Fodder #45
What's Trending? What's Transcendent?
Last night, Israel launched a preemptive attack on Iran’s nuclear and military sites. This had been broadcast. US embassies issued alerts. Iran said they’d be ready, but reports already say some got hurt, maybe more. Israel released statements, some pretty tongue in cheek. The US said it was unilateral. Netanyahu says it’s not over. It’s all going to move very fast.
In the US, some Waymo’s got destroyed in a mostly peaceful immigration protest, and they decide to ditch LA. But it raises a great question: what will happen when the protest is really against AI? A senator tries to interrupt a press conference, and ESPN commentators ain’t having it.
Apple delivered Liquid Glass that nobody asked for at the WWDC conference. They love it. People are now asking, “What would Steve do?” Still no good Apple Intelligence. In fact, Apple is so far behind in AI that they released a new paper, saying that all the other AIs are illusions. AGI is a fad, guys. Move along.
OpenAI released O3 Pro, which thinks for a long time. Meta looks to invest in Scale.ai. Gemini moves from version 0506 to 0605, and Zvi asks the right question: “I swear these AI companies have to be fucking with us with the names at this point.”
China stops exporting rare earth metals and we stop importing students and suddenly the US and China have the beginnings of the workings of a possible plan. A Robotaxi with no driver is spotted in Austin, TX. Eugenics goes mainstream. A normie helped patch things up between the most powerful man and the richest man in the world. Newsom does a Star Wars troll of Trump. A big chunk of internet services have an outage all at once, and some people decide they can look up from their phones.
Now on to the reading!
Timely
US-China framework of agreed-upon measures - A breakdown of the China deal and who said what and if we’ve really accomplished anything.
A knockout blow for LLMs? - A great breakdown of the Apple paper and what it really means for LLMs (and AGI).
The Ten Warning Signs - Ted Gioia continues to be the best at explaining what’s going wrong in our society and he continues to be right. A breakdown of the knowledge hierarchy in ten steps.
How smart creators will make money in 2026 - Everyone hates influencers but wants to be a content creator and conveniently forgets that they’re the same thing from different perspectives. A look at where the creator ideas are going and how they’ll look in the future.
Timeless
No One Was Really Watching - Stop worrying! Do it now. Comparison is the thief of joy.
We did the math on AI’s energy footprint - A great dive into exactly how much energy goes into all the prompts that you write and how much energy we’re really going to need.
TIME TO MAKE BORING PEOPLE UNCOMFORTABLE AGAIN - Boring isn’t exactly memorable. Nor admirable. An uncomfortable reminder to be yourself. And it’s ok to ruin brunch sometimes.
Consciousness, Cognition and the Neuronal Cytoskeleton - A New Paradigm Needed in Neuroscience - This was the latest paper to formally discuss some of the quantum OR orchestration ideas of Roger Penrose, effectively arguing that consciousness in the brain is a process that happens at the quantum level and we are therefore incredibly far from coming close to encapsulating it. Highly relevant amidst all the discussions about AGI or machine consciousness.
Books
The Emperor’s New Mind by Roger Penrose - Roger Penrose leaves black-hole math to declare that genuine consciousness springs from quantum events buried deep inside our neurons. Because these “objective reductions” transcend algorithmic rules, he says, silicon can only fake awareness, never possess it—a direct swipe at strong AI. The claim leans heavily on Kurt Gödel, flirts with the mind of God and free will, and remains gloriously unproven. Treat it as a charged-up thought experiment: a wedge of physics to pry into the mystery of mind, and perfect for a free afternoon’s philosophical daydream.
Tweets
Some good ones, so you don’t need to scroll!
🤣
The world is amazing. Cheers!