Comment on The train that never came; how maglev technology was derailed
ook@discuss.tchncs.de 5 days agoYeah, how is it so unbelievable that when you go twice the speed you are twice as fast but when you go a third faster in speed you only go a third fast in time. Diminishing returns is something else, like you would go a third faster in speed but arrive only a quarter faster.
Wrufieotnak@feddit.org 4 days ago
No, the other commentator is right.
What they said is that you add 100 km/h, and you gain 2h when you add it to a slow train with 100 km/h, but if you add 100 km/h to a fast train with 400 km/h, you only gain a few minutes.
That is called diminishing returns.
t3rmit3@beehaw.org 4 days ago
That’s not diminishing returns in terms of time and speed, which is CanadaPlus’ point. 100km/h faster is 100km/h faster, not 100% each time. It would be diminishing returns if doubling the speed each time didn’t halve the travel time, but “diminishing input = diminishing output”, or 100% -> 50% -> 25%, etc, is not diminishing returns, that’s linear.
An actual example of diminishing returns would be the cost to speed ratio, where doubling the budget each time will not result in a doubled speed.