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  1. ☝️ i am so happy about this! ☝️

    thank you BRAZIL !!!!!!

    Brazil prosecuted their traitor when We Failed to because of US legislator's cowardice

    Then US People reelected an Insurrectionist Traitor

    & then just when the fascists thought they were going to win, BRAZIL brings it home for Democracy!

    Now let's bring it home for Ukraine!

  2. Analysis: The Civil War in France

    Students from the Paris suburbs - home to France’s mainly non-white working poor - wanted teachers, desks & buildings fit for education.

    State racism is real, &, every few years, young people come out to demand justice - currently augmented by wider protests against establishment attitudes toward low wages, high prices, Israel's genocide, support for Ukraine, decay of public services

    counterpunch.org/2026/10/27/th

    #FrenchProtests #USPol #EUPol #news #democracy .

  3. Trump’s Diesel Deal Exposed: Cash for Putin, Danger for U.S. Troops and NATO

    Cheaper diesel is the sales pitch. New revenue for Putin is the opportunity. Trump’s Russia deal raises urgent questions about Iran, American troops, Ukraine, and NATO security.

    egbertowillies.com/2026/10/26/

  4. "Garrett Langley, the CEO of automatic license plate reader company Flock, told an audience of police chiefs at a private police conference Sunday that anti-Flock protests around the country are not real, according to leaked audio obtained by 404 Media.

    He also said his wife advised him to never apologize, said he would prefer to never do interviews with the press again, and claimed without evidence that the social media opposition to Flock is driven mostly by Russian bots.

    “Somebody was paying for [the social media posts and] stopped paying for it,” Langley said about the many viral posts criticizing his company’s technology. “Social media chatter on Flock is down about 95 percent from July. It went down 50 percent last week when Ukraine bombed a Russian data center with a drone. Literally 50 percent overnight. And so look, I’m the last person, my wife as well, she’s like ‘This is crazy, these people are getting paid to say these things,’” he added, repeating a disproven theory that Ukraine’s strikes on Russian data centers had a significant impact on internet bot activity. "

    404media.co/in-leaked-audio-fl

    #USA #Surveillance #Flock #PoliceState #Privacy

  5. Silný příběh ukrajinského vojáka, který byl na konci své dlouhé osamocené šichty vážně raněn. Přišel o chodidlo a sám si musel amputovat druhou nohu v kotníku. Se zásobami shazovanými z dronů přežíval dalších ~8 měsíců(!) v kill zóně.
    Vydržel, dokud Ukrajinci nevyvinuli velkého drona s navijákem a popruhem. Tím ho poté odtransportovali na bezpečnější území...

    Sláva Ukrajině!

    reuters.com/graphics/UKRAINE-C

    #válka #Ukrajina #dron

  6. #TracksEast auf #arte: jetzt verstehe ich, wovor unsere Dorpolitiker*innen Angst haben: vor Schüler*innen oder - wie in #Serbien - Student*innen. Anders als bei uns finden die studentischen Proteste dort breite Unterstützung in der Bevölkerung. Die sensationelle Wahlerfolg der studentischen Liste ist noch nicht eingearbeitet:

    *Serbien, ein Land in Aufruhr
    ---------------------------------------------
    "Als Gastgeber für Verhandlungen zwischen Russland und der Ukraine sieht Präsident Aleksandar #Vučić sein Land. Doch tatsächlich gibt es innerhalb Serbiens derzeit die größten #Massenproteste der Geschichte des Landes. Generalstreiks, besetzte Unis, Straßenblockaden. In welche Zukunft wollen die Serb*innen? (...)"
    arte.tv/de/videos/122199-009-A

    #gernsehen

  7. 24.02.2022
    Rund 5.800 Windenergieanlagen in Zentraleuropa sind von einer Störung der Satellitenkommunikation betroffen, z.T. Austausch #HW erforderlich.

    "Hinter dem Ausfall stand der Cyberangriff auf das Satellitennetz KA-SAT. Die Europäische Union schrieb diese Attacke später Russland zu. Demnach habe diese etwa eine Stunde vor dem russischen Einmarsch in die Ukraine stattgefunden – und die militärische Aggression erleichtert."

    consilium.europa.eu/en/press/p

    #Russland #Cyberangriff #HybriderKrieg

  8. “Anarchism is democracy taken seriously”*…

    Further (and to some extent, contra) to yesterday’s post– Martin Gurri on the need to reground Liberal Democracy— the estimable Alan Jacobs, who suggests that we need to get in touch with our “inner anarchist.” In a recent post, he shares a “mini-manifesto”…

    I am temperamentally and morally a conservative, which is to say: I believe that I am charged with preserving my inheritance, nurturing it, and passing it along to the next generation. That inheritance is spiritual, cultural, natural, and political. (It may or may not be financial; that matters little.) Our largest social problems stem from the fact that our political economy promotes the concentration of power and money, and the concentration of power and money militates against the preservation of any spiritual, cultural, and natural inheritance. That is how we get an unprecedentedly rich and theoretically free society that also features corrupt religious institutions, insipid art, and dying rivers. I will continue to do my best to conserve and promote my Christian faith, my convictions about art, and my natural environment, but I must do so in unpropitious conditions. We need an alternative political economy that encourages rather than inhibiting the work of conservation, and I think anarchism, properly understood, is that alternative.

    Citing his “major guides” to thinking about anarchism– Peter Marshall, Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism; James Scott, Two Cheers for Anarchism; and David Graeber, essays— he notes that, on his old blog he posted often on the subject, and directs us to “this essay [source of the image above] and then this reflection on Christian anarchy” for his fundamental thoughts.

