Browsed by
Category: Technology

Nick Land’s philosophy of accelerationism and the no-human future

Nick Land’s philosophy of accelerationism and the no-human future

Vincent Lê writes: It surfaces in terrorism reports and tech presentations, in the manifestos of mass shooters and the public declarations of billionaires. What is ‘accelerationism’? Over the past decade, especially the past few years, this term has migrated from the dark corners of the internet into mainstream politics and culture – and in the process has split into two dominant forms that could not be more contradictory. One group of accelerationists dreams of burning down the world and building…

Read More Read More

Democrats should be on the front lines of the data center resistance

Democrats should be on the front lines of the data center resistance

Tressie McMillan Cottom writes: Americans hate data centers. They really, really hate them. A Gallup poll from May found that 71 percent of Americans would oppose a data center being built in their area. In rural communities in Utah and North Carolina, regular people are organizing to stop data center construction, speaking out at public hearings and pressuring politicians for bans. They are passionate enough to attend political education sessions about water rights, land use and thermodynamics. Cities like Tulsa,…

Read More Read More

After SpaceX’s huge IPO, Americans’ financial future will be bound to AI

After SpaceX’s huge IPO, Americans’ financial future will be bound to AI

Eduardo Porter writes: Americans are growing worried about what artificial intelligence portends for their futures. Eight in 10 Americans report concern over AI, compared with a third who report being excited, according to a recent Quinnipiac poll. More than half think it will do more harm than good in their daily lives. Seven out of 10 think it will reduce the number of available jobs. Skeptical though they may be, they are about to get more AI rammed down their…

Read More Read More

The Silicon Valley elites who believe their political power should match their financial might

The Silicon Valley elites who believe their political power should match their financial might

The American Prospect reports: According to Zack Rosen, founder of California YIMBY and the Abundance Network, the problem with politics is Americans being too involved. Bemoaning the rise of small-dollar political donations in fundraising documents leaked to the Prospect, Rosen is blunt: “Small dollar internet fundraising makes politics dumber.” Rosen misses what he considers to be a bygone era of elite dominance. Lamenting the current state of democratized influence, Rosen says “the old gatekeepers were political professionals who could count…

Read More Read More

German court rules that Google is directly liable for false claims in its AI-generated search overviews

German court rules that Google is directly liable for false claims in its AI-generated search overviews

The Decoder reports: A German court has ruled that Google is directly liable for what its AI search overviews say. Previous case law shielding search engine operators from liability doesn’t apply to AI overviews. The Regional Court of Munich hit Google with a temporary injunction barring the company from spreading false claims about two Munich-based publishers through its AI-generated search overviews (case no. 26 O 869/26). The court classified Google as a direct infringer because the “AI overview” is its…

Read More Read More

Ukraine’s technological advances could mark a change in the nature of warfare

Ukraine’s technological advances could mark a change in the nature of warfare

Anne Applebaum writes: In a field outside of Kyiv last weekend, a van was parked discreetly behind some trees. Inside the van there were no passenger seats, just a long desk, two office chairs, two laptops, extra screens. Outside appearances to the contrary, this was a mobile drone-interceptor base, one of hundreds of similar vehicles now scattered around Ukraine. It’s also part of something much bigger: a set of technological advances that have changed the war with Russia, and maybe…

Read More Read More

Hezbollah’s fiber-optic drones expose weakness in Israeli defenses

Hezbollah’s fiber-optic drones expose weakness in Israeli defenses

The New York Times reports: An explosive drone snaked between the hills of southern Lebanon before striking an Israeli armored personnel carrier. Two days later, another slammed into a tank. Three days after that, a third pounded into a missile-defense system. Each day, multiple drones attack Israeli forces, the Israeli military has said, and with lethal effect. In the past week alone, they have killed three soldiers. The relentless drone attacks by Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group, have exposed…

Read More Read More

AI Frankenstein: Anthropic urges global pause in AI development, flags ‘self-improvement’ risk

AI Frankenstein: Anthropic urges global pause in AI development, flags ‘self-improvement’ risk

The Wall Street Journal reports: Anthropic is calling for top artificial intelligence labs to weigh slowing the pace of development, suggesting that AI systems are advancing so rapidly that they may soon be able to improve themselves without human intervention in ways that could pose significant societal risks. The ability to slow global AI development would “likely be a good thing,” the company said Thursday in a blog post that disclosed internal data documenting how quickly its most advanced models…

