"On the Pitfalls of Technophilic Reason: A Commentary on Kevin Jon Heller’s “The Concept of ‘the Human’ in the Critique of Autonomous Weapons”, with @elkeschwarz.bsky.social. journals.law.harvard.edu/nsj/2025/05/...

There is a striking lack of public mindedness (one might say idiocy in the original sense of the word) when multi-billionaires will happily bet significant amounts of their money on ‘deals’ but recoil at the idea of paying into the public coffers from which they clearly benefit.

To understand how genAI rapidly deteriorates useful (online) information & how this problem reaches into all manner of information sources read this whole thread. For all the talk about ‘trusting AI’, AI sure seems a sharp instrument to erode trust writ large

A great piece! A couple of observations: The plan for the Global South is made clear in the section on Africa: “we wash our hands of you, unless you have valuable minerals - in which case, let’s talk.” The rest of the economic strategy: “free trade for thee, but not for me!”

What if we read the U.S. National Security Strategy not as a 'normal' policy strategy but rather a declaration of business intent? My thoughts on the carrot and stick business politics of the US NSS at @opiniojuris.bsky.social opiniojuris.org/2025/12/18/t...

Newly published research "which also found that AI-related water use now exceeds the entirety of global bottled-water demand." All for the privilege to become part of an imperialistic, totalising artifice. Günther Anders was prescient in understanding exactly how we make ourselves obsolete.

IDK ... if the big AI companies really were primarily concerned with serving humanity with their products, then why do they hire people like Osborne (OpenAI) and Sunak (Anthropic) who have a less than stellar record serving wider humanity in their previous roles ...

I have read most of the @nytimes.com editorial board op Ed’s now and can only conclude that they must have been hacked.

And another one by the @NYT ‘editorial board’ that sounds precisely like a defence tech industry brochure or op Ed. I’m too familiar with the narratives to ignore the striking semblance

For those who need to be reminded: you cannot please or satisfy a person like Trump / an administration like the current US admin. There is no end, no “enough”, just a continual shifting of goal posts.

Check out my essay "Welcome to the age of Longevity Capitalism" now open access in @finandsoc.bsky.social Thank you @aminsamman.bsky.social for endorsing the project, and to @jvtk.bsky.social for our great conversation on these ideas. Picture credit to Harald Bergauer visual interpretation

Pre-order now www.sup.org/books/politi...

The title of Thiel's early musings on the Anti-Christ and Armageddon, back in 2022, were perhaps more of a description than a lament www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibR_....

Why does the @nytimes.com editorial board parrot precisely the defence tech industry talking points? Like an Anduril or Palantir blog, or a16z's American Dynamism podcast etc. I'd have hoped the NYT would speak to a more diverse set of experts on the matter. www.nytimes.com/video/opinio...

This should more acurately be titled "The Salespeople of AI"

He is right, I too am bored by AI. I am bored by the fact that 'innovation' has become so narrow as to revolve entirely around AI, at least in public discourse. It fills me with inertia.

When can we expect the AI-induced era of abundance to begin? Just planning for 2026 ....

"AI is the asbestos in the walls of our technological society, stuffed there with wild abandon by a finance sector and tech monopolists run amok. We will be excavating it for a generation or more." - Cory Doctorow Entire speech is well worth reading. pluralistic.net/2025/12/05/p...

Together with the ever-more ridiculous ideations and outlandish visions of the superwealthy for our collective future, this should really prompt us to change course, politically!

Following on from my previous comment .... www.anthropic.com/research/sma...

📣New scholarship ! Amin Samman builds on Yuran’s "The Sexual Economy of Capitalism" to unpack modern finance and its “obscenity”. justmoney.org/obscene-fina...

What if, when Putin said in 2017 that whoever has the best AI will rule the world, he really actually was setting a trap …

"In the environment of wartime, both normality and democratic oversight are suspended, making conflict an important factor in economic returns. Peace is a less economically attractive proposition, and risks are de-prioritised.” – @elkeschwarz.bsky.social transitionsecurity.org/venture-capi...

