This turned out to be the most prophetic tweet of the year

A new bill called the SMARTER Act would overhaul the immigration system: -establishes America’s first points-based categories -overhauls the H-1B (more portability, awarded in order of tax contributions, & bans underpayment relative to natives) -it ends the Diversity Visa -cuts large parts of the family-based system -brings immigration levels under democratic control One of the smart features is the points scheme is largely based on salary, de-emphasizing education credentials. Avoids the diploma mill problem that so many other points-based proposals runs into.

Jensen said a bunch of false stuff in his interview with Ezra. Good explanation from Zvi on what he gets wrong about Chinese open source:

Don’t say you love the anime if you haven’t read the manga

My session for the IFP short course on the economics of innovation is now online!

No one better than @SecScottBessent

Things that are self-replicating are orders of magnitude more dangerous than things that are not self-replicating. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

Read more: ifp.org/indoor-air-quality/

Saying permitting reform "guts" the clean water act is wildly dishonest: - Section 401 of the Clean Water Act is just one of several important sections of the law. Changing 401 will not lower water quality standards. - Section 401 gives states responsibility to certify that projects meet water quality standards set by other sections of the Clean Water Act. - The problem is that some states stretch or outright misuse their 401 authority to block projects they dislike (pipelines), akin to how the Trump administration has used DOD waivers to block projects it doesn't like (wind). - All Congress is considering right now is how to limit the misuse of 401. Congress is NOT going to repeal 401, federalize 401 certification, or say projects don't have to meet water quality standards. - I expect reforms will be limited to requiring states to: make decisions based on water quality analysis only, explain their decisions in writing, and potentially limit how states add conditional when they certify projects. - None of this is remotely "gutting" the Clean Water Act or Section 401. 401 will still be a state-controlled process, it will still check water quality standards. The only thing that will change is the ability to misuse the process to block projects for political reasons. - 401 reform is also important for transmission lines. If Congress creates a federal backstop for siting and permitting transmission lines, 401 may become the last veto that states opposed to new lines can use. nitter.net/mattyglesias/status/21…

Housing is crazy because it’s one of America’s biggest issues that can be mostly fixed for the cost of exactly $0

We are so back

Every child should get to go to a good school. *Your* child is in a position of extraordinary vulnerability and dependence on *you*, which comes with an obligation to try to do right by them in particular, just like if you are a nurse you have particular obligations to your patients and if you are an employer you have particular obligations to your employees. That's not an obligation to send them to private school! But it's an obligation to make sure they are safe at school, check regularly what they're learning, make sure they are literate and numerate even if the school fails to make sure of that, and change things if the situation they're in is really bad for them. We wouldn't think much of a nurse who doesn't give their patient the recommended treatment because 'why are you any more deserving than destitute people who can't get treatment'. The nurse may go join Doctors Without Borders if he wishes; that would be a commendable thing to do. But when people depend on us, and have no resort to anyone else, we must do right by them.

And then the final step is removing all standardized tests so no one can tell what you’ve done to the grades

This is exactly right:

On AI capabilities: the French press is all over the Haitian-Canadian novel C’était ça ou mourir. It's winning basically every award you can win, and was tipped to be the 2nd Canadian winner of the Prix Goncourt. Only one problem: 1/2

I kind of understood the logic behind running the Druckenmiller AI-generated column, since the news was his endorsement of the message. I think if a column is rendering some kind of technical verdict, it’d be nice to have some reason to believe the author has done true research

Some thoughts on this news that is causing people to freak out: - This is not going to meaningfully increase the risk of an AI-engineered virus and might in fact make us safer. - If what you are worried about is "superintelligent AI" making a virus: it could achieve this without an automated lab by paying people. An automated lab allows us to monitor and block physical chokepoints. If we put in the proper safeguards, this would actually be the worst method for anyone to use to design a weapon. - If what you are worried about is AI enabling better bioengineering: this may indeed improve that technology, and this is a good thing. Our fear of bioweapons cannot impede our development of new medicines to the extent that we are scared to bring automation to the lab! - Biodefense should be maximally concentrated on things like surveillance, pandemic-class pathogen data governance, blocking physical chokepoints, and building out infrastructure that prepares us to withstand an attack so well that it deters any actor from trying.

when someone says they care about ai safety but then call it “generative ai” —

It's now clear that AI companies cannot coordinate, even publicly, on pacing R&D without antitrust risk. An antitrust exemption is the only way to get out of this collective action problem short of regulation. The race to the bottom isn't going to fix itself!