This month, AI systems autonomously disproved a math conjecture that stumped humanity for eighty years. A Mayo Clinic AI detected pancreatic cancer three years before doctors could see it. The first AI-designed drug targeting an AI-discovered disease mechanism showed positive results in human trials.
In the same month, graduates booed commencement speakers for mentioning artificial intelligence. Pope Leo XIV issued an encyclical denouncing the “culture of power” behind AI. Sam Altman’s home was attacked twice in three days, first with a Molotov cocktail, then with gunfire; the first attacker carried a manifesto listing the names and addresses of additional AI executives. On Reddit, r/antiai surged past 580,000 human visitors. An organized AI Resist List launched. Law enforcement issued formal warnings about anti-tech extremism.
The technology has never been more capable. The resistance has never been fiercer. If you are reading this newsletter, you are probably feeling both of those things at the same time. That tension is the story.
We have been writing about this trajectory for over a year. In Dreams of AGI vs. Economic Reality we identified the economic mismatch. In Trust, AI Evolution, and Social Stability we argued the real risk was never the technology but the people behind it. In Stabilizing a Socioeconomic System Through a Value Transition we named the deeper problem: the world is accelerating through a phase transition from material scarcity to attention scarcity, and no amount of containment or alignment guarantees structural stability. That has to be designed.
None of what is happening right now is surprising. What is new is that it is all happening at once.
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