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Category: economics – Page 2

Are we heading towards World War III? | Heni Ozi Cukier | TEDxLisboa

This talk dives into four critical dimensions — social, economic, political, and military — to uncover the patterns that led to World War I and II. By comparing those pivotal moments with today’s global dynamics, it reveals troubling signs of growing instability. Are we on the brink of a Third World War? Through the lens of history, this analysis offers a powerful reflection on the present — and a warning to not repeat the mistakes of the past.

Heni Ozi Cukier, widely known as Professor HOC, is an expert in international politics dedicated to making geopolitics more accessible to the general public. He shares his extensive knowledge — and insights into the challenges and dynamics of the contemporary world — through what has become Brazil’s largest geopolitics YouTube channel: PROFESSOR HOC.

He is also behind award-winning documentaries, including Cracol ndia.

In the United States, he worked at the United Nations Security Council, the Organization of American States (OAS), and the Woodrow Wilson Center think tank.

In Brazil, he gained prominence as the founder and coordinator of the postgraduate program in Geopolitics at PUC Paraná, establishing himself as a leading voice in teaching international relations and analyzing global affairs.

He holds a degree in Philosophy and Political Science, and a Master’s in Conflict Resolution and International Peace from the renowned American University in Washington, DC. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community.

Continue reading “Are we heading towards World War III? | Heni Ozi Cukier | TEDxLisboa” | >

Wuhan’s AI Development

Wuhan, China’s inland metropolis, is paving the way for a nationwide rollout of “embodied” artificial intelligence meant to fast-track scientific discovery, optimize production, streamline commerce, and facilitate state supervision of social activities. Grounded in real-world data, the AI grows smarter, offering a pathway to artificial “general” intelligence that will reinforce state ideology and boost economic goals. This report documents the genesis of Wuhan’s AGI initiative and its multifaceted deployment.

Iceland approved the 4-day workweek in 2019, nearly 6 years later, all the predictions made by Generation Z have come true

Fewer hours. Same pay. Possible approach to the Economic Singularity?

In 2019, Iceland made headlines by becoming one of the first countries in the to adopt the four-day working week, not through a general law, but through agreements allowing workers to negotiate shorter weeks or reduced hours. Five years on, the results are indisputable.

The Icelandic experiment began in 2015 with a pilot phase involving around 2,500 employees, or just over 1% of the country’s working population. Following the resounding success of this initiative, with 86% of the employees involved expressing their support, the project was formalised in 2019. Today, almost 90% of Icelandic workers benefit from a reduced working week of 36 hours, compared with 40 hours previously, with no loss of pay.

Initial concerns about the four-day week were widespread, both in Iceland and elsewhere in the world. There were fears of a drop in productivity, increased costs for businesses and difficulties in adapting to maintain service levels. However, the Icelandic experience has swept these fears under the carpet.

From Infection to Access: A 24-Hour Timeline of a Modern Stealer Campaign

While many associate account takeovers with personal services, the real threat is unfolding in the enterprise. Flare’s latest research, The Account and Session Takeover Economy, analyzed over 20 million stealer logs and tracked attacker activity across Telegram channels and dark web marketplaces. The findings expose how cybercriminals weaponize infected employee endpoints to hijack enterprise sessions—often in less than 24 hours.

Here’s the real timeline of a modern session hijacking attack.

Infection and Data Theft in Under an Hour.

Sierra Space Awarded Lunar Logistics Contract by NASA

Notably in April, Sierra Space announced the completion of successful hypervelocity impact trials conducted at NASA’s White Sands Test Facility in Las Cruces, New Mexico, to optimize the structural integrity of Sierra Space’s LIFE habitat space station technology. This included the use of NASA’s .50 caliber two-stage light gas gun to replicate micrometeoroid and orbital debris (MMOD) impacts to LIFE’s outer shield, to prepare the space station of use in orbit.

About Sierra Space.

Sierra Space is a leading commercial space company and emerging defense tech prime that is building an end-to-end business and technology platform in space to benefit and protect life on Earth. With more than 30 years and 500 missions of space flight heritage, the company is reinventing both space transportation with Dream Chaser®, the world’s only commercial spaceplane, and the future of space destinations with the company’s expandable space station technology. Using commercial business models, the company is also delivering orbital services to commercial, DoD and national security organizations, expanding production capacity to meet the needs of constellation programs. In addition, Sierra Space builds a host of systems and subsystems across solar power, mechanics and motion control, environmental control, life support, propulsion and thermal control, offering myriad space-as-a-service solutions for the new space economy.

The cost of some invasive species could be 16 times higher than we thought

From river-clogging plants to disease-carrying insects, the direct economic cost of invasive species worldwide has averaged about $35 billion a year for decades, researchers said Monday.

Since 1960, damage from non-native plants and animals expanding into new territory has cost society more than $2.2 trillion, more than 16 times higher than previous estimates, they reported in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution.

The accelerating spread of —from mosquitoes to to tough-to-eradicate plants—blights agriculture, spreads disease and drives the growing pace of species extinction.

Chinese commercial company lands contract to build provincial satellite constellation

HELSINKI — Chinese commercial satellite manufacturer MinoSpace has won a major contract to build a remote sensing satellite constellation for Sichuan Province, under a project approved by the country’s top economic planner.

Beijing-based MinoSpace won the bid for the construction of a “space satellite constellation,” the National Public Resources Trading Platform (Sichuan Province) announced May 18, Chinese language Economic Observer reported.

The contract is worth 804 million yuan (around $111 million) and the constellation has been approved by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China’s top economic planning agency, signaling potential alignment with national satellite internet and remote sensing infrastructure goals.

Turning fallen leaves into sustainably made paper: Ukrainian scientist selected as a finalist for the Young Inventors Prize 2024

Munich, 4 June 2024 – According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the pulp and paper industry is one of the largest industrial sectors in the world and has an enormous influence on global forests. This sector accounts for 13–15% of total wood consumption and uses between 33–40% of all industrial wood traded globally. In search of more sustainable solutions for paper production, 23-year-old Ukrainian inventor Valentyn Frechka developed a method for recycling leaf litter into paper. Frechka is a finalist for the Young Inventors Prize of the European Inventor Award 2024, in recognition of his promising work towards a circular economy and addressing one of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). He was selected from over 550 candidates for this year’s edition.

Using new technology to recycle fallen leaves into paper

The global loss of trees is known to significantly exacerbate climate change, increasing air pollution levels, causing the loss of biodiversity, and disrupting the water cycle. Global warming also leads to issues such as soil erosion and reduced freshwater availability. It also increases costs for managing environmental problems such as flooding.

Facing Superintelligence (with Ben Goertzel)

On this episode, Ben Goertzel joins me to discuss what distinguishes the current AI boom from previous ones, important but overlooked AI research, simplicity versus complexity in the first AGI, the feasibility of alignment, benchmarks and economic impact, potential bottlenecks to superintelligence, and what humanity should do moving forward.

Timestamps:
00:00:00 Preview and intro.
00:01:59 Thinking about AGI in the 1970s.
00:07:28 What’s different about this AI boom?
00:16:10 Former taboos about AGI
00:19:53 AI research worth revisiting.
00:35:53 Will the first AGI be simple?
00:48:49 Is alignment achievable?
01:02:40 Benchmarks and economic impact.
01:15:23 Bottlenecks to superintelligence.
01:23:09 What should we do?