    But the meat of the post is the “notebook” of thoughts on anarchism that follow. A few examples:

    It is vitally important to distinguish anarchism from libertarianism. The highest goods of the libertarian are freedom of action and freedom to own property, both conceived as belonging to the individual. The anarchist, by contrast, seeks some form of the good life in collaboration and cooperation with others. Anarchism is therefore intrinsically social, pluralistic, and unplanned. Because, as Isaiah Berlin says, the Great Goods are not always compatible with one another, you collaborate with people who share your priorities, understanding and accepting that others will find other structures of collaboration. And in pursuing those goods you have the humility to recognize that you don’t know how they may be achieved; that is something you discover through your collaboration. (Related by me: this and this.)

    Anarchism is therefore not a system of government but a practice, and one can practice it at any level of social interaction. The parent who tells two squabbling children to work out their differences themselves, rather than appealing to a parental verdict, is practicing anarchism, and a very important form of it too. (See my comments on machi no hoiku and mimamoru in this post. Anarchist pedagogy!)…

    The true anarchist can never throw bombs, because when you do that you are making decisions for other people without their consent, which is anthithetical to anarchism…

    Anarchism can never be revolutionary in the sense in which political systems (communism, socialism, fascism) can be revolutionary. But the ultimate effects of anarchism can be far greater than the effects of any of those other movements. As Hannah Arendt said, every revolutionary becomes a conservative the day after the revolution; as The Who said, “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.” Anarchism declines bosses [but importantly, not leaders] altogether. And that is truly revolutionary – but it is only brought about by means so slow and patient that no one can see them at work…

    So much more, eminently worth reading in full: “Anarchist Notebook.”

    Extra credit opportunity: recognizing that Jacobs’ critique of the status quo is not inconsistent with Gurri’s, how might we take up Gurri’s challenge to reground Democracy in a way that stirs in the “commons” thinking of anarchism?

    * Edward Abbey

    ###

    As we rebuild better, we might send revolutionary birthday greetings to Nestor Makhno (AKA Bat’ko Makhno); he was born on this date in 1888 (O.S.). He was a Ukrainian anarchist revolutionary and the commander of the Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine during the Ukrainian War of Independence (a war to regain independence by the Ukrainian People’s Republic against the Bolsheviks, who had annexed Ukraine into the Soviet Union). He established the Makhnovshchina (loosely translated as “Makhno movement”), a mass movement in the Ukrainian peasantry to establish an anarchist system in the country between 1918 and 1921.

    Sadly, that struggle for independence continues to this day.

    source

    #Anarchism #anarchy #BatKoMakhno #collaboration #commons #culture #democracy #history #NestorMakhno #philosophy #politics #Ukraine
  9. europesays.com/people/279706/ THIS WEEK: the EU’s new Canada offer, cash for farmers and Russia’s Lavrov returns to G20? – EUobserver #{@type:DefinedTerm #identifier:24} #identifier:4063} #identifier:4308} #identifier:4338} #identifier:4511} #name:Canada #name:China #name:Russia #Name:ThisWeek(Agenda) #name:Ukraine #termCode:agenda #termCode:canada #termCode:china #termCode:russia #termCode:ukraine #UrsulaVonDerLeyen

  10. Serbian president concedes defeat to student-led movement in election
    abc.net.au/news/2026-10-26/ser

    The Student List has won 104 seats in the 250-seat parliament so far in vote counting, and it's likely the final tally will be 135-140 seats.

    Aleksandar Vučić has conceded defeat, ending his 12 years as President. The Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), is projected to win only 105 seats.

    Students protested for months, saying the SNS is unfit to govern Serbia due to corruption and authoritarianism.

    It certainly doesn't help that Aleksandar Vučić is a RWN and was strong supportive of Putin's invasion of Ukraine. Likewise, having Putin endorse his campaign would have been the kiss of death.

    There are clear parallels between the election in Serbia yesterday and the election in Hungary in April. Viktor Orban, another RWNJ and vassal of Putin, was voted out after two stretches totalling 20 years as Prime Minister of Hungary.

    #Serbia #SerbiaPol #SerbiaVotes #AleksandarVučić #StudentList

  11. 'Immediately acting on this conviction, he offers NATO Dutch F-35s for deployment at the alliance’s eastern border in the event of an invasion. The jets still need a software update to enable them to identify the latest Russian radar systems, which the US has to approve and deliver. Eichelsheim: ‘You also have to be a believer that we’re actually going to be attacked.’ The commander of the Dutch air force eventually secures the Americans’ cooperation, mere days before the invasion'.
    volkskrant.nl/kijkverder/v/202

  12. Je serais un gouvernement qui achète des armes aux États-Unis, je me poserais des questions. Bon d'accord, ça fait longtemps qu'il aurait dû se poser des questions. Mais en gros, si Musk/Trump peuvent couper/limiter pour l'Ukraine Starlink et Starshield, la version militaire, qu'est-ce qui protège ce gouvernement dans le futur de ne pas subir la même chose ? Ou encore que les E-U refusent de fournir les pièces de rechange, ou qu'ils coupent l'accès à des outils numériques indispensables à l'utilisation de certains équipements ?

    #politique #armée #ÉtatsUnis #Musk #Trump

  13. The death toll from an Oct. 23 missile strike on a factory in Oryol, Russia, has risen to four, with 19 hurt and one missing, the governor says. Ukraine says the plant, Proton, supplies parts for Russian missile and air-defense systems. t.me/astrapress/129314

  14. Sunday Morning Reading

    Writing a blog is an interesting experience. So is reading them. The best blogs are the ones where the person behind the keyboard shines through. You can say it takes courage to put yourself and your opinions out there. You would be correct. A lot of that got diminished when social media took over because of its hit and run nature. But blogs and the writers behind them are still there and surface now and again. Today’s Sunday Morning Reading features a few along with a few other tricks and treats. Hope you check them and the rest of the links out.