1/US stepping up attacks on the EU. This has left many in Europe scratching their heads but it is part of the neo-royalist agenda. The EU stands for the rules based order and stands in the way of a new order based not on rules but clique interests. www.politico.eu/article/top-...

These are not serious political proposals, they are vehicles to minimise risk on future bets. Anyone with an ounce of understanding of political dynamics and the long history of conflict can tell you that these ideas 'don't scale' to do what the VCs want them to do. www.ft.com/content/b127...

Exciting!!

The Fifa Peace Prize … How much longer must we endure everyone praising the emperor’s clothes. It continues to erode any sense of shared reality and normalises a grotesque web of deceit.

Imagine for five seconds what the reaction would be if a woman CEO behaved this way

Reading the National Security Strategy I cannot help but think that the US has been cognitive warfared.

Book launch! Engin Isin's The Birth of Sensory Power: Doing Things with Words, Numbers and Neurons @edinburghup.bsky.social with @couldrynick.bsky.social @rachelhumphris.bsky.social @elkeschwarz.bsky.social @cearadau.bsky.social at @qmulsse.bsky.social www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-birth-...

It’s all part of the same techno-eschatology package but that whole discourse does seem particularly unhinged at the moment

If I understand these ramblings correctly, this CEO is saying that extrajudicial killings like US strikes in Venezuela (aka war crimes) should become 'constitutional' so that his firm can make more money. I don't know how he is not a total liability for the company www.youtube.com/watch?v=8i-y...

I think a lot about this ...

Look, this is an abomination, void of any grasp of humans or humanity. Kalshi should not exist (which is why there are lawsuits in 11 states against Kalshi for illegal gambling etc. this alone should spook investors 🤷‍♀️). But let's not forget: all venture capital is about making bets & wagers. 1/

There should be greater resistance to the use of the term 'peace' in these and other proposals of ending bloodshed through 'deals'. In fact there should be outrage that the word peace is used in this way.

I am very excited that there is now an English translation of this important book. Christopher John Müller has done an amazing job. Thank you to both @morbuscriticus.bsky.social and Christopher for making this happen!

A reminder: those making, selling, promoting AI for all aspects of human life are NOT experts in human affairs or social dynamics. They are technicians or business people with little knowledge of or care for political and social dynamics.

This thread is spot on and this part raises one of the most devastating aspects of this new AI focused environment: “They can’t see themselves in relation to others”.

Published today: my op-Ed for Sifted on why the dynamics of VC are too risky for defence. I’m grateful to the editors for letting me make this point in the ‘lion’s den’ sifted.eu/articles/def...

"VC strategy thrives on rapidly scaling up growth for extraordinary returns... VC investment, especially in defence, comes with its own dynamics." Sharp analysis from @elkeschwarz.bsky.social on UK government's growing entanglement with US venture capital: transitionsecurity.org/venture-capi...

My latest for @transitionsec.bsky.social, where I take a look at the implications of the UK forgeing its defence strategy in the image of the US. I argue that this pathway to growth, via a "defence dividend”, risks primarily serving those with vested industry interests, not the public at large.

NEW ESSAY: Ahead of the Budget, read @ElkeSchwarz on how the UK Government has made venture capital investment in defence tech the cornerstone of its growth model and security strategy. transitionsecurity.org/venture-capital-statecraft/

📢The Swedish Defence University is recruiting TWO fully-funded, salaried PhD positions to conduct research on Artificial Intelligence and War, supported by the national WASP-HS programme - a unique opportunity. Please share widely! www.fhs.se/en/swedish-d...

There is always another joker up someone's sleeve sifted.eu/articles/eri...

... and speaking of self-referential systems of tech, power and violence, this sure was an interesting read www.thenation.com/article/soci...

See also: Defence

"'Wir leben im Kapitalismus. Seine Macht scheint unausweichlich. Aber das galt auch für das göttliche Recht der Könige', sagte Le Guin in ihrer Rede von 2014. Ihr Wort macht Hoffnung. Bis heute."

I am not even three minutes into that Axios / Karp interview and already I am slightly lost for words when this weapon system CEO describes that their software can also cover that "kind of sexy violent part of war" for commanders .... That sexy violent part of war. Honestly.

Europe is next