ABSTRACT
The glass ceiling of any calculation seems to be an unattainable limit. It is indeed physically unattainable for linear growth. However, in an extremely counterintuitive way, these orders of magnitude are in fact quickly reached by the astonishing exponential growth. The exponential growth of King Belkib’s debt is stunning. In the same way, it’s enough to fold a sheet of paper 42 times so that its thickness is the height of the distance between Earth-Moon, and 103 times so that it makes the width of our observable universe! Yet, the observable universe is very, very big. Biological trees have academic counterparts. The entry of a researcher into the scientific world is often equated with the defense of her doctoral thesis, which is supervised by one or more professors. If the exponential growth is staggering, so is its decline. By dividing a piece of sugar in half about sixty times, one end up having to divide the sugar molecules.
