those lines, then it typically either doesn't bother me or only bothers me minimally. (And on or two occasions, I believe I have been guilty of this.) I get far more annoyed by the abuse of the term "quantum," whose abuse and even misuse is far more embeddeed in the English language. (I had the urge to write "exponentially more" just to be ironic/snide, but I'll stick to saying that the idea occurred to me and mentioning it parenthetically. :) )
Of course, writing N^2 and saying that's exponentially is exceptionally bad. In fact, that's a bloody crime.
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