Hello and welcome back to Five Things!
A couple of evenings ago my wife and I discussed what we wanted to watch. I said Gilmore Girls, because it is the perfect show for when fall starts. Also, it is full of wonderful dialogs and just one of my favorite shows ever. So this weekend my wife is out of town and I spent the Saturday with our two younger daughters and we played cards, having a great evening and of course I was winning. Then, when I thought it would be nice to just sit down and write this newsletter, I went to the living room and our 11-year old daughter, affectionately known as K4, was already sitting there, watching Gilmore Girls. saying: “Gilmore Girls is the perfect show for fall, want to join me?” I hope her mother won’t find out, but we watched Gilmore Girls until way past midnight and it was just wonderful to watch her giggle in sync with me. Also, since we just watched the episode where Lorelai feels the first snow of the season coming, I am now looking forward to smelling the first snow. Yeah, I know, it is a show, but it is a wonderful one.
Are We Sleepwalking into World War III?
One important factor is a shift in the global balance of power that is encouraging revisionist powers to challenge the global dominance of the US and its allies. In 1989, the year of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the G7 nations — the US, UK, Germany, France, Italy, Canada and Japan — accounted for around two-thirds of global economic output and about the same percentage of international military spending. By 2022, the G7 represented about 43 per cent of global GDP and about half of global military spending.
The relative decline in the power of the western alliance has created an opening for revisionist powers that are unhappy with the current world order. So too has the growth of anti-war sentiment in the US, driven by disillusionment with the outcomes of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Successive American presidents — Obama, Trump in his first term and Biden — promised to be peacemakers who would end forever wars.
Yes, I know, not the lightest subject to start into this newsletter. I lived through the cold war and in retrospective that now looks like a wonderful time with few real wars going on. I do fear that not resolving regional conflicts quickly enough can lead to bigger wars that spread across large territories. And I hate that we have to spend so much money on rearmament instead of education, health and fundamental basics like clean water and affordable food.
Donald Trump has sold out Ukraine. He makes appeaser Chamberlain look like a man of iron principle
US-Russian talks on agreeing the shoddy terms of a precedent-setting American sell-out of Ukraine are at an advanced stage, after meetings in St Petersburg this week. Trump has zigzagged over the war ever since returning to office. Now, panicked by record-low poll ratings, he seems determined to scapegoat Ukraine and force its de facto capitulation. Recent steps – his shocking decision to fund Putin’s war machine by buying Russian diesel, his waiving of tougher sanctions, his mysterious, lethal interruptions in US satellite and intelligence sharing with Kyiv, and his renewed attempt to oust Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy – mark Trump out as the skulking Judas, the craven Brutus of the modern age. He makes Chamberlain look like a man of iron principle. All that’s lacking is an umbrella.
I really want somebody somewhat sane back in the White House who has some set of recognizable principles. Really, I am not expecting much right now, just an ally to be able to rely on. The upside of this whole mess: Europe is very determined now to help Ukraine defend itself.
Computer Chips Are the Most Magnificent Things Humanity Has Ever Made
Moore’s Law was never an actual law, like gravity, but an observed regularity. Chips improved on a regimented schedule. This observation became a promise: every two years, the industry would deliver a product that was twice as good, at no extra cost. The rest of the world came to count on this. Apple, for instance, takes for granted that it can design a new phone using powerful chips that do not yet exist. These fictional chips are then summoned into existence by the delusional commitment of more than two million chip-industry employees to the perpetuation of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I have developed a weird interest in the chip industry over the last few decades. It is fascinating how they do this and improve those chips with every new release, relentlessly innovating, all the time.
Cool, Cool, Cool, Palmer Luckey and Ben Lamm Made a Genetically Modified Military Dog Startup
The initial rounds of gene-editing will focus on eliminating common health conditions that impact these breeds, like hip dysplasia. Further down the line, Lamm envisions expanding to “really interesting things,” such as incorporating olfactory receptor genes from wolves to “enhance” the military dogs. (Colossal Biosciences is perhaps best known for its work on gene-edited wolves for its so-called Dire Wolf De-Extinction Project.)
Warhound, based in Texas, will also equip its canines with “Anduril’s advanced cybernetic Augments, software, and battlefield situational awareness,” according to a press release. Asked if this means the dogs will be some kind of cyborgs, Lamm clarifies that the plan right now is to supply them with tools like “advanced body armor” rather than, say, embedding some sort of computer in their dog bodies.
Why can’t somebody please tell those billionaire tech bros finally that the dystopian science-fiction books they read as boys were meant to be as a warning, not a blueprint for them to build something that could kill us all? Seriously, what’s wrong with these people?
Sending a Silly Meme Is an Act of Love
People have been sending one another memes nearly as long as the web has been worldwide, gathering amusing bits of internet ephemera and texting, emailing, or sharing it on social media with their loved ones. Before it was TikToks and Instagram Reels, it was I Can Has Cheezburger? links posted to Facebook walls. (Even before the internet existed, people engaged in meme-sharing-like behavior: your grandma clipping articles from the newspaper that she thought you might like, for instance.)
As communication goes, sending a meme is one of the lowest-lift—one might even say laziest—ways to stay in touch. It’s barely a step above not saying anything at all. But a surprisingly large body of research on meme-sharing has found that it can serve an important function in relationships and bring people closer together.
I am actually very happy that I do not anymore receive powerpoint presentations by email, which people used to collect and distribute memes back in the late 90s, early aughts. Also, when I send you a meme or a reel, always remember that I was thinking of you while sitting on the loo…
That’s it. Have a great Sunday! If you missed last Sunday’s edition of Five Things, have a look here:
— Nico