Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️ Profile Banner
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️ Profile
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️

@JonAskonas

Followers
4,764
Following
2,397
Media
66
Statuses
1,047

Politics @CatholicUniv | Senior Fellow at @joinFAI | Effective Optimist at @aftfuture | 🇺🇸/acc

District of Columbia, USA
Joined February 2009
Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.
Explore trending content on Musk Viewer
Pinned Tweet
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
5 months
Join me on Jan. 31 for a conference on Generative AI and National Security at @CatholicUniv , sponsored by @LeidosInc . We have a cracker-jack roster of experts from AI start-ups, defense, and think tanks, exploring this game-changing technology.
3
4
26
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
3 months
People can have all sorts of complicated feelings about Elon Musk's politics, personality, goals, etc. But downplaying his technical acumen and entrepreneurial genius is one of the strongest signals that someone is utterly lacking in either intelligence or integrity.
@PirateWires
Pirate Wires
3 months
Patient paralyzed from the shoulders down plays chess with the help of the @neuralink chip in his brain. "It was like using the force on a cursor, and I could get it to move wherever I wanted."
40
146
1K
56
158
1K
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
"You leaked classified to impress some teenaged weebs? Have some dignity and post classified weapons specifications to War Thunder forums to win a debate about turret rotation speed like a man."
2
60
302
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
8 months
Tweet media one
7
18
249
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
“Personally, I have always preferred the Christianity of the emperor Constantine to that of Mother Teresa.”
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
At @NOV1TATE , Peter Thiel arguing that “Nihilism is not Enough.” “More than ever, I am convinced that history has meaning - and that its meaning is terrifying.” Rene Girard
Tweet media one
5
9
109
28
24
196
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
I'm in @ForeignPolicy with @noUpside , arguing that the recent Discord documents leaks are only the latest and greatest indication that, for many people, their loyalties to their online communities are more powerful than their IRL commitments.
6
32
154
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
6 months
The internet has fully eaten the newspaper.
Tweet media one
10
14
144
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 month
We are already seeing an explosion of AI regulation that is designed to ban open source while claiming to be neutral. SB 1047 designates a "hazardous capability" to include what a third party can show with infinite fine-tuning and re-training. Meanwhile, closed models get points
Tweet media one
Tweet media two
Tweet media three
@Scott_Wiener
Senator Scott Wiener
1 month
The thread also contains fear mongering about open source. Unless you think catastrophic harms are going to happen left & right with open source projects, it’s absolutely false to say this “de facto criminalizes open source.” + these are civil sanctions, not criminal liability!
15
0
17
6
36
134
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
3 months
@jskochan I'm sure there are some who take this too far. But there is a reason no other EV, or rocket, or brain chip company, or (back in the day) payments company took off, despite the tech elements being there. Elon is a brilliant engineer. But he is a 1-of-1 entrepreneur.
4
2
130
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 month
@michaelsobolik @TikTokPolicy "I…worked on this story for a year…and…he just…he tweeted it out."
1
3
118
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
The narrative seems to be that Tucker Carlson has been let go from Fox. I think he’s been unleashed. We have never seen anything like what is going to happen next. To understand the new kind of power Tucker has, read my essay in @tnajournal .
11
23
110
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
At @NOV1TATE , Peter Thiel arguing that “Nihilism is not Enough.” “More than ever, I am convinced that history has meaning - and that its meaning is terrifying.” Rene Girard
Tweet media one
5
9
109
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
Baptists shocked and horrified to be associated with the Bootleggers.
@ESYudkowsky
Eliezer Yudkowsky ⏹️
7 months
In case you missed it, the latest Big Lie is that the dangers of AI are a secret Silicon Valley conspiracy to promote 'regulatory capture'. This conspiracy evidently includes the eminent founder of deep learning who resigned from Google so he could speak freely about x-risk; the
120
140
962
5
9
100
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
Does technology make our lives better, or threaten the future of our species? Marc Andreessen ( @pmarca ) has one answer for what ails humanity: accelerate. Our wide-ranging conversation explains his manifesto and addresses his critics.
4
19
92
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
3 months
@jskochan As a rule, you'll notice that everyone who downplays his achievements as an entrepreneur has never actually made or built anything.