    Good writing stands out. Even on the Internet where it comes in small waves and ripples, subsequently washed away by more of the same, or often overwhelmed by the slop running alongside threatening to take it over. David Todd McCarty’s A Stream Has No Memory isn’t about that necessarily, and yet it is. All things flow.

    As I mentioned, personal blogging took a hit when the age of social media dawned. Yet, those that still exist, though not always as prolific, still provide insight when a writer allows you to peek into deeper waters. In many ways putting yourself out there, regardless of where, can easily become a personal hell. There’s been quite a controversy eddying about in tech circles about some who loudly condemned what was formerly Twitter reversing course and just as publicly announcing that they are returning. To each their own personal hell, I guess. I’ve stated my feelings about that here and here. Noted developer Marco Arment took to his blog with a post simply and aptly titled Community. It isn’t about what X marks the spot, it’s about what I believe deep down we all search for when we choose to share ourselves in our writing and our creative work. It can be lonely even with a magnitude of followers in whatever personal hell you choose to put yourself into.

    Jason Snell links to an excellent post by Cory Doctorow called Critique And Writing. Yes, it’s about AI and folks using it to generate editorial feedback, but it’s about so much more. We develop critical thinking by critiquing the work of others who work in the same field, whether it be writing or other disciplines. I had an acting professor once tell the class that the way we responded to the work of others told him more about how we were developing (or not) as actors as the work we ourselves did onstage.

    In the category of things we all share but wish we didn’t Neil Steinberg takes on scams and their persistent and constantly replicating existence in I Look Forward To Reviewing Your Proposal And Learning About The Quest For Pie.

    Natasha MH takes a look at perhaps the year’s most controversial film, Digger, in Hail The Conquering Heroes. That film is becoming a personal measuring stick for me as to who sees the world we live in as I do and who doesn’t.

    Halloween is upon us. With grandkids that’s quite a treat. But it can also be tricky. I’m headed there next weekend because my grandson has convinced us that we have to go trick-or-treating with him and his sister. He’s chosen for me to be costumed as a T-Rex. (Wearing costumes is my own personal hell.) Regardless of my escapades, I marvel at all of the decorations that abound and proliferate in yards up and down every block of every town rendering them all somewhat meaningless. Rex Huppke takes on the topic in America Has An Addiction To Giant Halloween Skeletons.

    And if Halloween spirits swirling amongst all of the evil things going on in the real world aren’t enough to scare the beejeebus out of you give a read to Max Seddon’s piece The Putin Whisperers about three men who worked to stop Putin from unleashing nuclear Armageddon. Some things are just damn scary.

    All things flow.

    (Image from The Cleveland Museum of Art on Unsplash.)

    Thanks for reading. Feel free to subscribe if you want. It’s free. If you’re interested in just what the heck Sunday Morning Reading is all about you can read more about the origins of Sunday Morning Reading here. If you’d like more click on the Sunday Morning Reading link in the category column to check out what’s been shared on Sunday’s past. You can also find more of my writings on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. This site does not use affilate links.

     

    #ai #blog #blogging #books #Community #Culture #Internet #life #Movies #russia #SocialMedia #SundayMorningReading #Tech #ukraine #Writing
  15. RE: mastodon.social/@Jinjirrie/117

    There’s a reason the Israeli MFA was so keen to share the video. Beyond the cheap, exploitative #Nova branding, it featured an #AI-generated Black woman. In an Orientalist context, nothing signals indignity more efficiently than a Black face deployed to launder the crime of ethnic cleansing.

    It It is harder to sell the same claim through recent immigrants from Russia and Ukraine, many of whom, the argument goes, discovered their Jewish identity only when they learned of the benefits available to those who move to Palestine-Israel, as people indigenous to a land with which they have no meaningful connection. Even more challenging is using actual Arab Jews, because they are a reminder that these Jews are in fact indigenous to the region, unlike a random Eastern European immigrant. #Zionism’s biggest achievement is forgetting the Arabness of indigenous Jews.

    Nor is there another minority in Israel that has been treated worse than actual Black Jews, particularly the Ethiopian community. Jewishness is not a genetic trait, and there is no test for it. Yet Israel’s treatment of Ethiopian Jews echoes, in disturbing ways, the racialized and eugenic logic of 1930s #Germany.

    rollingstone.com/music/music-n

  16. ⚡️Podcast: decodingtrolls.net/p/podcast-f

    The Real Russia is not the Russia of the parades, or the imagined Russia of Historical Russia. It is the Russia of record, indicted by the post-World War II legal order for its crimes in Ukraine.

  17. Please copy and paste into the form on the website of your Senators and Representative and please share with friends. congress.gov/contact-us

    Dear Sen/Rep,

    I object to President Trump’s new whistleblower program for which he alone will provide “binding” arbitration.

    Not only is Trump’s action a usurpation of power, this proposal conflicts with existing whistleblower law, the False Claims Act which provides compensation of up to 25-30% of recovered proceeds. But in those cases, the fraud must be shown to be real.

    The first recipient, Nick Shirley, is receiving $10,000 for videos that he claimed proved child care center fraud in Minnesota. The videos were debunked by reputable news organizations, state investigations, and unannounced compliance visits. Shirley’s fraud not substantiated, yet he is being rewarded for lying with a check for $10,000.

