A collection of 371 posts
Worries about AI doom rarely take Darwinian evolution seriously. A new paper argues we should—but we are still further from that scenario than its authors suggest.
Nathan Schachtman’s indispensable new paper explains how the International Agency for Research on Cancer has misled the public with its classifications of carcinogens.
The transatlantic battle over social media and censorship.
Despite the dangers, we must seize the gifts bequeathed by world-altering technologies, since these amount to life in unprecedented abundance.
Tragicomic scenes from reparations-based medicine.
Earth Day once helped focus public attention on real environmental problems. Today it is a festival of alarmism, misanthropy, technophobia, and moral theatrics.
What happens when human manipulation arrives at its Claude Mythos moment?
The Wikipedia knowledge monopoly is not ready for the Grokipedia threat.
Now that glyphosate has become a national-security issue, it’s time to revisit the source of misinformation about this controversial herbicide.
Most of today’s “artificial intelligence” is better described as artificial autocomplete than artificial mind.
The central risk of AI is not that machines will become malevolent. It is that human incentive structures, amplified by scalable technology, outrun our ability to govern them.
The contributions of Robert Trivers belong in the special category of ideas that are obvious once they are explained, yet eluded great minds for ages; simple enough to be stated in a few words, yet with implications that have busied scientists for decades.
‘Avatar: Fire and Ash’ is a Rousseau-esque oikophobic fantasy of evil humans and noble savage aliens.
The sad and curious case of the chronic fatigue syndrome.
Matt Shumer’s viral essay about AI is part of a long history of fear produced by technological change.