4
3
92
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
10 months
Why are conspiracy theories so prominent in America today? In @tnajournal , I argue that the explosion of conspiracy theory can best be understood as the long-delayed repayment on the epistemic debt of state secrecy.
@tnajournal
The New Atlantis
10 months
The dark force ripping apart our shared sense of reality isn't misinformation. It's state secrecy. New online... the latest installment in ʀᴇᴀʟɪᴛʏ: ᴀ ᴘᴏsᴛ-ᴍᴏʀᴛᴇᴍ
1
12
18
4
19
67
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
11 months
@rSanti97 Strong. Dominant.
Tweet media one
1
0
68
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Weaponized brain drain is such a no-brainer. And you don't have to trust them/allow them into critical industries. Given them a green card to teach Electrical Engineering at University of Nebraska or whatever, or do QA process design for a tractor company. Easy strategic win.
@AlecStapp
Alec Stapp
1 year
Russian scientists clearly want to flee their country. Let’s copy the “Soviet Scientists Immigration Act” and let them immigrate to the US. It would weaken Russia and strengthen America 🇺🇸
Tweet media one
Tweet media two
16
80
670
1
14
69
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
3 months
It's time to take back our future. I'm proud to be a small part of @aftfuture , a new political advocacy organization aiming to give the future - our future, our children's future, America's future - a voice in American politics, and to push back against a growing conspiracy
Tweet media one
@psychosort
Brian Chau, SF 7th-16th, Toronto 17th-21st
3 months
Glad to finally announce what I've been working on alongside @perrymetzger @JonAskonas @BasedBeffJezos Enough arguing and complaining. Time to act. Time to protect AI. Time to accelerate America.
9
23
129
5
17
68
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
That’s right. As everyone knows, after Microsoft was forced to end some of its self-preferencing policies in 2001, Internet innovation ground to a halt. No one wanted to build software for PCs, and investment in the entire sector declined. 🙃
@neil_chilson
Neil Chilson ⤴️⬆️🆙📈 🚀
7 months
This is hilarious. Open source is important, vital, and Khan doesn’t give a fig about it. Has she ever even mentioned the words before? I mean, I’d be happy to be proven wrong. Self-preferencing - i.e., running a business - is an extremely common and obviously beneficial
0
1
11
3
10
67
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
Are we in a moment of tech acceleration or stagnation? Moving too fast or too slow? I thought Vaclav Smil's "Invention and Innovation" would make a strong case for caution. The book convinced me otherwise. My critical review of in @AmericanAffrs
7
19
63
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
11 months
Everyone is concerned about computers that pass the Turing Test, but I'm more concerned about the increasing number of humans that can't.
3
8
59
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
Now that DC wants to tamp down the Ukraine war because other theaters are heating up (not to mention the election), the Washington Post gets an exclusive from "people familiar with the planning" about the Ukrainian bombing of Nordstream. Like clockwork.
7
26
60
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
3 months
@jskochan I've heard this from people that work for him. I've heard it from co-founders who otherwise hate his guts, from VCs that did or did not invest, from technical experts in those fields, etc. The more you know about how hard it is to actually build, the more impressed you are.
1
1
53
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
@SevaUT Russia's mimetic imitation of the United States is really next level. "The US did a disastrous regime change operation. Are we really a великая держава if we don't have our OWN disastrous invasion and regime change?"
5
5
50
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
11 months
I will respond to Christine Rosen’s criticism of my essay “Why Conservatism Failed” sometime in the near future, but I will say this for now: everyone in this photograph has been dead for years.
3
9
48
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Are you beginning to understand now?
@CrispinBurke
Crispin Burke
1 year
- OG's motive in leaking documents appears to have been to convince a few gamers that he was a real-life Jason Bourne.
2
2
52
6
12
45
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
2 months
@William_Blake I think @pmarca said “Ayn Rand’s heroes aren’t real, but her villains are.”
3
1
48
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
8 months
Eight hour road trip through God’s Country with @rSanti97 @Micaheadowcroft and @fxxfy , cold plunge and sauna before hanging with a bunch of Doomer Optimists at the @thewagonbox . The vibes are immaculate.