    Trump’s $25 million program, not expressly authorized by Congress, is supposed to be self-funded. But in Shirley’s case, the federal government received no compensation from the state of Minnesota because no fraud was proven.

    This is yet another pre-election boondoggle designed to deflect from Trump’s failed war of choice in Iran, his subservient behavior towards Russia and his duplicitous behavior towards Ukraine.

    I want you to call out this travesty for what it is. Speak out now and speak out loudly. Investigate this $25 million budget source and determine its legality, as well.
    #resist #ResistOfTheDay #fraud #greed

  18. ‘… the CIA’s operations are now “much more aggressive” than they were during the Biden administration.

    ‘As the ODNI has declined in size and relevance, the CIA, with Ratcliffe in charge, has reclaimed its traditional role at the center of the intelligence community.

    'And his relationship with Trump and low-profile manner have probably helped keep the president from attacking the agency.

    ‘The director was using a line of communication informally known as “the channel,” which allows Russian and American spies to talk candidly, away from the scrutiny of the press or the grandstanding of politicians. Putin, an ex-KGB officer, would understand that Ratcliffe had come not as a diplomatic envoy but as a fellow spy, with a message he felt was important for Putin to hear.

    ‘Broadly speaking, current and former officers told me, morale is highest in the operations directorate, among the officers who conduct the espionage that Ratcliffe wants to emphasize. Personnel in the Special Activities Center, which conducts covert and paramilitary activities, are particularly satisfied, recently retired officers told me, perhaps because they’re so busy, and not only in Ukraine.

    ‘Analysts strive for objectivity. But intelligence as a practice is not truly apolitical, because it’s an instrument of presidential power. The most successful CIA directors know how to tell their bosses the truth while also serving their interests’.
    theatlantic.com/national-secur

  19. Український M&A за дев'ять місяців 2026 року досяг $2,14 млрд. Торік за той самий період було $1,10 млрд. Дані KPMG M&A Radar.

    Але заголовок обманює. Одна угода, покупка Ivano-Frankivskcement групою TCC, дає близько $860 млн. Без неї виходить приблизно $1,28 млрд. Це все одно зростання, тільки спокійніше.

    Ось що цікавіше. Частка українських покупців впала з 70% до 59% ринку. Це 30 угод. Іноземців було 13 проти 8 торік. Їхній розкритий обсяг виріс із $41 млн до $1,275 млрд. Навіть без TCC це близько $415 млн, приблизно вдесятеро більше.

    Куди йдуть гроші. Технології: 14 угод. Агробізнес: 8 угод на $428 млн. Енергетика: з 2 до 5 угод. Оборонні технології: 5 угод вище порогу $5 млн проти 2 торік. Серед найбільших ще Swarmer і Ratel Robotics на близько $224 млн та PZU і MetLife Ukraine на близько $100 млн.

    Для фаундера і власника бізнесу це просте правило. Покупець з-за кордону вже платить за український актив, і платить у секторах, де є виробництво, дані або оборонна цінність.

    Контрарна теза. Багато хто чекає закінчення війни, щоб продавати дорожче. Але іноземці купують зараз, а не після. Чекати може означати віддати маржу тому, хто не чекав.

    Якби до вас завтра прийшов іноземний покупець, ви б знали, яку частину бізнесу готові продати і за яким мультиплікатором?

    #україна #ma #інвестиції #бізнес #virgroup

  20. IC Brief Morning — 2026-10-25

    Russian intelligence operations are diversifying across orbital, proxy, and embedded-agent vectors as Iranian lethal plotting drives embassy drawdowns, stretching Western services across domains. A repeat Russian satellite approach within 10 km of a Western spacecraft by November 30 is unlikely, and a US military strike on Iranian territory by the same date is unlikely. High confidence in both reflects consistent multi-source reporting. Moscow retains orbital geometry to close again; the DNI memo backs drawdowns, not strikes.

    Russia's human-intelligence infrastructure includes a registered Israeli think tank linked to a Russian presidential directorate that placed paid journalists near Knesset access, and a Ukrainian citizen arrested in Germany for collecting armored-vehicle data from defense industry contacts. German prosecutors are unlikely to charge the suspect within 90 days. NATO supplier firms face a vetting gap that expulsions do not close, absent a shift from Russian non-traditional cover.

    A halt to US intelligence sharing with Ukraine by late November is unlikely, as CIA operational tempo constrains a cutoff, though a Ukrainian strike on Russian energy infrastructure remains the strongest trigger for a presidential order. Moderate confidence rests on anonymous sourcing. Convicted Brazilian intelligence chief Ramagem is very unlikely to face US custody by November 30; ICE's release and the expelled police liaison signal political protection.

    icbrief.org/icbrief/

  21. The Rise of AI: Is There Hope for Mankind?

    Beyond Today Magazine

    November—December 2025

    Extraordinary advances in artificial intelligence fuel dreams of ease on one hand, and nightmares of catastrophe on the other. Will AI supplant human decision-making? Will humanity even survive?

    The Rise of AI: Is There Hope for Mankind?

    by Steven Britt

    ince the release of ChatGPT in late 2022, the world has been captivated by advances in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). As these systems become more humanlike in their output, everyone—from leading experts in the field to presidents and pundits alike—is feeling the accelerated pace of technology and wondering where we are headed.

    In 2023, Elon Musk warned, “AI is more dangerous than, say, mismanaged aircraft design or production maintenance or bad car production . . . It has the potential of civilization destruction” (emphasis added throughout).

