There's something deeply obscene and broken about the fact that Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth are bombing elementary schools in an illegal war of aggression, and there's still a sense among the opposition that it has to be explained in terms of gas prices in order to get American voters to care.
What this does to military A.I. capabilities is beyond the brief of this newsletter, except to say that I think it’s “bad” for Grok, the pedophile mechahitler A.I., to be involved with weapons in really any way. What I am interested in, here, is what this reveals about the state of politics in Silicon Valley. In a sentence, I think what’s happening is (1) basic (i.e. normal) cutthroat competition between rival firms for government contracts, which is both driving and being driven by (2) an open and ongoing political-ideological dispute between two factions of Silicon Valley capital, which is in turn informing and being informed by (3) an almost religious disagreement about the nature of the god being built on the computer.
To start, it seems quite obvious that the Tech Right--a bloc of right-wing, Trump-aligned executives, investors, podcasters, Twitter personalities, firms, and companies, among them Palantir’s Joe Lonsdale and Alex Karp, Anduril’s Palmer Luckey, and, of course, xAI’s Elon Musk--with its extensive links to the administration, has been exerting behind-the-scenes pressure on Hegseth and the Pentagon to sever ties with or otherwise punish Anthropic. It was a Palantir executive, after all, who snitched on Anthropic to the D.o.D., and Hegseth’s speech in January about “objectively truthful AI capabilities” was a close echo of Musk’s ramblings about his “maximally truth-seeking” model Grok. The Tech Right’s contempt for Anthropic is first and foremost financial in nature. Musk, obviously, would like xAI to be first in line for any government contracts. (Indeed, Hegseth announced a deal with xAI this week to use Grok under the Pentagon’s preferred “all lawful use” terms.) And I suspect Palantir, Anthropic client though it may be, has the same existential fear of Claude as McKinsey or Salesforce or any other consultancy or software-as-a-service provider. If Anthropic is aggressively courting the D.o.D. to contract directly, and if Claude is as good as every thinks, what does Palantir’s future as a data-analytics-in-camo platform actually look like?
This doesn’t necessarily separate him from any other Silicon Valley liberal. But I think it’s good to attend to the valence of his liberalism. Amodei, like most of the Anthropic executives and many people in the A.I. in general, has long been associated with the worlds of Bay Area Rationalism and Effective Altruism--wonkily utilitarian philosophical and philanthropic practices focused on self-described rationalist inquiry and self-improvement. Bay Area Rationalism is a loose and diverse movement, containing a host of political perspectives, but it’s always had a particular concern with moral philosophy as it relates to the expected development of artificial superintelligence. To be a Rationalist liberal democrat (small-L small-D), e.g., might mean orienting your liberal democrat-ness toward its practical applications around the eschatological scenario of hard-takeoff A.G.I.
I don’t mean to suggest that Amodei’s commitments to liberal democracy are inauthentic. More that, as far he is concerned the stakes of this commitment go well beyond his own moral or ethical culpability. The decisions he makes now, and his consistent practice to his espoused beliefs, could mean the difference between a benevolent computer god and a wrathful one. X avatar for @hlntnr Helen Toner @hlntnr One thing the Pentagon is very likely underestimating: how much Anthropic cares about what *future Claudes* will make of this situation. Because of how Claude is trained, what principles/values/priorities the company demonstrate here could shape its "character" for a long time. Andrew Curran @AndrewCurran_ Update on the meeting; according to Axios Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave Dario Amodei until Friday night to give the military unfettered access to Claude or face the consequences, which may even include invoking the Defense Production Act to force the training of a WarClaude 4:26 PM · Feb 25, 2026 · 227K Views 41 Replies · 122 Reposts · 1.96K Likes And this has placed him, and Anthropic, on a collision course with the Tech Right. Musk, too, believes he is bringing superintelligence into existence at xAI. But for him the urgenct imp
one way of seeing anthropic vs. the pentagon is as a fissure between the two silicon valley tribes most enthusiastic about ai: "rationalists" and "accelerationists"
maxread.substack.com/p/what-anthr...
This map shows widely dispersed dots representing the guesses of US survey respondents about the location of Iran on a world map. 23% placed a dot in the correct area.
Where is Iran?
Each dot represents an American's guess.
pro.morningconsult.com/articles/can... 🌐
The more I think about the DC press slagging AOC for a lack of FP depth while Donald Trump is President, twice, is making me angry enough to explode. The fuck is wrong with the journalists that they're like this
AI Slop is a hot topic, but what do AI coders and developers feel about democracy and their role in creating products that impact it?
Out now and Open Access in ICS: "A new digital divide? Coder worldviews, the ‘Slop economy,’ and democracy in the age of AI"
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
A survey of Silicon Valley developers reveals that 74% would implement features restricting human rights if pressured, fueling a "slop economy" of low-quality AI content. The study argues corporate demands override ethics, creating a gap in information quality
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
“global society is bifurcating into two broadly parallel information environments; digital elites and digital commoners.”
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Happy to announce the 1st ever @isanet.bsky.social conference in South Asia in August 2026. Hosted in Colombo, Sri Lanka, we welcome proposals from scholars based in and/or studying South Asian politics & international relations, but also broader global themes ofc www.isanet.org/Conferences/...