Tweet media one
@Happyholistichs
Roxanne Ahern
8 months
A snowy but cozy morning at the @thewagonbox in Wyoming today! (Can you believe some people cold plunged in the creek this morning not me I am not that brave)
Tweet media one
Tweet media two
Tweet media three
4
2
62
6
2
46
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
4 months
Good 🧵 I argued years ago that Google’s core philosophy was authoritarian, and would show itself to be so over time. It’s still shocking how it has played out. Google Gemini is just the natural evolution of a project Google set upon long ago.
@mjuric
Mario Juric
4 months
I'm done with @Google . I know many good individuals working there, but as a company they've irrevocably lost my trust. I'm "moving out". Here's why: I've been reading Google's Gemini damage control posts. I think they're simply not telling the truth. For one, their text-only
2K
7K
31K
3
8
42
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Still the most elite foreign policy team in history.
Tweet media one
2
6
43
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
6 months
This is a classic of the Boomer warnings about Our Democracy. It begins with a sober analysis of the precise reason why the Internet is incompatible with print-era democratic institutions. And then switches to a deranged, reactionary diatribe against "the algorithms".
@TheChiefNerd
Chief Nerd
6 months
NOW — Al Gore Says Social Media Algorithms Disrupt Democracy and Need to be Banned: ‘They are the Digital Equivalent of AR-15’s’ “The shift from an information ecosystem based on print to one based on broadcasting and then moving on to the internet and to social media has
530
326
769
3
8
39
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
10 months
Tweet media one
0
1
37
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Of course, posting classified docs to impress your video game homies (the kind of thing I predicted last year) is only the beginning of the weirdness after the fall of consensus reality. Catch up with the future at @tnajournal .
3
5
32
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
Tweet media one
@martin_casado
martin_casado
7 months
Nope
Tweet media one
64
42
513
2
4
34
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
On Wednesday, a speaker at the @ISI forum lauded Wendell Willkie as a forgotten American hero. Today, Peter Thiel highlighted him as a forerunner of the Antichrist. You can’t deny that @CatholicUniv is where the most interesting conversations are happening.
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
At @NOV1TATE , Peter Thiel arguing that “Nihilism is not Enough.” “More than ever, I am convinced that history has meaning - and that its meaning is terrifying.” Rene Girard
Tweet media one
5
9
109
3
3
33
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
In a recent post, Alan Jacobs criticizes Paul Kingsnorth and me for alarmism and abstraction in response to my @compactmag_ essay "Why Conservatism Failed". I respond by getting down to brass tacks on the demise of traditions and the future of piety.
1
5
32
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
2 months
We talk about technology, tradition, LARPing, craft, virtue, pro-natalism and more. @reihan came up with the term “traditionalist accelerationism”, which is a fantastic description of what I’m proposing.
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
3 months
Had a wonderful conversation on technology and the future of human flourishing with @reihan at @ManhattanInst .
1
10
31
2
5
30
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
11 months
"Freedom Conservatism" is the La Sombrita of political manifestos. Announced with fanfare by the establishment, the product, we're told, of great focus and care, yet completely bereft of any social value and a condensed symbol of the total exhaustion of a political project.
Tweet media one
5
3
29
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
8 months
Need @lukeburgis explain this kind of anti-mimetic phenomenon, the Avatar effect. Neither Avatar nor its sequel made any kind of cultural impact at all. No derivative art, no fan culture, no water cooler conversation. The sequel is the third highest-grossing movie ever.
4
0
28
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Across the think tank landscape, there is one organization that seeks to grasp the promise of technology for American prosperity, while keeping both eyes open about the perils of proceeding without care or forethought. I'm proud to be involved with what @ZacharyGraves is building
@JoinFAI
Foundation for American Innovation 🇺🇸🚀
1 year
Allow us to reintroduce ourselves.
Tweet media one
11
17
101
1
6
26
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
@tnajournal The last time this happened, Glenn Beck left Fox to do his own thing. He’s basically disappeared from mainstream media…but anchors $10Ms of annual revenue. Tucker is bigger and far more politically central, with a younger audience. And now, the gloves are off.