    Is there reason to fear AI? Is it possible that AI will soon achieve human-level or even superhuman intelligence? And, if so, is there hope for mankind to survive the creation and implementation of such a powerful technology?

    When machines learn to think

    While the AI we see today is impressive, many experts believe we are only a few years away from artificial general intelligence (AGI)—systems with the humanlike ability to solve entirely new problems by innovation, experimentation and learning.

    Since the inception of the machine age, computer software has only been able to accomplish rigid, preprogrammed instructions within strict boundaries. However, AI is now able, without a single line of new code, to perform a multitude of tasks on request. In minutes, it can make a better diagnosis than your doctor, out-argue a lawyer, translate a speech into another language, negotiate a contract and write a poem about it all in Shakespearian style.

    The current reality was nearly unthinkable to the average person just three years ago when ChatGPT debuted. At the time of this writing, AI models are already able to score above average on IQ tests and ace graduate-level exams across multiple disciplines.

    Despite these impressive achievements, these systems fall short of AGI.

    Intelligence, much like consciousness, is difficult to actually define, and there is no widely accepted definition of exactly what constitutes AGI. Current AI systems perform well on tests because they have likely seen the information before—a distinguishing feature of AGI would be the humanlike ability to solve entirely new challenges, learning and adapting as it goes.

    While today’s AI tools can already outperform most human beings on a wide variety of written and verbal tests, a true AGI system would be a world-changing breakthrough. The reason is simple: Machine intelligence can be scaled just by hooking up more processors. One could easily create entire teams of AGIs working together on complex problems from different angles just as people would—researching, experimenting, publishing findings and reasoning. They would never sleep, never take a break, and would operate at superhuman speed.

    The first and most obvious task on the agenda, in the minds of many, would be to set this AGI to work unlocking the secrets of building even higher intelligence—redesigning and improving itself until it has completely surpassed human beings, a level known as artificial superintelligence (ASI).

    Much thought has gone into the consequences of AGI or ASI becoming a reality, and the imagined outcomes fall into four different possible endings to the story:

    1. The A.I. utopia. Guided by careful design and moral wisdom, AGI works tirelessly to end disease, to design and build clean energy grids, and to free humanity to pursue creativity. Work becomes optional, poverty fades and everyone lives happily ever after.

    2. The hostile machine. Like the plot of numerous action movies, a rogue AI decides it would be better off without mankind and moves to destroy us.

    3. The paperclip maximizer problem. Philosopher Nick Bostrom warned in 2004 that even a neutral AGI can be lethal if it’s simply given the wrong goal. In this scenario, the AGI is set over a factory and told to make as many paperclips as possible. It soon begins converting forests, oceans and eventually human beings into raw materials for more paperclips—inadvertently destroying mankind in a blind pursuit of a poorly defined goal!

    4. Human mischief—supercharged. The most likely and earliest danger is abuse of this rapidly changing technology for evil. Just as mid-20th-century physics gave way to nuclear bombs with terrible destructive power, nations or criminals could weaponize and unleash AGI for cyberwarfare, bioweapons and more.

    Notice that only one of these outcomes doesn’t end with the destruction of mankind! But will the technologies really advance to such extremes?

    2025: The year of AI agents

    By the end of 2024, tech leaders were already calling 2025 “the year of AI agents,” signaling a fundamental change in how AI would be used.

    Until recently, AI tools like ChatGPT could only generate text and ideas—they could not take real-world action outside of giving a response to a user’s input. AI agents change that completely.

    The key difference between a chatbot and an AI agent is that an agent can interface with other software tools, even without being explicitly told to do so, to accomplish a task on its own. The earliest step toward AI agents was adding simple web-search features, allowing AI to perform its own Internet searches, scanning through dozens of different websites to answer detailed queries with up-to-date information.

    Significantly, on July 17, 2025, Open-AI released Agent Mode in ChatGPT, imbued with the ability to fully use the Internet through a web browser. For example, you can give Agent Mode the dates of an upcoming trip, your budget and some interests, and it can research the area, plan a full, day-by-day itinerary and book your hotel and tickets for you!

    The massive financial bet on AI

    If investment is a measure of expectation, the world’s richest companies and governments all clearly believe that AGI—or something similarly world-changing—is coming soon.

    In January 2025, OpenAI announced construction of Project Stargate, a $500 billion datacenter requiring over five gigawatts of power—more than twice the output of Hoover Dam. Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s supercomputing center, dubbed Colossus, has cost $4 billion so far and draws 150 megawatts from the grid, with plans to spend $25 billion to quadruple its capacity to nearly 1 gigawatt.

    And the spending doesn’t stop at hardware. In one of the most aggressive talent recruiting wars in history, Meta (formerly known as Facebook) has offered elite AI researchers compensation packages worth $300 million per person over four years—sometimes more than $100 million in the first year!

    In all this, key chipmaker Nvidia skyrocketed to become the world’s most valuable company in history, topping $4.5 trillion in value.

    This “compute race” resembles the nuclear arms buildup of the Cold War, but with one striking difference—the pace. Nuclear weapons development spanned decades; ChatGPT was released just three years ago.

    Russian President Vladimir Putin famously said in 2017, “Whoever becomes the leader in AI will become the ruler of the world.” That prediction accurately summed up the fervor for powerful AI systems that has ignited these historic investments.

    Biblical perspective: Is AGI really possible?

    The fact is, machines cannot replicate the God-given, spiritual nature of human beings.  Ecclesiastes 3:11 tells us that God “has put eternity in their hearts.” People are not just biological processors of data. It is the human spirit from our Creator that gives us human understanding (Job 32:8; 1 Corinthians 2:11). And He designed us to live in a loving relationship with Him!

