This is a newsletter about the intersection of capitalism, geopolitics, and artificial intelligence.
I’m a freelance journalist and the author of a forthcoming book called Obsolete: Power, Profit, and the Race for Machine Superintelligence.
I’ve written about AI for The New York Times, The Verge, The Guardian US, TIME, The Thomson Reuters Foundation, SF Standard, The Nation, The American Prospect, and Jacobin. My reporting and commentary on this topic has been shared by the three “godfathers” of deep learning (Yoshua Bengio, Yann LeCun, and Nobel laureate Geoffrey Hinton), noted AI critic Gary Marcus, Life 3.0 author Max Tegmark, and others.
Some more about me
My cover story in The Nation, “Confessions of a McKinsey Whistleblower,” was the magazine’s 4th most popular story in 2023, and my Jacobin cover story, “Can Humanity Survive AI?,” made rounds among staff members working for several US senators and representatives (it’s also the best sneak preview of the book I’m writing).
I’ve also written for BBC Future, Vox, Le Monde Diplomatique, and elsewhere. I’ve appeared on CBS News Sunday Morning, The Majority Report, and The Weather Channel, and elsewhere. I host the podcast The Most Interesting People I Know.
In addition to covering AI, I've written about psychedelics, prisons, emerging technologies, philosophy, fish welfare, management consulting, police alternatives, and more. I've also conducted interviews with Michael Stipe of REM and Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes.
You can find some selected writing and more about me at my personal site and Twitter. I live in Brooklyn.
What’s with the name?
Some of the most powerful and well-funded organizations in history are trying to build systems that would make humanity obsolete. It's far from clear that they will succeed, but regardless, these companies and the people running them should be critically examined as part of a broader project to collectively understand and govern the development of advanced artificial intelligence.
Depending on who you ask, AI is our salvation or our doom; an over-hyped, bigoted, bullshit artist or the ticket to immortality and utopian abundance; just another tech fad or the last invention we need ever make. The AI discourse is confusing, messy, and frustrating. But the technology — and our response to it — will shape the future, whether or not we’re part of the conversation.
This newsletter aims to help you parse this mess.
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