New short story: “Elective”

Your new knee isn’t as good as the old one except for the fact that it will become upgradeable rather…

New short story: “The Secret Conclave of 2039”

It wasn’t the dustiest room in the Vatican nor the most forbidding; it wasn’t frequented but it was near the…

New short story: “A Voice in the Crowd”

Richard’s statistical models for violent deaths were the best. They did not predict individual murders — even for the data-dense…

Quick link: Manufacturing delaborization and development strategy (with notes on Argentina)

Brad DeLong — a professor of Economics at Berkeley and, among other things, the author of “Slouching Towards Utopia,” probably…

New short story: “River Crossings”

The last medical bill was usually around twenty grand – the cost of moving your dead body to wherever it…

New short story: “The Festivals of Winter”

When a data leak showed the Cryogenics Lab had never gotten nearly as close to killing anybody as people had…

Informal paper: “Technology portfolio modeling, generative AI, and optimal fund design”

I’m posting a minor update of an informal paper I wrote a while ago using arguments from standard portfolio theory…

New short story: “Spoils of War”

He remembered being high on B-77 with the distant clarity with which we remember familiar strangers we know very well….

Quick link: Burning the world and/or USD 400 billion a year

The IEA report: The Oil and Gas Industry in Net Zero Transitions The key part: Oil and gas companies investments…

The one AI-related existential risk I’m worried about

People who have been fascinated since their youth with the idea that a certain thing is going to break the…