[p-christ]

Think about it in terms of how many days of knowledge each rep gets you.

The first rep gets you 1 extra day of knowledge. The next rep gets you 2 extra days. The next one gets you 5 extra days.

So each rep is getting you more and more knowledge even though the time required to execute the rep remains the same. This is exponential growth.

If you only have 1 card then for most days you won't have any reviews to do so it doesn't work. But if you add cards regularly then over the long-run every day you'll be getting more and more "extra days of knowledge" by doing the same amount of reviews each day.

[woojoo666]

My main point is that when people think about "learning", they think about learning new pieces of information. Reps only reinforce old pieces, they don't teach anything new. Retaining knowledge is part of learning, sure, and I saw your article about "learning is remembering" which was a good read. And I support your initiative, spaced repetition is an amazing tool. But I'd still say "learn exponentially" implies more than just retention. I'd personally love a system that lets me pick up exponentially more new knowledge per day, though I'm not sure if that's possible

[dekleinewolf]

It's not giving you more knowledge though. It's giving you the exact same amount of knowledge - you're just retaining it longer.

[p-christ]

If you've forgotten something then you don't have that knowledge anymore. So remembering things for longer means you are effectively gaining knowledge.

It's like someone giving you $10 and then trying to argue that they haven't actually given you $10 because just a few minutes ago you had a $10 bill in your pocket but you spent it on something else.