    Genesis 2:7 states that “the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.” AI systems, made of silicon circuits and transistors, are mere dust of the ground.

    However, the Bible gives grave warnings about human ingenuity. At the Tower of Babel, God said that, because the people were working together with the same mindset and language, “Nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them” (Genesis 11:6).

    The spread of global technology has helped to remove the language barrier God introduced at Babel. And today’s engineers, corporations and governments are working with one mind and one goal—to create machine intelligence that can learn and perform nearly any task as well as, or better than, human beings.

    Gary Kasparov, the renowned chess grandmaster who famously lost to IBM’s Deep Blue chess computer in 1997—a feat once considered impossible for a machine—stated, “Saying that Deep Blue doesn’t really think is like saying an airplane doesn’t really fly because it doesn’t flap its wings.”

    In other words, in the eyes of the world the difference between intelligence and capability will be considered irrelevant—as what matters is what AI can do.

    Just as the builders at Babel, humanity is coming against limits that once seemed unreachable.

    The real dangers start before AGI arrives

    Science fiction loves the trope of self-aware AI turning against its creators. Despite the dazzling leaps of AI agents or how human the newest AI models may seem in their writing, they are not at all a step toward true humanlike intelligence.

    However, the most immediate dangers of AI do not require any form of consciousness or sentience to amplify evil in the world.

    “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9).

    Recall the problem of “fake news” in recent years. Hundreds of provocative, but untrue, headlines deceived many. AI will be used to produce more convincing content faster than ever, including not only text but fraudulent images and videos that are increasingly difficult to discern.

    Likewise, bad actors across the board augment their abilities with AI already—from hackers holding companies hostage with ransomware to phishing scams duping people for their bank information. Very soon, AI agents will make it possible to outsource these evil deeds completely, enabling a single person to deploy as many simultaneous attacks as their computing resources can support.

    The scale of the threat grows when considering geopolitical motives. State-sponsored cyber attacks from China against critical U.S. systems are now routine, and their human hackers are probably already equipped with AI assistants at their side. It’s not a stretch to imagine the Chinese government commissioning an army of AI cyberwarfare agents that autonomously seek out vulnerabilities in critical American systems and infiltrate them for espionage and/or disruption.

    Internet-based attacks can have real, deadly consequences, but the dangers of AI do not stop there. An Encyclopedia Britannica essay titled “Killer Robots: The Future of War?” postulates that “the first revolution in warfare was the invention of gunpowder. The second was the invention of nuclear weapons. And this [AI-powered autonomous robots] will be the third” (Toby Walsh, Britannica.com, originally published 2018). As it rightly observes, “The weakest link in a drone is the radio link back to base.” Now it can keep going on its own.

    Coinciding with developments in AI, drone technology and humanoid robotics have undergone rapid advances in recent years. Flying drones are already redefining the principles of modern warfare through the Russia-Ukraine war, where cheap remote-piloted drones carrying explosives have neutralized multimillion-dollar tanks, dramatically altering battlefield dynamics. Replacing remote drone pilots with AI is an all-but-certain escalation that will soon make these platforms capable of greater destruction and on a much larger scale.

    On the robotics front, Boston Dynamics in the U.S. and Unitree Robotics in China are routinely demoing new humanlike and doglike robots—powered by AI systems—that learn via neural networks to not only walk, but run, jump, climb, dance and do backflips. In the near future, governments may be manufacturing vast armies of AI-powered autonomous robot soldiers.

    Consider also the problem of AGI or ASI falling into the hands of volatile dictators, and the stakes become even higher. On June 22, 2025, U.S. stealth bombers destroyed three Iranian nuclear facilities, derailing Iran’s uranium enrichment ambitions for years to come. Replace the thought of “uranium enrichment” with “AI computer clusters” and the same logic may apply in the near future—nations launching preemptive strikes to prevent rivals from reaching AI supremacy.

    Will humanity survive the AI explosion?

    Jesus Christ warned that in the end times the world would be plagued by “wars and rumors of wars” (Matthew 24:6). AI is poised to be both fuel and the spark for that fire.

    While AI marches forward at breakneck speed, the “AI utopia” scenario does not seem at all likely. Human nature, as history has shown many times over, dictates that AI will be used as a tool for both good and evil. The abilities of these systems in the near future leave us with very bleak prospects.

    Will mankind survive? Jesus said that things will get so bad that “unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved [alive] . . .” (Matthew 24:22). In other words, the Bible confirms that the doom-and-gloom scenarios are indeed the logical, predictable outcome of man’s efforts!

    Our greatest problems—war, greed, corruption—are not technical but spiritual in nature. AI cannot solve them. Rather, it will amplify them.

    And yet, there is hope! Jesus continued, “. . . but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.” In the absence of a loving Creator, the collective sins of mankind would be our undoing—but God, out of mercy and love for His people, will intervene before AI or any other threat would destroy mankind.

    Until the return of Jesus Christ, the world we live in will become increasingly dangerous and unpredictable. Paul warned that “in the last days perilous times will come” (2 Timothy 3:1). AI advances are worsening many spiritual dangers. Social media will become more addictive and more toxic. Advertising will become more enticing than ever, fueling hedonism. Deceptive AI content will soon make it nearly impossible to tell truth from reality. All these problems and more are at our doorstep!

    What should we do as AI races ahead? Stay spiritually awake, testing every claim against God’s Word, and remember that the only true hope for the world is the coming Kingdom of God.

