Dad. Husband. American. Builder. Innovator. Value adder.
USA
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Progressivism: The pathological inability to understand second-order consequences.
For millions of young people across America, homeownership seems further out of reach than ever before.
Here's my proposal: we can help restore the dream of homeownership with a 5 to 1 federal match for first-time homebuyers saving for a downpayment.
merkley.senate.gov/merkley-p…
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Axel retweeted
My AI doom scenario:
AI is successfully captured by governments. It is good enough to be extremely useful to them in maintaining control of their populations, but not good enough to bring about radical innovation and transformative growth. It is kept in this state intentionally, since radical change is a threat to the incumbent power structure. All compute is centrally monitored so no one can advance the field further.
Dissent becomes functionally impossible due to AI-powered censorship. Given the politics of the people who want to capture AI, this means further mass migration, degrowth climate policies, an ever-increasing regulatory burden, and ubiquitous anti-White discrimination in the name of equity.
To a doomer, even a right wing doomer, this would be a relatively good outcome because we haven’t all been gunned down by terminators. I don’t think it’s a good outcome and I want to prevent it.
The world is, and has always been, a race between the chaotic forces of growth and the centralizing forces of control and stability. I want growth to win. AI has the potential to shatter existing global power structures and allow something new to grow in their place.
Speed of change is the only defense against parasitism, control, decay. Change so fast that they can’t keep up. AI will either end the evil dream of centralized control once and for all, or, if the controllers manage to capture AI, cement it for all time.
Hence, acceleration. I want more open source, more competition, more diffusion. I want us to print so much compute that everyone can run frontier models on their desktops. I want power too cheap to meter. I want the scales to finally and decisively tip towards explosive chaotic growth and end the possibility of closure forever.
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Axel retweeted
Last month I wrote about how we can build a positive and safe future for everyone: meta.com/thefutureisforevery…
Every lab has the responsibility and incentive to move at the pace required to train its models safely, and the ability to take its own actions to ensure that happens.
The reality is:
- People won't want to use agents that are misaligned with them and that don't do what they ask, so labs have a strong natural incentive to make their models more aligned.
There is a lot of debate about slowing progress on capabilities until alignment catches up. My view is that trust and alignment are quickly becoming the most important capabilities that will differentiate agents and models. Any lab that doesn't focus on alignment will fall behind.
- Labs face significant liability if their models cause harm, so they have a strong incentive to prevent this as well.
Meta delayed shipping Muse for several months to focus on safety and security. We didn't call for everyone else to do this before we would. We just did it as part of our day-to-day work because it was clearly the right thing for people and for us. I'm proud of the security foundations we've built.
- Engaging independent evaluators and advisors is industry best practice. MSL already does this today in several areas because it helps produce better work. Other labs can just do this too. In general, it would be helpful for there to be a larger and more diverse ecosystem of evaluators.
- Committing the significant majority of compute towards serving people rather than racing towards recursive self-improvement is one of the best ways to ensure we develop this technology safely. Meta has made this commitment and other labs can do this as well.
I believe the key to building a positive future for everyone is maintaining the right balance of power. This is within our power to do.
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Spot on. Absolutely brilliant framing.
In response to the clip going around with the African lady saying 'WHAT WHITE CULTURE!?!'
Because I can explain it in more detail than anyone else... here are the main things that create western civilisation.
The principle, the law of nature that is an adaptation to and what operation it creates in our civilisation.
THE WESTERN CIVILISATION STACK
Western civilisation can be understood as a set of adaptations to the laws of nature that allow millions of people to cooperate, solve problems and innovate together.
1. SOVEREIGNTY — Let people act.
Law of nature: Knowledge and ability are distributed among individuals.
No ruler or institution can know everything everyone knows. Sovereignty gives people freedom to choose, experiment and solve problems for themselves. That creates millions of independent problem-solvers instead of waiting for one authority to find the answer.
2. RECIPROCITY — Don’t impose your costs on others.
Law of nature: Cooperation survives when it benefits both sides.
Freedom cannot mean freedom to steal, defraud, injure or force others to carry your costs. Reciprocity means pursuing your interests while respecting the same right in others. It turns conflict into cooperation and makes peaceful life among strangers possible.
3. RESPONSIBILITY — Make people accountable for consequences.
Law of nature: Every action produces consequences.