3
4
24
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 month
The AI revolution has given SF and the "Cerebral Valley" an unearned second lease on life...and California legislators are racing to squander it by creating California's own "FDA for AI".
@psychosort
Brian Chau, SF 7th-16th, Toronto 17th-21st
1 month
The California senate bill to crush OpenAI's competitors is fast tracked for a vote. This is the most brazen attempt to hurt startups and open source yet. 🧵
Tweet media one
31
152
479
2
7
25
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
3 months
@dare_2know Developing the basic science behind something is the first, not the last step, of actually building a world-changing technology.
4
0
24
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
4 months
Navalny demonstrated something so singular in Russian political life that many speculated about the "angle" he was taking. Hopefully now it becomes obvious that his choice to return to Russia, knowing it meant death, was nothing but an act of extraordinary moral courage.
@BBCBreaking
BBC Breaking News
4 months
Jailed Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny has died, Russian media report, citing the prison service
2K
4K
8K
3
6
24
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
11 months
Barbie: The Movie is a film adaptation of the Strauss-Kojeve correspondence.
3
7
23
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
11 months
One of the most fascinating interviews I’ve ever listened to.
@kofinas
Demetri Kofinas 💎🙌🏼
11 months
Neil Howe ( @HoweGeneration ) speaks with me on @HiddenForcesPod about why he believes we are nearing the end of a once-in-a-century cycle that will require the mobilization of most Americans in a struggle for national survival.
8
21
131
2
2
23
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
“As long as a few polycules in bunker systems survive, there’s a chance…”
@SevaUT
Seva
1 year
yudkowsky going full strangelove here
Tweet media one
9
8
76
2
0
22
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
. @tylercowen nailed the problem. The more I talk to folks in the "AI Safety" world, the more apparent it is that the whole framework is tautological, inventing novel vocabulary for problems that other fields have been contemplating for hundreds of years.
Tweet media one
1
3
22
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Credit where it's due, I'm impressed with AOC for introducing the Preventing Elected Leaders from Owning Stocks and Inside-Trading (PELOSI) Act!
@GRDecter
Genevieve Roch-Decter, CFA
1 year
BREAKING: US Representatives AOC introduces bill to ban Congress from trading and owning stocks.
Tweet media one
7K
13K
178K
1
2
21
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
11 days
I think, without an exaggeration, that US competition with China is more about institutional capacity than anything else, and these sorts of problems (tip of the iceberg) are a national security threat.
2
6
23
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Weaponized brain drain is a powerful force in a multipolar world. We should be trying to get as many of China, Russia, Iran’s etc best and brightest to study and stay here, even if we divert them from certain fields for national security reasons.
1
6
22
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
6 months
I'm sorry, broadcast isn't coming back. The newspaper isn't coming back. The nightly news isn't coming back. Editorial board endorsements aren't coming back. The Sunday shows aren't coming back. That democracy is gone. The only question is, what next?
3
0
22
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
Tweet media one
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
I would feel more confident in the predictions of AI safetyists if there was any evidence they had read one (1) book about any previous historical case.
1
1
17
1
1
22
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
10 months
It’s called, we do a little American dynamism. @hamandcheese @maxb____ @SofiaHaft @anduriltech
Tweet media one
1
4
20
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
6 months
Tweet media one
0
0
19
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
4 months
It’s weird that the libertarians brag about absolutely giving up on the idea of wielding political power or influence to achieve their objectives like it’s some kind of flex. Real Charlie Brown and the football hours here.
@sladesr
(Stephanie) Slade
4 months
LOL, yes, a "put me in charge and I will choose the *right* winners and losers" approach to state power is unlibertarian.
6
6
92
6
4
20
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
5 months
To paraphrase Buckley, I would rather be ruled by 500 random Harvard Extension School students than by the alumni of Harvard College.
@Jenniferhochsc2
Jennifer hochschild
5 months
@evelkniefall not flaws--your word, not mine. Extension school students are mostly smart, ambitious, hard working, thoughtful, sometimes very accomplished--but mostly striving for upward mobility without background that would get them admitted to what is usually understood as Hvd. grad school
741
28
151
0
0
19
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
8 months
Classic mistake, if you keep rush-building military units, you never have enough gold to upgrade your cities or advance up the tech tree.
