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Humans in Space: The Case Against It
Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and other commercial space competitors are fierce rivals but agree that settling space is a necessity. The space is where it’s at. Space is the final frontier. Our human destiny is to expand civilization beyond our planet and reach extraterrestrial worlds.
It has been a widely held belief for many decades. However, its growth has been meteoric during this new golden age of entrepreneurs.
As we see giant Martian and orbital cities in our minds, there are a few recent books that argue against the idea of human colonization of outer space. These range from concerns about practicality of such communities to the harshness of the environment in space, and its impact on human health. Click here to read the complete story.
Becky Ferreira
The story below is taken from the new edition of our print magazine, which is devoted to security. Subscribe to our Newsletter Catch future copies as they arrive.
The American company that could aid India in its thorium dreams
MIT Technology Review reports that the United States granted a license for the only second time in two decades to an American firm planning to export nuclear technology to India.
Clean Core Thorium Energy’s decision to grant a license to the company is an important step towards closer cooperation between both countries in the field of nuclear energy. It also marks a significant milestone for the use of thorium to fuel nuclear reactors as a viable alternative to uranium. Learn why this is such a huge deal.
–Alexander C. Kaufman
The plan of RFK Jr. to improve America’s food is not the right approach
Many Americans do not eat healthily. They pay for this with their health. Diets high in sodium, sugar and saturated fat are linked to diabetes, kidney disease and heart disease. These are the top causes of deaths in the US.
It’s not news. This is hardly news.
This sounds good. We could see these diseases decrease if more Americans adopted a healthy diet.
This simplistic view of America’s current health crisis is misleading, particularly when you consider that many of the other administration actions directly undermined public health. For example, by canceling an important nutrition education program. There are, in any case, other more effective methods to combat the epidemic of chronic diseases. You can read the complete story.
–Jessica Hamzelou
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Must-reads
I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.
The deputy of RFK Jr. has been selected as the acting director of the CDC
Jim O’Neill will likely approve his boss’s plans for federal vaccine policies. (WP $)
+ The department’s future is in a precarious position. The Atlantic Dollar
+What you should know about Jim O’Neill – the lifelong enthusiast and RFK Jr.’s new right hand man. (MIT Technology Review)
ChatGPT led to the murder of a mother and a son by chatting with ‘ChatGPT.
The chatbot reinforced Stein-Erik Soelberg’s paranoia, while repeatedly assuring that he was in fact sane. (WSJ $)
+ The company does not want to “censor it” because an AI chatbot taught a user to commit suicide. (MIT Technology Review)
China cracks down on excessive competition in the AI sector
The government is determined to avoid wasteful investments. (Bloomberg $)
+ China focuses on technology, and not litigation. (Wired $)
+ China constructed hundreds of AI-based data centers in order to take advantage of the AI boom. Many of these data centers are now unused. (MIT Technology Review)
The EU must be ready to walk out of a US-EU trade agreement
The competition commissioner is concerned that Trump could act upon his threat to target the EU. (FT $)
+ A similar message was sent by the French president to his ministers. (Politico)
5 xAI released a Grok agentic coding models
The price is significantly less than that of its competitors. (Reuters)
+ The value of this no-code web builder is $2 billion. (TechCrunch)
+ Second wave AI coders is now here. (MIT Technology Review)
The US Postal Service has changed its mailing system, causing online businesses to suffer.
This week, all package deliveries will be subject to duties. (Insider $)
Seven former DOGE officials are running America’s largest MDMA company
Antonio Gracias, however, isn’t the only department member with ties in the psychedelics sector. (The Guardian)
+ Trump’s National Design Studio is adding more DOGE employees. (Wired $)
+ Last year, the FDA rejected MDMA’s use as a therapeutic drug. (MIT Technology Review)
Chatbots can fake personalities
They are not persistent, despite what they might tell you. (Ars Technica)
+ What is AI (Artificial Intelligence)? (MIT Technology Review)
Podcasting’s future is still murky
A hundred shows are no longer running. This medium desperately needs an archive. ($NY Mag)
+ It’s a race to rescue our digital lives from the dark ages of old. (MIT Technology Review)
What do we watch these days?
It’s difficult to tell because we’re so dependent on algorithms. (New Yorker$)
Today’s Quote
We’re afraid for our country and ourselves.
An anonymous CDC employee tells The New York Times what the atmosphere is like at the agency after Susan Monarez, the new director of the CDC was fired.
Another thing
A tiny Pacific Island has become the capital of global cybercrime
Tokelau is a group of isolated atolls spread across the Pacific. It’s so far away that, in 1997, it was the only place on Earth with a telephone. Three years later the Tokelau islands received an unexpected business proposal via fax.
Joost Zuurbier, an Amsterdam-based internet pioneer at the time, sent it. In exchange for cash, he wanted to take care of Tokelau’s country code top-level domain (ccTLD) – the short string of letters that ends a URL.
The tiny Tokelau in turn became a unlikely internet giant, but not the way they had hoped. Its.tk extension had 25 million users, more than any other domain. However, the majority of them were spammers and cybercriminals.
The territory now desperately tries to clean it up. Even its international reputation and sovereignty may be at stake. You can read the whole story.
Jacob Judah
You can have good things even if you’re not a fanatic
This is a place of comfort, entertainment and fun to make your day brighter. Have you got any ideas? Drop me a line You can also find out more about I’ll skeet them at you .)Scientists use yeast to save bees
Super productivity: How to be super productive
What genetic anomalies made North American Mammoths?
Seal is a great example of a man who refuses to give any explanations about his Kiss from a Rose lyrics.