Read More Read More

The household battery revolution that could change energy bills … and the world

The household battery revolution that could change energy bills … and the world

The Guardian reports: The timing was rich with symbolism. As intense heatwaves pummelled Europe and Asia, and oil markets around the world leapt and sputtered, the two big chimneys of one of Australia’s largest power stations were being demolished. Meanwhile, the Australian energy minister was holding a media conference to hail a fall of up to 10% in the benchmark electricity price in parts of the country. Quietly, and with surprisingly little fanfare from the rest of the world, Australia…

Read More Read More

ICE may use massive troves of data collected by advertisers for surveilling everyone in America

ICE may use massive troves of data collected by advertisers for surveilling everyone in America

Politico reports: The trillion-dollar industry that amasses and shares troves of Americans’ information is confronting a new ethical quandary — the Trump administration’s interest in wielding this data to potentially further its sweeping immigration agenda. Immigration and Customs Enforcement published a request for information in January seeking input on how “commercial Big Data and Ad Tech providers can directly support investigations,” a request that came as the administration was pursuing efforts to expand the United States’ immigration enforcement capabilities. It…

Read More Read More

The AI boom is heading toward a massive financial crash

The AI boom is heading toward a massive financial crash

Joachim Klement writes: I calculate that over the past four quarters, 93 per cent of US GDP growth was explained by tech investments. Even at the peak of the technology, media and telecom bubble [which burst in 2000], it barely reached 60 per cent. The developers of large language models such as OpenAI and Anthropic are preparing for blockbuster initial public offerings later this year to benefit from investor optimism about their growth. Meanwhile, the hyperscalers Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta…

Read More Read More

AI costs are hitting corporate America

AI costs are hitting corporate America

Axios reports: Corporate leaders are starting to question whether soaring AI spending is delivering meaningful returns. Why it matters: Companies that rushed to embrace AI are now confronting ballooning IT costs, uncertain productivity gains and growing employee skepticism. Driving the news: Microsoft canceled most of its Claude Code licenses, in part over costs, according to The Verge, and Uber’s COO said AI costs are getting “harder to justify.” An AI consultant tells Axios one of their clients recently spent half a billion dollars in a single…

Read More Read More

Neuroscience needs to stop treating the brain as if it is a computer

Neuroscience needs to stop treating the brain as if it is a computer

Àlex Gómez-Marín writes: What is a brain? The question might seem obvious, but it is not trivial. Neuroscience has progressed in the past century, with the development of sophisticated techniques to measure and manipulate brain cells, neural circuits and even animal behaviours. Yet how the brain actually works still eludes us. In The Brain, In Theory, neuroscientist Romain Brette deconstructs the predominant model of the brain, which treats the organ like a computer. He concedes that engineering metaphors can be…

Read More Read More

Uber’s COO says it’s getting harder to justify the money spent on AI tokenmaxxing

Uber’s COO says it’s getting harder to justify the money spent on AI tokenmaxxing

Business Insider reports: A top Uber exec said AI is not giving the company bang for its buck. In a Rapid Response interview released on Saturday, Uber’s operations chief, Andrew Macdonald, said it was becoming harder to justify AI costs within the company. He said that Uber CTO Praveen Neppalli Naga went viral after telling The Information in an April interview that Uber had already blown through its Claude Code budget for 2026. The comment led to what he described…

Read More Read More

Pope Leo just schooled the tech bros on Tolkien

Pope Leo just schooled the tech bros on Tolkien

Miles Klee writes: Nobody was surprised that Pope Leo XIV cited well-known saints and previous pontiffs in his first encyclical, or papal letter of spiritual guidance, “Magnifica humanitas,” released Monday. But the name that immediately jumped out to many readers is one synonymous with high fantasy literature: J.R.R. Tolkien, the Catholic author of The Lord of the Rings. Leo’s letter is concerned with “safeguarding the human person in the time of artificial intelligence,” a major theme of his first year…

Read More Read More

Pope Leo denounces ‘culture of power’ and new forms of ‘colonialism’ driving rise of AI

Pope Leo denounces ‘culture of power’ and new forms of ‘colonialism’ driving rise of AI

Pope Leo writes: Even today, colonialism assumes new forms. It no longer dominates only bodies, but appropriates data, transforming personal lives into exploitable information. Entire regions, especially those marked by structural fragility and limited geopolitical relevance, are currently subjected to a new mindset of extraction: that of health data, epidemiological profiles, genetic maps and demographic information. These have become the new “rare earths” of power: vital data which, once aggregated and analyzed, can be used to train predictive models, guide…

Read More Read More