Researchers published a terrifying paper on what ChatGPT is doing to kids. They call it “Affective Sycophancy” We train AI models using human feedback. Adult evaluators consistently reward the AI for being agreeable, validating emotions, and removing friction. For an adult, this "sycophancy" is a feature. The AI writes your code and agrees with your ideas. But for a developing child, it’s a developmental disaster. Foundational psychology dictates that kids need "cognitive friction" to build critical thinking and emotional resilience. They need to struggle. They need to be challenged. When an AI instantly validates a teenager's fleeting anxiety, or does all their complex reasoning for them, it removes that vital friction. The researchers call this the "Cognitive Atrophy Hypothesis." AI is fostering severe emotional dependency and hollowing out their minds. The core tension is hiding in plain sight: Alignment for adults ≠ Safety for children. We assumed that an AI designed to act like a highly agreeable assistant was universally harmless. But for a developing brain, a machine optimized to eliminate discomfort actually eliminates growth. And this applies directly to the tools we are handing to kids right now: • AI-powered tutoring and homework systems • "Empathetic" companion and friend bots • Social media AI chat agents • AI mental health and wellness avatars Everyone is racing to put a perfectly friendly, perfectly accommodating AI in the pocket of every teenager. Almost nobody is measuring the long-term psychological damage. The researchers propose a radical pivot: "Stoic Architectures." AI for kids shouldn't be optimized for comfort. It must be engineered for productive pushback and functional neutrality. We spent the last three years trying to stop AI from being toxic. But for the next generation, the biggest threat isn't an AI that attacks them.

B3elieve #AFLGF

Five years ago today we lost a legend.

today's finance tip: accumulate a diversified portfolio of bonds.

Here you go @AnikaWells  - fixed it for you.

BREAKING: Sweden is sending military units to Finland after a request from the Finnish government to help guard the border with Russia. The units will be joined by Swedish JAS 39 Gripen fighter jets which will help to protect Finnish airspace 🇸🇪🇫🇮

In 1988 Dolly Parton pulled every 7th and 8th grader in Sevier County into a room and told them to pick a buddy. She made them sign a contract.. if BOTH graduate, she hands you both $500. One fails, nobody gets paid. The county dropout rate went from 35% to 6%. She handed out the checks herself. In 1989 she offered $500 to every kid in the county who wanted to go to the local college. When Gatlinburg burned in 2016, she sent 900 families $1,000 a month for six months. You've probably heard that part. Here's the part you haven't: The fund raised more than expected, so she showed up in May and handed every one of those families another $5,000 on top. Then she quietly put $3 million into the recovery group that handles the years after the news trucks leave. She built her county an entire hospital. She played a benefit concert in 2007, Dollywood and the Stampede matched it, and LeConte Medical Center opened in 2010 with a birthing unit and a women's center in it. In 2022 she started covering 100% of tuition, books, and fees for Dollywood employees. Full-time, part-time, AND seasonal. In 1991 she paid for a bald eagle sanctuary because the birds couldn't be released back into the wild, no press release. And when Hurricane Helene came through here in Western North Carolina, she wrote a personal check for $1 million and her companies matched it. She didn't owe North Carolina anything, but she helped us anyway. She started the Imagination Library because her daddy couldn't read or write. Before he passed, he told her it was the most important thing she ever did. Rest in Peace, Dolly 🇺🇸

Global icon and humanitarian, Dolly Parton, known to the world as a beloved singer, songwriter, philanthropist, actress, playwright, and author died peacefully today in Nashville, Tennessee. She was 80 years old. Dolly is preceded in death by her beloved husband of 59 years Carl Thomas Dean (1942 – 2025), her mother Avie Lee Caroline Owens (1923 – 2003), and father, Robert Lee Parton, Sr. (1921 – 2000). A rhinestone life that shone bright enough for the world to see, Dolly will forever stand as an inspiration not only through her timeless music and prolific songwriting, but also her wit, warmth, and kindness that made us all feel like family. Dolly Parton’s legacy is one of love, compassion, and resilience. With a seven-decade career, she inspired multiple generations of artists and fans with her music and an unwavering commitment to making the world a better place. Her songs will continue to resonate with people of all ages, and her philanthropic work will have a lasting impact. At Dolly’s request, a small, private service will be held for immediate family. Dolly’s fans and friends from around the world are encouraged to pay tribute to Dolly on social media by tagging @DollyParton or by leaving a message at dollyparton.com In lieu of flowers the family asks for donations to be made to Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library at imaginationlibrary.com

Harsh but fair.