AI Slop is a hot topic, but what do AI coders and developers feel about democracy and their role in creating products that impact it?
Out now and Open Access in ICS: "A new digital divide? Coder worldviews, the ‘Slop economy,’ and democracy in the age of AI"
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Thanks for the support!!
#OutNow in #iCS
Who shapes democracy in the age of AI?
Miklian and Hoelscher study Silicon Valley coders and the rise of a new digital divide built around information quality.
doi.org/10.1080/1369...
if you control for same type of miles driven, same time of day, same roads, and same make and model of car, the gains tend to evaporate (at least they did when I ran the CADOT numbers). Also it means billions for Waymo to make this claim, so they have every incentive to juice
Just fyi waymo is cooking their books and bit on that data, not comparing apples to apples. They're about as safe as human drivers
Pretty crazy that nearly all of the EU Commission is still on X even as Elon Musk is literally talking about destroying the EU.
You can leave X. It's really not that difficult.
I would say this because I edited it but @mshannahmurphy.bsky.social's piece on tech bros founding their own for-profit cities really is unmissable reading www.ft.com/content/b127...
The World Bank’s latest data shows a quiet global triumph: 93% of people aged 15 to 24 can now read and write. In many regions youth literacy has reached or neared universal levels, marking one of the most successful, least reported stories in development. buff.ly/vnsUhLo
#ShareGoodNewsToo
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2322597121
At 185 mph maximum sustained winds, Cat 5 Hurricane #Melissa is now just 7 mph shy of what @michaelfwehner.bsky.social r.bsky.social & Jim Kossin have defined as the cutoff for a prospective "Cat 6" hurricane:
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Free today until midnight!
Grab a free Kindle copy of my latest book Crisis: A Global Case Primer. It's an Amazon flash sale special for what the Financial Times called "A must-read...essential."
Please spread the word if you can. Thanks for your support!
www.amazon.com/Responsible-...
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD ***************** Investigation of: LOSS OF THE SUBMARINE TITAN IN THE NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN ON JUNE 18, 2023 * * * * * * Accident No.: *********** * * * * * * Interview of: Co-designer/Pilot Deepsea Challenger DCA23FM036 via Microsoft Teams Friday, July 26, 2024
INTERVIEW OF 10 BY LCDR 11 Q. So how did you get yourself started into submersible 12 operations? 13 A. Well, I'm sure you're familiar with my film Titanic. When I 14 set down the path to make that film, the first thing that I did 15 was arrange to be introduced to the head of the submersible 16 program at the P.P. Shirshov Institute in Moscow, a guy named 17| Professor I. I did that through a mutual friend 18 of ours, a guy named , who is one of the preeminent underwater cinematographers in the world. And had been on a 20 submersible expedition out to Titanic the previous year with the 21 Russians. And that was organized by a Canadian company that was 22 doing an IMAX film which was released under the title Titanica.
Learned that an anonymous outside expert on submersibles did an interview with the OceanGate Titan investigation, and they released a transcript, with all the names redacted. The first line of his first answer? "I'm sure you're familiar with my film Titanic."
Word of mouth is important to a book's success. So, if you'd like to see the authors who wrote your favourite stories commissioned to write more, please keep talking about all the #books you love.
“One of the negative consequences AI is having on students is that it is hurting their ability to develop meaningful relationships with teachers, the report finds. Half of the students agree that using AI in class makes them feel less connected to their teachers.”
5:30 a.m.—wake up and lie there and think. 6:15 a.m.—get up and eat breakfast (lots). 7:15 a.m.— get to work writing, writing, writing. Noon-lunch. 1:00-3:00 p.m.—reading, music. 3:00-5:00 p.m.— correspondence, maybe house cleaning. 5:00-8:00 p.m.- make dinner and eat it. After 8:00 p.m.—I tend to be very stupid and we won't talk about this.
I relate to quite a bit of Ursula Le Guin's writing schedule, but it's the "very stupid after 8pm" part that seems to hit harder and deeper as the years go on.
On the morning of Keir Starmer's conference speech here's a new post on an odd psychopathology in British politics - our main parties don't like the people who vote for them - the dreaded Professional Managerial Class. And so they are acting out like a divorced dad seeking cooler voters. 1/n
A snapshot of Silicon Valley in 2025 is Mark Zuckerberg, now a MAGA-friendly mixed martial arts fan who doesn’t worry much about hate speech on his platforms and complains that corporate America isn’t masculine enough.
Respectfully disagree: 1) in fact it is unusual for a democracy w/ this level of GDP to turn authoritarian & so quickly; 2) the weakness of both institutions (congress & courts) and individuals (Schumer etc) is shocking. Would take less than 10 people in congress or 2 SC justices to stop all this.
Academic authors, here's a peek into the black box of journal publishing from an journal editor if you can bear it:
I have no doubt that the journals are preparing their own lawsuit which gives themselves 1b and all authors free journal access for 45 days
Specific articles don't usually have their own isbns, which are also needed per settlement terms. Would love to be wrong on this since I have 45 articles and only 3 books in database
Needs to be books registered at copyright.gov for the this particular suit, hopefully another suit for articles comes (20m of those vs 7m books)
