Future Scarcity
An interesting discussion on the implications of AI and robots. Read the whole thread.
Maybe unpopular opinion? I think an age of abundance via AI might cause more war instead of less, because the value of land on earth will trend toward infinity (there is finite land on earth), while the cost of creating robot armies to fight over it will trend toward zero.
— Phil Metzger (@DrPhiltill) April 18, 2026
The Latest From Jared
I understand some in the community have an affinity for specific hardware, but the focus should be on outcomes. With respect to SLS, the desired outcome is launching crewed Orion spacecraft at a reasonable cadence, rebuilding muscle memory, and buying down risk so we can land…
— Jared Isaacman (@rookisaacman) April 17, 2026
[Mid-morning update]
An interesting interview with him.
[Noon update]
ICYMI, from Jared’s X post: “I do not want to throw away billions of taxpayer dollars, and time we do not have, on a flavor of a rocket that is not necessary to return astronauts to the moon.”
Jeff Greason
I haven’t listened yet (it’s a two-hour interview), but I’m sure it’s interesting:
This has gone live now. Wide ranging; how I got in the field, what worthy goals are for the space enterprise, some of what we need, and of course, advanced propulsion. Gets a little emotional in spots. And 2 hours long ….https://t.co/CyO6dZPone
— Jeff Greason (@JeffGreason) April 16, 2026
Thanks to @tmro https://t.co/iIdePreSGP
Intelligence Versus Wisdom
Interesting thoughts. One of the purposes of the Senate was to be the wise house, to tamp down the impetuosity of the People’s House. We lost a lot of that with the 17th Amendment.
[Update a few minutes later]
Related: “An AI trained on engagement will optimize for engagement. An AI trained on profit will optimize for profit. An AI trained on wisdom would optimize for something else entirely, but we would have to know what wisdom looks like before we could train for it. And we have spent the last century systematically dismantling every institution that once tried to answer that question.”
ULA’s Woes
I’m starting to wonder how long they’ll survive. With Blue Origin finally flying (if still at low rates) and other providers coming on line, maybe it doesn’t matter.
Project Hail Mary
We saw it a week ago and, while it was a good movie, I wasn’t as blown away by it as many seem to have been. But Matt Shapiro thought it was great.
Cats And Cancer
They could be useful in understanding it for humans as well.
This is of particular current interest, given that we just spent several thousand dollars for surgery for one of the cats to remove a tumor in the small intestine. Fortunately, it appears that they got it all, and the prognosis for the 7YO is good.
Swallwell
What kind of odious people would have signed up to get this creature elected in the first place?
— Not-So-OK Boomer (@Rand_Simberg) April 11, 2026
[Tuesday-morning update]
Eric Swalwell and the Brett Kavanaugh karma train.
Couldn’t happen to a nicer set of scumbags.
Also, how Nancy fed Swalwell’s delusions of adequacy.
[Bumped]
The “Ceasefire”
…is merely a strategic pause. And the blockade of Iran is part of it.
[Tuesday-morning update]
I’m going to make many of you spitting mad at me for pointing this out, but now that we have started the naval blockade, Iran’s strategic position (which was already hopeless) has become terminal. They are soon going to run out of storage space for their oil. And we haven’t even…
— Ken Gardner (@KenGardner11) April 13, 2026