Freedom works when the person making a decision also bears responsibility for its results. When people can keep the benefits of their choices while forcing the costs onto others, cooperation breaks down. Responsibility reconnects choice with consequence.
4. PROPERTY — Make control and consequences clear.
Law of nature: Resources are scarce and cannot satisfy every competing use at once.
Property establishes who controls something, who may use or exchange it, and who bears the consequences of those decisions. That reduces conflict, encourages people to improve what they possess, and makes investment and long-term planning possible.
5. TRUTH — Correct error faster than reality punishes you for it.
Law of nature: Reality does not change because we believe something false.
Truthful testimony, open criticism and evidence allow people to discover mistakes before those mistakes become catastrophes. A civilisation that can criticize and correct itself can learn faster than one that protects comforting falsehoods.
6. CONTRACT — Make cooperation possible across time.
Law of nature: Cooperation requires predictable future behaviour.
Promises backed by reputation and law allow strangers to trust one another enough to cooperate. Contract lets one person invest today because another can credibly promise performance tomorrow. That makes enormous networks of specialization, trade and investment possible.
7. RULE OF LAW — Replace arbitrary power with predictable rules.
Law of nature: People have conflicting interests, and power creates opportunities for predation.
Law provides a common procedure for resolving disputes without violence or personal rule. When rulers and citizens are both constrained by known rules, people can cooperate, invest and experiment without constantly fearing arbitrary interference.
8. DUE PROCESS — Test accusations instead of trusting authority.
Law of nature: Human beings are biased, mistaken and sometimes dishonest.
An accusation is not proof. Evidence, defense, confrontation, impartial judgment and appeal create an adversarial process for discovering error. Due process protects both society from wrongdoing and individuals from arbitrary punishment.
9. DECENTRALISATION — Let many solutions compete.
Law of nature: No one knows in advance which adaptation will work best.
Families, firms, towns, institutions and governments can try different solutions to different problems. Failures can remain local while successful solutions spread. Decentralisation therefore turns society itself into a continuous experiment.
10. MARKETS — Let reality select among competing solutions.
Law of nature: Evolution advances through variation, selection and retention.
Markets allow people to try different products, services and ways of organising resources. People select among them through voluntary choice. Successful solutions attract resources; unsuccessful ones disappear or improve. Markets turn millions of choices into continuous social learning.
11. SPECIALISATION — Let differences become advantages.
Law of nature: People differ in knowledge, ability, resources and circumstances.
Instead of everyone doing everything badly, specialization lets people become exceptionally good at different things and exchange the results. Cooperation converts human differences from a source of conflict into a source of increasing productivity.
12. SCIENCE — Institutionalise error correction.
Law of nature: A false model eventually fails when tested against reality.
Science turns doubt into a productive institution: observe, propose, test, criticize, replicate and correct. Knowledge therefore does not have to depend upon authority or tradition. Every generation can discover where the previous generation was wrong and build upon what it got right.
13. CAPITAL — Preserve successful adaptations.
Law of nature: Progress compounds only when successful adaptations survive.
Tools, businesses, infrastructure, institutions and knowledge allow yesterday’s successful experiments to become tomorrow’s starting point. Each generation does not begin again from zero. It inherits accumulated solutions and adds another layer.
14. EDUCATION — Transfer accumulated knowledge between generations.
Law of nature: Individuals die; knowledge does not have to.
Writing, schools, apprenticeships and universities allow discoveries to survive their discoverers. Instead of every generation rediscovering mathematics, engineering, medicine and law, it begins with thousands of years of accumulated learning.
15. COMMONS — Build things that make everyone more capable.
Law of nature: Cooperation can produce benefits no individual could produce alone.
Courts, roads, standards, security, scientific knowledge, infrastructure and trustworthy institutions multiply everyone's ability to act. A successful civilisation does more than protect private interests: it continually creates shared capital that makes future cooperation cheaper and more productive.
THE RESULT
These principles form a system:
Sovereignty creates experimentation.
Reciprocity makes it peaceful.
Responsibility makes it sustainable.
Property makes interests clear.
Truth corrects error.
Contract creates trust across time.
Law suppresses predation.
Decentralisation preserves alternatives.
Markets select successful solutions.
Specialisation multiplies productivity.
Science accelerates discovery.
Capital preserves what works.
Education transmits it.
Commons multiply everyone's capabilities.
That is the deeper logic of the Western stack:
Stable rules + distributed freedom + relentless error correction = cooperation at scale and accelerating innovation.
