It happens anywhere you have a one group A of things that are necessarily distinct (e.g. software tools) and another group B that is also necessarily distinct (e.g. buried wires and satellites) and people want to be able to use anything from category A with anything from category B.
We could create a mechanism for every single A*B combination, but instead there's gonna be pressure to minimize the effort, and that means a smaller set of intermediate stuff in the middle.
Another example might be that you have a bunch of people with different skills, and a bunch of people with different goods, and then the convergence-point involves money, rather than having a lot of distinct techniques like "how to use carpentry to acquire chickens."
It happens anywhere you have a one group A of things that are necessarily distinct (e.g. software tools) and another group B that is also necessarily distinct (e.g. buried wires and satellites) and people want to be able to use anything from category A with anything from category B.
We could create a mechanism for every single A*B combination, but instead there's gonna be pressure to minimize the effort, and that means a smaller set of intermediate stuff in the middle.
Another example might be that you have a bunch of people with different skills, and a bunch of people with different goods, and then the convergence-point involves money, rather than having a lot of distinct techniques like "how to use carpentry to acquire chickens."