@SevaUT
Seva
8 months
russia has to have the all-time record for squandering a great civilizational spawn point. $75 trillion in natural resources and a quarter of the population doesn’t have indoor plumbing. how do you keep fucking up so badly
83
342
4K
0
2
19
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Remarkable to see folks who rightly prize understanding AI systems at a technical level for thinking about how they will behave, completely disregard specialized knowledge in politics, economics, sociology, psychology, etc. Much of "AI Safety" is fundamentally unserious.
2
1
20
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
10 months
The entire crux of the debate on the American right today is whether you read this as a contradiction or as a description.
@GreenPlusAnE
Russ Greene
10 months
Hi, I am very mad that both these things are absolutely true at once: 1. We have let free markets run amok, free from political control. 2. Big business and government are so closely intertwined, there’s no private sector. Help!
6
5
34
2
3
19
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
3 months
@TheAnnaGat "When tenderness is detached from the source of tenderness, its logical outcome is terror. It ends in forced-labor camps and in the fumes of the gas chamber.” - Flannery O'Connor
2
1
19
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
Looking forward to debating AI with @neil_chilson tomorrow, moderated by @hamandcheese !
@ISI
Intercollegiate Studies Institute
8 months
Join us Nov. 1st for a high-profile conversation about how our economy can better advance the safety and happiness of the American people in 2023 and beyond. Registration is FREE—and breakfast and lunch will be provided for student attendees!
Tweet media one
1
1
5
1
4
19
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
@SevaUT A certain Russian far-right nationalist Internet personality spent the initial week of the invasion explicitly comparing Russian progress in Ukraine to US progress in Iraq in 2003 and I think he maybe should have thought that through a bit more.
0
0
18
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
I would feel more confident in the predictions of AI safetyists if there was any evidence they had read one (1) book about any previous historical case.
@geoffreyhinton
Geoffrey Hinton
7 months
@ylecun Let's open source nuclear weapons too to make them safer. The good guys (us) will always have bigger ones than the bad guys (them) so it should all be OK.
199
88
897
1
1
17
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
8 months
One of the characteristics of our epistemic fracture is that the "fact" has become slippery. In the digital media ecosystem, you can always hotswap them on the fly. The assumption of immutability that reigned in the print era has collapsed. /1
3
6
18
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
I really enjoyed this conversation with @kofinas at @HiddenForcesPod , one of the most attentive observers of our tech and media landscape, where we got deep into the themes of my writing in @tnajournal .
@kofinas
Demetri Kofinas 💎🙌🏼
1 year
The last few years have been characterized by a growing sense of bewilderment, anger, and distrust. Distrust in institutions, in each other, and in ourselves—in our capacities to apprehend reality and come to consensus on the nature of our world. 🧵/x
4
3
30
0
2
17
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
9 months
I was thrilled to sit down with @eriktorenberg on @Upstream__Pod and discuss the political and civilizational impacts of the Internet and AI. If the printing press lead to the 30yrs War and the nation-state, what does digital tech have in store?
1
2
17
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
My friend @lukeburgis bringing the heat about the architecture of desire, mimetic rivals, and wanting to want the right things. @ISI
Tweet media one
0
1
16
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
The anxiety and dread that many feel towards AI is driven by the fear that humanity will no longer be the smartest beings on the planet. But only a small fraction of humans ever believed this in the first place. The digital retrieves the medieval:
0
6
17
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
It’s funny to see people who never cared about tech before discover that they are conservatives (in Grant’s definition): “those who accept the orientation to the future in the modern but who want to stop the movement of modernity at points which touch their special interests.”
@anneapplebaum
Anne Applebaum
1 year
"time to upgrade our 19th-century institutions for a post-A.I. world, and to learn to master A.I. before it masters us" from @harari_yuval , @tristanharris
21
98
297
0
1
16
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
4 months
“In the future, everyone will be postliberal for fifteen minutes.” Looking forward to this event my students have put together in a few weeks.