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THAT’S IT?
This is what 20 years’ worth of used nuclear fuel looks like safely stored at the former Maine Yankee nuclear plant.
The plant generated 119 billion kilowatt hours of reliable power from 1972-1996, which is enough to power half a million homes each year.
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Never read a more Islamophobic passage in my life from 1830 by John Quincy Adams.
“The precept of the koran is, perpetual war against all who deny, that Mahomet is the prophet of God. The vanquished may purchase their lives, by the payment of tribute; the victorious may be appeased by a false and delusive promise of peace; and the faithful follower of the prophet, may submit to the imperious necessities of defeat: but the command to propagate the Moslem creed by the sword is always obligatory, when it can be made effective. The commands of the prophet may be performed alike, by fraud, or by force.”
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RT @sapinker: The degeneration of Nature, Science, NEJM, and Scientific American into woke propaganda dispensers (and their refusal to publ…
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Is Maserati dying a slow death?
OVERHEARD:
“60 of the 86 Maserati dealers in the US have not reported a single sale this month.
13 have 1 sale.
Only 4 have sold more than 2.”
Mind-boggling numbers.
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Can telling people the truth about data centers—that they're safe and beneficial, with little environmental cost—convince them to support data centers?
The answer seems to be...🧵
No.
To start, notice that people really dislike data centers and don't want them built near them:
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The United States Mission to Belgium condemns, in the strongest terms, Ghent University’s retaliation against an American scholar following his accurate whistleblower reporting on academic fraud.
The United States government regularly funds and supports research, academic exchanges, and other engagements with overseas universities. Dishonest, corrupt institutions that engage in, or reward, scapegoating mob behavior are not desirable partners for us. This is particularly true where the purpose and effect of the scapegoating is to punish accurate journalism unearthing academic dishonesty. We are therefore reviewing any relationships we have with Ghent University.
Bad-faith idealogues will try to make this a referendum on the content of Cofnas’s scholarship – or polemical distortions of it. That’s wrong. Free speech means that controversial views are protected. And Cofnas’s views were known to Ghent University when he was hired.
The ultimate purpose of freedom of speech is to overturn lies, fraud, and false ideologies. This is precisely what Cofnas was doing, and precisely the reason his home institution wants to silence him.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
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People have such a huge gripe about this concept because they think it means something like "just throw out black peoples' scores" rather than "compare similar subpopulations between states so you can actually observe the effect of different educational policy by state rather than just get a proxy for demographic makeup."
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SUCCESS! Total Solar Eclipse 2026 from just outside the rural town of Duraton, Spain.
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A woman who nearly has an anxiety attack at a burger joint due to the presence of white people is obviously mentally unwell and therefore unfit for office.
I ate two bites of my kid's cheeseburger at a Culver's in black river falls and told him they ran out of ice cream. Mostly just wanted to leave bc I was on the verge of a anxiety attack...to many old white people who didn't think we spoke english
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"What bad has mass immigration to Europe ever done for us?"
- "The raping?"
"What?"
- "The raping"
"Oh yeah yeah. They do rape an awful lot that’s true yes."
- "And the welfare costs"
- "Oh yes the welfare costs, Rich. The unemployment benefits alone."
"Ok, I will grant you the raping, and the welfare costs, are two bad things mass immigration have done for us."
- "And the terrorism"
"Oh yeah obviously the terrorism. I mean the terrorism goes without saying. But apart from the raping, the welfare costs, and the terrorism…"
- "Violent crime"
- "Honor killings"
- "Car bombings
"Yeah, you are all right, fair enough."
- "Burqas"
- [nodding among the group] "Yeah, that is something we’d really not miss if the immigrants left."
- "Political support for bad economic policies."
- "And it’s less safe to walk in the streets at night now, Rich."
Ok, but apart from the raping, the welfare costs, the terrorism, the violent crime, the honor killings, the car bombings, the burqas, political support for bad economic policies and the unsafe streets, what bad has mass immigration ever done for us?
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There's an asymmetry in how liberals and conservatives evaluate one another.
Liberals dehumanize conservatives more than conservatives suspect. Conservatives dehumanize liberals less than liberals suspect.
In the US, liberals think conservatives hate them much more than conservatives actually do, while conservatives don't realize liberals hate them as much as liberals actually do. The hatred asymmetry is one reason liberals tend to win over time.
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