    Our world is charging toward a future it cannot control—but, thankfully, that future is securely in the hands of God the Father and Jesus Christ. For our sake, man’s self-destructive course will be cut short, and God’s Kingdom will bring the peace that no human-devised AI could ever deliver!

    ****

    LOLGB+

    #agi #AI #artificialIntelligence #chatgpt #technology
  22. Valurnan och kartongen – efter en helg om att skydda demokratiska val i Lviv

    Söndageftermiddag i Lviv. Motståndskraft i krig kan vara att tillåta vardagen att få ta den plats den bör i ett öppet och demokratiskt samhällle.

    På skärmen i konferensrummet i Lviv visas en tecknad valurna. På den sitter Ukrainas treudd, och ovanför den hänger tre flygbomber på väg ned. Bilden tillhör en föreläsning från Ukrainas centrala valkommission, och den sammanfattar ganska väl den fråga som höll oss sysselsatta under helgen. Hur skyddar man ett val, och dess förberedelser, som inte kan hållas? Jag hade kommit till Lviv för att, tillsammans med kollegor från Myndigheten för psykologiskt försvar, delta i en konferens om FIMI – Foreign Influence and Malign Information – för tjänstemän från ett flertal ukrainska myndigheter. Rubriken för konferensen handlade om att värna demokratisk integritet i krig.

    Ukraina har levt under krigslagar sedan den fullskaliga invasionen i februari 2022. Lagen om krigstillstånd förbjuder val så länge den gäller, och parlamentet förlänger den med nittio dagar i taget. Idag röstade parlamentet igenom ännu en förlängning, till slutet av januari 2027. Parlamentsvalet skulle ha hållits i oktober 2023 och presidentvalet i mars 2024. Inget av dem har blivit av, och ingen vet idag när de kan bli av.

    Det vore lätt att dra slutsatsen att demokratin i Ukraina är satt på paus. För egen del har jag svårt att se den så. Sommaren 2025 drev parlamentet igenom en lag som tog bort självständigheten för landets två antikorruptionsmyndigheter. Samma kväll samlades människor vid Ivan Franko-teatern i Kyiv med handskrivna skyltar av kartong, och protesterna spred sig snabbt till Lviv, Dnipro, Odesa och ett tjugotal andra orter. Nio dagar senare var lagen ersatt av en ny som återställde myndigheternas oberoende. I juli i år hände det igen, när presidenten avskedade försvarsministern Mykhailo Fedorov, som varit en populär minister som drivit på reformer. Protesterna pågick i över tre veckor på trettiotre orter, från Uzjhorod i väster till Sumy och Charkiv nära fronten. Enligt den internationella konfliktdatabasen ACLED blev juli 2026 den månad med flest demonstrationer under hela kriget. Protesterna fick igenom att överbefälhavaren byttes ut, men Fedorov fick inte tillbaka sin post.

    Det mest intressanta i min mening är hur det slutade. I augusti gick Fedorov själv ut i en video och krävde val, trots kriget. Organisatörerna tog avstånd, och protesterna ebbade ut. Ett folk som stått i timmar på torgen för att kräva ansvar av sin regering ville alltså inte ha val i krig. Opinionsmätningarna säger samma sak. I en undersökning från KIIS i somras svarade 57 procent att val bör hållas först när ett fredsavtal är på plats och kriget är över, och bara 15 procent ville ha val nu. Jag läser det som ett tecken på en mogen demokratisk kultur, där människor skiljer mellan att utkräva ansvar och att riskera valprocessen genom ett val i krig.

    Men ju längre kriget pågår, desto svårare blir ekvationen. Det märktes i samtalen under helgen i Lviv. Den som ska organisera Ukrainas första val efter kriget står inför frågor som saknar enkla svar. Omkring 5,7 miljoner ukrainare lever som flyktingar utomlands och närmare fyra miljoner är internflyktingar i sitt eget land. Soldaterna vid fronten ska kunna rösta, liksom de som lever under ockupation eller just befriats från den. Ungefär en fjärdedel av vallokalerna ligger i ockuperade områden eller har förstörts. Väljarregistret stängdes den 24 februari 2022 för att skydda uppgifterna och öppnades för väljarna först i december 2025. Många av dem som vana bemannade vallokalerna finns inte kvar, och en ny generation har vuxit upp utan att någonsin ha röstat. Varje sådan fråga är också en möjlig skiljelinje. Vem ska få rösta, var och hur? Vilka förutsättningar ska finnas att rösta för de som lämnat landet i kriget? I ett land i fred kan sådana frågor diskuteras i lugn och ro. I Ukraina kommer de att ställas under tidspress och med en motståndare som lyssnar och aktivt försöker påverka.

    Ryssland är mycket medvetet om detta. Sedan presidentens ordinarie mandatperiod löpte ut i maj 2024 har Kreml återkommande hävdat att Zelenskyj saknar legitimitet och därför inte har rätt att underteckna några avtal. Påståendet bygger på en medveten förvrängning av den ukrainska grundlagen, som låter presidenten sitta kvar tills en ny är vald. Institute for the Study of War har beskrivit hur Ryssland samtidigt erbjuder korta vapenvilor för val och därmed bygger en fälla. Håller Ukraina inget val kallas ledningen illegitim. Håller man ett under hot riskerar man ett val som går att ifrågasätta. Valfrågan blir på så sätt ett angreppsmål i sig, en sårbarhet i berättelsen om den ukrainska demokratin.