@ampostliberal
The American Postliberal
4 months
🚨Attention Postliberals of D.C.🚨 Join @PatrickDeneen , @ampostliberal & @ISI in Washington, D.C. on March 7th for a lecture on “Our Postliberal Future”! Learn more and register here! ⬇️⬇️⬇️
Tweet media one
3
12
36
0
4
16
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
4 months
While we often disagree on the merits, my @JoinFAI colleague @hamandcheese is one of the few people asking even the right class of questions about our moment in history. I always benefit from reading him, and you will too.
0
6
16
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
10 months
But, I argue in the piece, the impact is bigger than politics. State secrecy acts like dark matter, always threatening to upset our world of facts on a time delay. It's a major source of our ongoing epistemic anxiety.
@lukeburgis
Luke Burgis
10 months
McLuhan was right when he said the fascination with nostalgia is because people don't have a stable sense of self in the present; in a similar way, I think a fascination with conspiracy theories is directly related to a sense of epistemic collapse and confusion.
14
17
191
2
2
16
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
To be clear, this was always obviously the most likely case, and I'm glad we are pushing for a negotiated settlement. But it's still shocking how many "serious people" beclowned themselves by insisting that stating the obvious was "Russian misinformation."
3
1
16
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
8 months
If you look at the state of US force structure and readiness, compared to propensity to serve, it's hard to imagine wars where we don't need to bring back conscription. I mean, we totally maxed out Army + Marines combat arms to do Iraq + Afghanistan 2008-2011.
@CastilloJasen
Jasen Castillo
8 months
@stephenwertheim Hard to imagine wars where we would need a conscript military.
0
0
2
2
1
16
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
A beautiful piece from @KTmBoyle . Any apologist for the current regime around pain, harm, and safety must address the question: why are people in societies with more suffering than ours happier than us?
@KTmBoyle
Katherine Boyle
1 year
We have long been fully invested in eradicating the suffering we deem unconscionable, but more important are the simple questions that define a serious life: For whom will you sacrifice? What will you defend? For what will you choose to suffer?
32
62
344
1
3
15
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
An insightful and critical take from @noUpside on today's "alternate" media - the constellation of Substacks, magazines, and others positioning themselves against the "mainstream". Usefully read alongside @Andrey4Mir 's book.
3
7
16
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
I don't think it's a coincidence that both the smartest criticisms of American support for Ukraine AND the smartest criticism of Putin's global vision - one which obliterates it on its own terms - have both been in @compactmag_ .
@g_shullenberger
Geoff Shullenberger
1 year
In a recent speech, Vladimir Putin articulated the guiding principle of the new multipolar global order he hopes to help usher into existence: “the possibility for any nation, any society, and any civilization to choose their own way, their own sociopolitical system.”/1
Tweet media one
14
9
86
0
4
15
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
10 months
But here's the thing: I'd rather be governed by literal, off-the-shelf ChatGPT that most of the people on the Republican debate stage.
@atrupar
Aaron Rupar
10 months
Chris Christie on Vivek: "I've had enough already tonight of a guy who sounds like ChatGPT."
84
249
2K
0
1
15
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
The Vietnam War remains, despite the public attention, the most misunderstood and mis-remembered war that I am familiar with. Many of the authors of the "first draft" (including journalists and academics) were intimately involved and had their reasons to skew the story.
@simonbchen
Simon Boyi Chen
1 year
1/ Stereotyping South Vietnamese generals as complete buffons (including Lam Quang Thi, who is not a complete buffoon and wrote two erudite works on Vietnam War in postwar exile in US) remains common among US and Western historians in 21st century, but the reality is far more
18
93
455
2
1
17
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Ironically, this trend should substantially reverse, as AI makes coding easy and sophisticated, tasteful text generation scarcer (as the cost of SAT Writing-standard style text goes to zero). Book Club should rebrand as Prompt Engineering.
@KTmBoyle
Katherine Boyle
1 year
The decline in liberal arts degrees bodes well for society on almost every dimension. College students now know that majoring in Book Club won’t get you a great job. This is progress.
Tweet media one
839
115
1K
1
0
15
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
The piece is written to be accessible for an audience that just discovered what a Discord server was this week. It will serve well for briefing baffled Boomer bosses about what's going on!