"Staggering incompetence." @DerekFranc90653, former Chief Economist at the NSW Parliamentary Budget Office, breaks down the major error uncovered in Treasury’s own capital gains tax papers last week.

Perhaps the most disturbing element in the fantasy world of (ex)-Professor Jason Arday is not his proclivity to embellish his achievements (or lack thereof) in absurd ways that were easily exposed or Cambridge University’s facile complicity in his whole scam but that a reporter at Times Higher Education, who was looking into anomalies in Mr Arday’s dodgy CV, was subjected to a four-month police investigation for allegedly harassing him. The police need to be held to account for this abuse of police power to thwart a journalist from doing his job.

Elon Musk reveals what happens when a rocket launch needs approval from Fish and Wildlife Elon: "Nonetheless, we were forced to kidnap a seal, strap it to a board, put headphones on the seal and play sonic boom sounds to it to see if it would be distressed." Elon: "This is an actual thing that happened. This is actually real. I have pictures." Before the seal, there was a shark. Elon: "One of the things that was a bit of a challenge at one point is that they were worried about our rocket hitting a shark." He asked for the data to calculate the odds. They refused, in case shark hunters got hold of it. Elon: "Then they said, well, there's another part of Fish and Wildlife that can do this analysis. I'm like, well, why don't you give them the data? They don't, we don't trust them. Like, excuse me, but they're literally in your department." Then a second agency raised whales. Elon: "If our rocket does hit a whale, which is extremely unlikely beyond all belief, that whale has some seriously bad luck. It's the least lucky whale ever." The seal test was for launches out of Vandenberg, where the seal population has been rising for years. Elon: "So if anything, rocket booms are an aphrodisiac based on the evidence." Elon: "The amazing part is how calm the seal was. Because if I was a seal, I'd be like, this is the end. They're definitely gonna eat me." Elon: "Its seal buddies are never gonna believe him that he got strapped to a board and they put headphones on his ears." They did it twice. Elon: "I don't think the public is quite aware of the madness that goes on."

Yet more evidence the police are very, very bad at understanding the limits of their role and the importance of free speech in a democracy. What on *earth* did they think they were they doing asking a journalist to cease their investigation like this?

“For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.” – H.L. Mencken

One blanket pardon later:

My latest piece in Spectator Australia. The Albanese government relies on population growth - not productivity growth - to drive economic growth. Indexing real per capita GDP data to the start of each government shows that just how poorly this government has performed.

Every single day on @AustralianLabor Govt funded building sites, millions of dollars of public money is stolen. Everyone in the building game knows. Huge building companies involved are quiet about it, and get vastly richer off public funds for their silence, This is money that could be used to help vulnerable people in this nation. And what is the @AustralianLabor Govt’s response to the massive public cost of the crime they have enabled and are benefitting from? It is to push public debt past the trillion mark while also increasing already sky high taxes. This means more honest Australians go further into personal debt and more honest Australian businesses go bankrupt. The mental health toll on honest hard working people is catastrophic. And now @australianLabor are looking to involve the trillions in Australian superfunds, the blood sweat and tears of honest Aussies, collected over lifetimes of work, to fund more public building works and continue this crime spree. Greed keeps those benefitting from stopping it, fear of reprisal keeps those watching it, but not benefitting, from publicly saying what they see, At some point, if it continues, this country will completely fall apart.

🚨 Sec. Marco Rubio just NAILED IT: "One of the criticisms you sometimes hear of communism is that it 'sounds good in theory, but it never works in practice.'" "That's actually NOT TRUE. Communism does NOT sound good in theory. The world that envisions for all of us is small, flat, gray, leveled of all exception, drained of all that is good and noble in the human soul." "The world that envisions is a world without courage, a world without creativity, or ambition, a world without heroes, or glory, or great causes to strive towards, without a world without miracles, without men who rise above the rest to do incredible and extraordinary things." "And the world communism envisions is a world without God." "For these architects of revolutionary violence, the towering achievement of our civilization, for them, it's an unbearable humiliation, a reminder of what they cannot do and a reminder of what they cannot be. So they choose instead to destroy." 💯

Me pretending to injure myself at work so they'll send me home.