Rajeev

[Rajeev @rajeevruparell]

Thus shall you think of all this fleeting world:
A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream;
A flash of lightening in a summer cloud,
A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream.
– The Diamond Sutra

[Gary Marcus @GaryMarcus]

AI is absolutely not going to double humanity’s GDP by the early 2030s.

Why do we platform these crazy claims that never come true?

[Gary Marcus @GaryMarcus]

Holy shit, we are definitely all about to die. Had no idea how much progress had been made!

[Richard Seymour @leninology]

AI did not go 'rogue', did not 'solve' the Navier-Stokes problem, does not have 'goals', is not and will not ever be conscious, certainly is not going to evolve into a god-device and wipe out humanity. Criti-hype obscures the real dangers.

https://t.co/S8ceOAneeE

[Robert Parenteau,CFA until CFAI CMO fraud revealed @MacroEdge1]

The AI capex boom, 2-3 years in, has brought no labor productivity or TFP boom, no product price deflation, no killer consumer apps, no household employment gains, no real GDP acceleration (it all bleeds out through imports) and massive equity price appreciation. Nice one.

[Drop Site @DropSiteNews]

⭕️ Iran’s Battered Economy: $270B in Damage, 70% Inflation, Millions Jobless

Columbia University economist Adam Tooze, speaking on Foreign Policy’s podcast, argues the economic devastation being inflicted on Iran is “hugely asymmetric” and vastly underreported in Western media — context that Drop Site’s own reporting from Tehran bears out in stark detail.

🔸 The scale
➤ Iran estimates $270 billion in damages, roughly half of GDP
➤ IMF projects Iran’s economy will contract 6% in 2026, with consumer prices rising nearly 70%
➤ Up to 4.1 million Iranians could be pushed into poverty, per UNDP
➤ Israel has systematically targeted steel plants, petrochemical facilities, and industrial infrastructure

🔸 Jobs and livelihoods
➤ Iran’s Labor Ministry estimates 1-2 million thrown out of work; labor unionists put the figure at 3-4 million
➤ A major Iranian jobs platform recorded 320,000 applications in a single day in April
➤ Engineers and PhDs are driving taxis and selling gold to survive

🔸 Daily life
➤ Food staples like cooking oil, rice, and chicken have doubled or tripled year-over-year
➤ Internet shutdowns have cost businesses over $6 million a day
➤ Government workers now operate on five-hour days due to electricity and water shortages

🔗 Drop Site’s Murtaza Hussain and Reza Sayah, who reported from Tehran, write about the cost of the war on Iran’s economy. Read the full story at the link below.

[David Sirota @davidsirota]

Destroying the @InternetArchive's @WayBackMachine would be the equivalent of the burning of the Library of Alexandria - one of the worst losses of knowledge in history.

Media giants are now threatening to do this.

We can't let this happen.

Pass it on.

[The Jerusalem Post @Jerusalem_Post]

A recent survey reveals a strong right-wing shift among young Israeli voters, with Netanyahu leading as the preferred prime ministerial candidate.
https://t.co/dwqmjl6K3U

[Rajeev @rajeevruparell]

US 10-year yields hit highest level since war began https://t.co/UUZ4ZL9qb2 via @ft

[Rajeev @rajeevruparell]

https://t.co/84g7xmTCzp

[Gary Marcus @GaryMarcus]

OpenAI really is special!

And by the way what I told for you for the last eight years turned out to be true: you can’t get to AGI with scaling alone.

🤷‍♂️

[Matt Stoller @matthewstoller]

Gee I wonder why the 'AI is now God' narrative went into hyperdrive last week.

[Gary Marcus @GaryMarcus]

Wanna understand Sam Altman? Watch this February video – knowing what we know now.

When he says things he can’t actually deliver, or that aren’t the full truth, he often looks up at the sky.

Remember folks, this video is February; he knew then how much a struggle the development of GPT-5 had been. But he didn’t let on. He made predictions he couldn’t back up – with absolute conviction. That’s his M.O.

As we can now seen in hindsight, in his big talk about the leap from GPT-4 to GPT-5 (which he repeated in various ways many times), Altman wasn’t saying something he knew to be true, he was straight up bluffing.

Most of the world (and much of the media) accepted him at his word; I hope they will know better next time.

[Rajeev @rajeevruparell]

https://t.co/gdq0TuG8z5

[Rajeev @rajeevruparell]

https://t.co/Xy3osMU7eC

[Rajeev @rajeevruparell]

https://t.co/DpyAO5hOrQ.

[Rajeev @rajeevruparell]

What the Epstein Files Reveal About How Elite Worlds Work | The Ezra Kle... https://t.co/VydA0FpACF via @YouTube

[John Palmer @johnpalmer]

https://t.co/YXBERSUrHf

[Ed Zitron @edzitron]

this whole story is"researchers and investors who are directly invested in this are saying vague things about how powerful it is, and also a confirmed scam artist's AI-generated slop post went viral," with a smidge of "the companies are also saying the models are powerufl"

[Haaretz.com @haaretzcom]

"The West Bank's Area C is almost completely ethnically cleansed" | Haaretz Podcast
https://t.co/mQgJbp6d6R

[Rajeev @rajeevruparell]

https://t.co/3DwBSynGSX