2
1
15
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
8 months
In these dark times, it's good to be reminded of the lengths American civil servants have gone to forestall the apocalypse (finishing a handle of Wild Turkey with a Soviet factory director, RIP liver). Everyone should be reading @rSanti97 's new series.
0
5
14
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Many people are saying.
@nlw
Nathaniel Whittemore
1 year
@kofinas I want the 10-hour version of this
2
1
9
1
2
14
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
2 months
In a crowded field, Tankie Willy Wonka comes through with the worst take of the day. Not the argument to make if you are trying to stop a war with Iran.
@NathanJRobinson
Nathan J Robinson
2 months
If a country attacked a US embassy, what would we expect the US to do in response? And would that be legitimate? Are Iranians permitted to do the same when their own embassy is attacked? Or do we adopt one standard for ourselves and another for "enemies"?
876
3K
13K
0
0
15
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
Are you beginning to understand now?
1
5
15
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
I’ve often thought that Arthur C. Clarke’s thought that “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” was much more bidirectional than “rationalist” types want to acknowledge.
@ESYudkowsky
Eliezer Yudkowsky ⏹️
1 year
So the actual scary part to me is that GPT4 understands what it means to say, "Compress this in a way where *you* can decompress it." Humans take for granted that we know our own capabilities, that we reflect, that we can imagine how we would react to a future input, we can
231
309
3K
1
0
15
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
11 months
The Sharon Statement | The Freedom Conservatism Manifesto
Tweet media one
Tweet media two
2
1
14
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
@SevaUT Unironically, video games.
2
0
14
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
4 months
"It is mankind's manifest destiny to bring our humanity into space; to colonize this galaxy; and as a nation, we have the power to determine whether America will lead or will follow. I say that America must lead." - Pres. Ronald Reagan, September 22, 1988
@VardaSpace
Varda Space Industries
4 months
W-1 back on Earth
Tweet media one
83
351
3K
2
1
14
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
The Tuckerverse is going to change everything. Coming to a Twitter near you.
@the_point_mag
The Point Magazine
1 year
“He wasn’t just interpreting the news; he was making it. What made something newsworthy was whether it fit into the narrative.” New on Forms of Life, @jonaskonas on the world Tucker Carlson created:
0
4
6
1
2
13
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 month
@JoshuaSteinman Not only is this a classic regulatory capture move, it also speaks to AI Safety's incredible naïveté. Real ones know that the best use of weapons inspections is espionage and intelligence preparation of the battlefield. 🌝
1
0
12
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
4 months
Santi writes, I post, you read. Simply as. If you care about fixing federal and defense procurement, you gotta understand OTAs.
@rSanti97
Santi Ruiz
4 months
When DARPA and NASA want to buy cool things, they don't go through the traditional procurement process. Instead, they can use flexible "Other Transaction Authority." In today's Statecraft, we talked to the guy responsible.
5
59
264
0
2
14
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
7 months
Industrial policy is frontier tech policy
@hamandcheese
Samuel Hammond 🌐🏛
7 months
China's dominance in heavy industry and manufacturing could provide a long-term AI advantage. Here's my reasoning: 1. Symbolic AI is to Deep Learning as declarative knowledge is to tacit knowledge. 2. Tacit knowledge can't fit in a recipe book; it's embedded in social
2
2
13
0
2
14
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
4 months
Packed house for @USCTO45 keynote conversation with @jamil_n_jaffer at the “Generative AI and National Security” conference at @CatholicUniv sponsored by @LeidosInc .
Tweet media one
Tweet media two
0
4
14
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
10 months
🙃 Not Going to Make It, as the kids say.
Tweet media one
2
0
12
@JonAskonas
Jon Askonas ⏩🚀🏛️
1 year
You cannot not be enriched by this conversation. Somehow @kofinas produces amazing signal amidst a world of noise.
@kofinas
Demetri Kofinas 💎🙌🏼
1 year
I’m joined on @HiddenForcesPod by @LMSacasas to discuss how the technologies of modern life are reengineering humanity in ways that are leaving many of us feeling increasingly depleted, isolated, and bewildered.
10
12
60
0
1
14