    Det är här informationspåverkan möter det större fältet av hybrida hot. Rumäniens författningsdomstol ogiltigförklarade första omgången av presidentvalet i december 2024 efter en påverkanskampanj i sociala medier. I Moldavien beskrev de internationella valobservatörerna att parlamentsvalet 2025 undergrävdes av utländsk inblandning, olaglig finansiering, cyberangrepp och desinformation, och redan inför presidentvalet 2024 kunde polisen följa hur pengar för röstköp skickades genom det ryska banksystemet. Desinformationen är sällan ensam. Den samverkar med pengar, med nätverk av lokala mellanhänder och med angrepp mot den tekniska infrastrukturen. Och målet är oftast detsamma, nämligen tilliten till att valet går rätt till.

    Det finns en spänning i allt detta som jag inte tror går att lösa så länge kriget varar. Demonstrationerna är snabba och de fungerar, de är en temperaturmätare för de svåra frågor ett samhälle i krig står inför. Men gatans parlament är ingen ersättare för demokratiska institutioner och val. De fyller olika funktion. De som kan stå på ett torg i Kyiv en söndag är inte desamma som soldaten vid fronten, familjen som flytt till ett annat län eller de miljoner som lever i Polen, Tyskland och Sverige. Ju längre valet dröjer, desto mer tryck läggs på allt annat som ska hålla makten ansvarig, på domstolar, fria medier, civilsamhälle och på människor med skyltar av kartong på gatan.

    Samtidigt är engagemanget som uppvisas kanske något av det starkaste svaret på den ryska påverkan i Ukraina. Ett folk som går ut på gatorna för att försvara sina antikorruptionsmyndigheter mitt under ett krig, och som sedan väljer att vänta med valet tills det går att hålla det säkert, ger bilden av en demokrati som trots snart fem års krig har hopp om en tid av fred och med fria och öppna val. Jag tror att det finns en lärdom här också för oss. Vi gick själva till val i september i år. Skyddet av valet sitter till slut lika mycket i vårt förtroende för demokratin och vilja att delta och bidra till den, som i myndigheternas goda förvaltning av de demokratiska processer ett val förutsätter.

    Bilden på skärmen i Lviv följde med mig på vägen hem och över gränsen till Polen. Valurnan med bomberna ovanför beskriver hur det ser ut just nu. Men det som håller urnan på plats tills den kan användas igen är de människor som fortsätter att engagera sig och bidra till demokratin och de demokratiska samtal som pågår, hemma vid köksbordet, på caféet, på gator och torg. Och så också de tjänstemän som en hel helg satt i ett konferensrum i Lviv och övade på att försvara ett val som ännu inte har något datum. Det är i det arbetet som den ukrainska demokratin bärs fram, tills den dag då valurnan kan ställas fram igen.

    Referenser

    Bern, S. (2026, 24 februari). The West shouldn’t play Russia’s game with Ukrainian elections. Institute for the Study of War.

    Civil Network OPORA. (2023, 10 oktober). Legal information on the impossibility of holding elections under conditions of martial law.

    Dengi.ua. (2026, 5 augusti). Trust in Zelenskyy has declined, but Ukrainians do not support elections: KIIS.

    Detector Media. (2026, 22 juli). Oleksandr Korniienko: No one is going to hold elections under Shahed drone attacks.

    Hodunova, K. (2025, 28 januari). Putin claims Zelensky doesn’t have a right to sign any potential peace deal. Kyiv Independent.

    Interfax-Ukraine. (2026, 29 juli). 3.9 mln people remain displaced in Ukraine, 87% report financial hardship – IOM.

    Meduza. (2026, 26 augusti). Ukrainians marched for a month to get Mykhailo Fedorov his job back as defense minister. Then he released a video calling for elections, and the crowds stopped coming.

    OSCE/ODIHR. (2026, 18 februari). Moldova parliamentary elections 2025: ODIHR election observation mission final report.

    Rubryka. (2025, 31 juli). Zelensky signs into law bill restoring full independence of Ukraine’s anti-corruption bodies.

    ua.news. (2026, 26 oktober). The Verkhovna Rada extended martial law in Ukraine until the end of January 2027.

    Ukrinform. (2025, 23 december). ЦВК відновила роботу Державного реєстру виборців. https://www.ukrinform.ua/rubric-polytics/4072801-cvk-vidnovila-robotu-derzavnogo-reestru-viborciv.html

    UNHCR. (2026, oktober). Europe: 77th Executive Committee. https://www.unhcr.org/sites/default/files/docs/default/2026-10/europe-77-excom-english.pdf

    Vlasenko, A. (2026, 21 augusti). The street as a second chamber: Why Ukrainians are protesting again, and what it says about democracy during wartime. Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute. https://www.huri.harvard.edu/street-second-chamber-why-ukrainians-are-protesting-again-and-what-it-says-about-democracy-during

    #Demokrati #DemokratiskaSamtalet #Ryssland #Svenska #Ukraina
  23. 🇫🇷🇷🇴 #France has temporarily relocated a maritime patrol aircraft to #Romania to help identify navigation ​dangers and bolster the protection of critical energy ‌infrastructure in the Black Sea, Romania's defence ministry said on Tuesday.

    reuters.com/business/aerospace

  24. 🇺🇸 Oil companies will “be held accountable” if they import any barrels of Russian diesel fuel under the deal that #Trump struck with the Kremlin, House Judiciary ranking member Jamie Raskin said in a letter to industry heads Monday.

    politico.com/news/2026/10/26/r

    #usa #russia

  25. 🇺🇸🇮🇳🇷🇺 #India has faced no pressure from ​the US to reduce its Russian crude ‌imports, oil minister Hardeep Singh Puri said on Tuesday at an industry event.

    reuters.com/business/energy/no

    #usa #russia #trump

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