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"AI-controlled" sounds like an unmanned fighter, but there was still a pilot in the cockpit who could take control.

Everyone has some work they would gladly automate. I wouldn't call it "slaves". More like an underpaid staff.

It depends on what "win" means. The US can win the opening military phase pretty decisively. The part that keeps failing is turning that into a political end state that can survive after the shooting slows down.

It should be no surprise that the US cannot immediately overwhelm Iran, which has prepared for war with the USA since the overthrow of the Shah in 1979. Iran's new leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in November 1979, one day after 66 American diplomats and civilians were taken hostage at the U.S. embassy in Tehran, labelled the USA "the Great Satan":

https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2026/07/18/iran-ayat...

Consider that, since that time (46 years), much of Iran's income has been directed to preparation for surviving nuclear war with the USA. Ergo underground living and production facilities, similar to those that the Soviet Union has constructed in Russia:

https://www.bing.com/search?q=how%20many%20soviet%20%20under...

have been built and occupied in Iran.

Defeating such an entrenched enemy requires conquering surface forces, then denying each bunker access to the surface and bunker-by-bunker surrender, asphyxiation or destruction. This requires boots on the ground and/or automation beyond the current SOA.

The alternative is to allow Iran to possess nuclear weapons.


Just let it rain extasy pills, fentanyl, and whatnot else instead of bombs. Same for asphyxiation of bunkers, gas them with some airborne aerosolized opiods, like the russians did in a cinema in Moscow during a hostage situation.

Or PCP! HARR!


> The US can win the opening military phase pretty decisively.

Can they? Iran seems to have destroyed them pretty decisively, after the literal first day of casualties (which were happening while Iran thought it had just reached an agreement that would prevent a war, per the Omani negotiators at that time).


Which requires troops in the ground, a large civil administration, and a way of making some ofthe existing powers in the civilian population feel like they are better off under you

Interesting. There is state-linked capital, big tech, VC, and foreign/sovereign money.

In other words, it is fairly typical of many Chinese "companies".

What many in the West seem to have trouble grasping is the fact that a "company" in China is not an autonomous economic construct but is instead more deeply intertwined with the state.

A Chinese "company" is a hybrid entity that only exists with the approval of and in cooperation with and in service to the state. Just ask Jack Ma.

Complaining that this doesn't match the way the game is played in the West does nothing to deflect the competition it presents. It is specifically designed to break Western style free market capitalism and AI is a prominent test case.


Well, everything in non-democratic countries, except (part of) organised crime, exist with the approval and in service of the state. So formal ownership doesn't matter there (this is why Chinese stock market is a joke).

I don't think anyone assumed it to be any different. This is the case in every non-democratic country and this is exactly why capitalism is inseparable with democracy (because there won't be capital when there is no system that ensures that it won't be arbitrarily taken from you, with you thrown into "re-education" camp). Similarly, socialism is inseparable with authoritarianism because give people real voting rights and they will vote socialism out. Hybrid regimes that have been attempted, quickly flipped onto one or the other side - democratic capitalism, or authoritarian socialism - because they are unsustainable and can only be maintained for some time with careful management.


because they are unsustainable and can only be maintained for some time with careful management.

Is this a fact --- or a hope?

China is a different culture and is carving it's own path --- one that doesn't exactly match any that came before.

The West expected that it would change China. What is actually happening is China is changing the West.

For example, trade with the USA is now controlled by one person. It's hard to get much more authoritarian and anti-capitalistic than this.


I only meant to say that China will simply revert to government ownership of virtually everything, eventually, when they will no longer need to maintain the mask of capitalism. Government already owns 60% of productive capital there.

I didn't mean to say that China is set for failure as a nation. Merely that it will eventually become again fully "socialist"/"communist" rather than remain a hybrid system it currently is.


But will the USA eventually become again fully "democratic"/"capitalist" rather than remain a hybrid (aka fascist) system it currently is?

I think judgments and predictions are far from certain in both cases and are mainly rooted in bias and wishful thinking.


Either this, or will instead become a China-like full-on fascist. Because capitalism stops working if there are no guarantees of private property (no point to own stock if company can be nationalised, diluted, or simply gifted to a crony at whim), and every dictatorship eventually slides to that territory. US is no exception. It will not remain a hybrid for a long time - it will go either way.

A long handwritten essay used to at least prove someone spent time on it.


A 90% recovery process does not help much if most batteries never make it into the right recycling stream in the first place.


I expected this to be mostly about Apple being angry that OpenAI hired its hardware people, but the complaint sounds more specific and obviously it is still only Apple’s side for now.


Success makes the old playbook feel safer than it really is.


The awkward part is that modern software communities often do not produce the kind of durable secondary sources Wikipedia wants.


It’s also intriguing how an academic article read by no one would pass as valid source but an YouTube channel with multiple videos about the thing reaching millions of people across several countries and languages would not. I understand it’s not about reach, but trust and such. And it’s weird that Wikipedia, a Website, does not trust, in essence, its very medium.


Calling this a failure seems a bit unfair. The signatures forced an official EU response, even if they did not produce a law.

The disappointing part is the voluntary industry code. Publishers are not being asked to run servers forever, only to avoid making paid games completely unusable after shutdown.

At what point does buying a game become nothing more than renting access until the publisher changes its mind?


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