dailyplanet
The Daily Planet #129: The Coming Metabolic War
In today’s Daily Planet, @nilsgilman.bsky.social argues that a new geopolitical split is emerging around energy: a Green Entente led by China that builds dominance through green tech, and an Axis of Petrostates (the U.S. under Trump, Russia, Gulf monarchies) that defends fossil-fuel power.
The Daily Planet #127: Military Intelligence
Military AI is characterized by epistemic opacity. Unlike civilian AI, which is subject to public scrutiny and litigation when it fails, military systems are shielded by classification and state-secret privileges. This lack of transparency prevents external validation and makes it nearly impossible to correct for human biases or technical errors.
The Daily Planet #126: A Plausible Dystopia
There’s an uber-dystopian version of AI where it either annihilates us or sucks out our souls while we believe we are in a matrix of plenty. Maybe one of those dystopias will come to pass, but a far more likely dystopia is one that’s coming into being as we speak.
The Daily Planet #124: The Anatomical Compiler
Michael Levin is an interesting thinker; a rare Platonist in Biology. This quote from a recent post of his makes me think of biological engineering, but not the kind where we force organisms to do our willing, but rather work with their agential capacity to produce forms that we need:
The Daily Planet #121: Timefulness
I have been reading Marcia Bjornerud's "Timefulness" and really enjoying it. The more woke we are, the more we are prone to possessing our experience as somehow uniquely our own, like "this is my reality, and you have no right to doubt it." But that personal reality is embedded in a much larger planetary reality that doesn't care about our I-Me-Myself experiences that much. As Bjornerud says when she visited Svalbard as a graduate student:
The Daily Planet #119: On Deep Time
We barely remember what happened yesterday, so to expect us to take geological eras into consideration is a bit much. However, our lives are built on deep time - I wouldn't be writing these words if someone hadn't figured out how to turn solidified & liquified fossils into fuel.
The Daily Planet #118: On Contradiction
The term "contradiction" has many meanings. In logic it means claiming a proposition and its negation are both true at once. In conversation it means asserting the opposite of what someone else is saying. There's the Marxist version where contradictions reveal the underlying instability of the capitalist system.
The Daily Planet #117: The China Shock, Part 18
And finally, any country that's rapidly becoming more technologically capable and dominant in some industries is going to get adverse attention. Are they trustworthy? Will they eat us alive? These are fair questions, and it's instructive to see how the official Chinese sources are responding to them. This is what they have to say:
The Daily Planet #114: The China Shock, Part 15
Embodied intelligence refers to intelligent agents that have a physical or virtual body and interact with their environment through continuous sensing, decision-making, and action. Unlike traditional AI that processes static data, embodied intelligence emphasizes the dynamic loop where perception guides action, and action changes what is perceived. This interaction involves three key components: intelligence (the computational brain), embodiment (the physical or simulated body), and environment (the external world with its objects and dynamics).
The Daily Planet #113: The China Shock, Part 14
China is advancing its artificial intelligence (AI) efforts in a way that differs significantly from the United States. While the U.S. mainly focuses on developing large language models (LLMs) to achieve artificial general intelligence (AGI) - a future AI that can outperform humans in all cognitive tasks - China is taking a broader and more balanced approach. Instead of putting all its resources into one method, China is investing in multiple paths to AGI simultaneously.
The Daily Planet #112: The China Shock, Part 13
China is making a major push into embodied AI, which means creating smart robots and AI-powered machines that can sense, understand, and interact with the physical world. Unlike many Western countries that focus mainly on digital AI like large language models, China aims to combine its strengths in AI software with advanced robotics hardware. This approach is part of a national strategy to boost the economy, address social challenges like an aging population, strengthen the military, and gain a global technological edge.
The Daily Planet #111: The China Shock, Part 12
Chinese electric vehicle (EV) companies have invested a massive $143 billion between 2014 and 2025 to establish global dominance in the EV industry. Leading firms like CATL and BYD have focused on building a worldwide supply chain that covers everything from raw materials to finished vehicles. This global expansion is part of a deliberate strategy to secure resources and production capabilities amid rising geopolitical tensions and trade barriers.
The Daily Planet #110: The China Shock, Part 11
It's clear that renewables will not lead to a common human goal of addressing climate change; in fact, renewables might be a better hedge against foreign sources of energy than for climate action. In this world, China is both a supplier of energy technologies and an adversary worth hedging against.
The Daily Planet #109: The China Shock, Part 10
China is the world's largest consumer of coal, burning nearly half of the global total in 2024. This massive use is driven by its huge economy, high electricity demand, and abundant domestic coal resources. China generates about a third of the world's electricity, with coal as the dominant source. Despite rapid growth in renewable energy, China's increasing electricity needs mean it is not on track to meet its carbon intensity targets set for 2030.
The Daily Planet #108: The China Shock, Part 9
At the recent U.N. Climate Change Conference held in Belém, Brazil, Chinese electric vehicles (EVs) played a prominent role by transporting many world leaders, signaling Brazil’s growing reliance on China for its transportation and economic transformation. While Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva arrived in a Chevrolet, most other dignitaries were chauffeured in Chinese electric and hybrid cars, highlighting China’s strong presence in Brazil’s EV market.
The Daily Planet #106: The China Shock, Part 7
A decade after the Paris climate accord was signed, political support in the West is weakening, with the U.S. having withdrawn again under President Trump and Europe and Canada hesitating due to the costs and political challenges of climate policies. Despite this, the global transition to clean energy is accelerating, largely propelled by China's emergence as a clean-tech powerhouse. China's massive investments in manufacturing solar panels, batteries, and electric vehicles have dramatically lowered the costs of these technologies, making clean energy competitive with fossil fuels in many markets without heavy subsidies.
The Daily Planet #105: The China Shock, Part 6
"China Against China" by Jonathan Czinn explores the complex and often contradictory perceptions of Xi Jinping's leadership in China, particularly from the perspective of U.S. observers. Thirteen years into Xi's rule, opinions remain divided: some view him as a powerful authoritarian akin to Mao, while others see his grip on power as fragile. The article highlights how Xi has identified critical weaknesses in China's development - such as corruption, economic dependence on foreign countries, and the vulnerabilities created by decades of reform and opening - and has embarked on a counterreform agenda to strengthen China's resilience.