The strategically important city of Pokrovsk will soon fall to Russian troops. The video in this article shows the sorry state of Russia’s ground forces as they drive in.
https://www.nbcnews.com/world/ukraine/russian-forces-ride-key-ukrainian-city-fog-battered-vehicles-video-sho-rcna243168
From a year ago. As bad as things are now, we’re clearly not in WW3:
‘Ukraine’s former military Commander-in-Chief Valery Zaluzhny said that the direct involvement of Russia’s autocratic allies in its war on Ukraine means that World War III has started.
“I believe that in 2024 we can absolutely believe that the Third World War has begun,” said Zaluzhny, who is now Ukraine’s envoy to the United Kingdom, during a speech at Ukrainska Pravda’s UP100 award ceremony.’
https://www.politico.eu/article/ww3-officially-begun-ukraine-ex-top-general-valery-zaluzhny/
Russia’s once-massive tank reserve has just about run out of better tanks (T-72B and T-80), so the withdrawals of older ones (T-72A, T-64 and T-62) have sharply increased.
https://youtu.be/e_Ft1-pLm5A?si=VdEfvV54wgEHzOyv
A Ukrainian missile attack destroyed two, one-of-a-kind Russian aircraft used to test experimental equipment.
https://www.twz.com/air/unique-russian-a-60-laser-tesbed-jet-destroyed-in-ukrainian-attack
Russia’s new nuclear-powered nuclear missile (that’s not a typo) is a waste of resources and grants Russia no useful new capabilities.
https://youtu.be/M0t8UYZ9rrQ?si=WFN9mLa3pwbTg4Iv
The West made a rifle during the Cold War, called the “SAR-80,” that was as simple as the AK-47.
https://youtu.be/uhw6sVnxqB0?si=g9zWofSM2NxhOSew
So long as Hamas controls Gaza, there will be no substantial foreign aid to rebuild and no companies will want to risk doing business there.
https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2025/11/12/gazas-zombie-ceasefire
China has commissioned a new, small aircraft carrier that is more advanced than its American counterparts.
https://apnews.com/article/china-amphibious-assault-ship-carrier-navy-sichuan-523451ce91a7b7d730cf8412407a8ed1
After severe cost overruns and delays, the Navy cancelled its Constellation-class frigate program.
https://www.twz.com/sea/navy-sinks-the-constellation-class-frigate-program
American history has glossed over the mental illness and alcoholism that were widespread among WWII veterans after returning.
https://reason.com/2025/10/31/the-long-road-home/
A House of Dynamite is a recently released film dramatizing a surprise nuclear missile launch against the U.S. While it has been praised for its tension and acting, it’s unrealistic.
https://www.youtube.com/live/xUn5OdNw0oA?si=1vAH8AHjnK0ZMNRC
Why not put a small data center in a backyard shed? You can use the waste heat in the winter to heat your house, or to heat your water year round. Maybe you could even attach a sauna to it.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0rpy7envr5o
More experts are starting to think the “AI” sector is in a bubble.
- ‘So yes, Goldfarb says, AI has all the hallmarks of a bubble. “There’s no question,” he says. “It hits all the right notes.” Uncertainty? Check. Pure plays? Check. Novice investors? Check. A great narrative? Check. On that 0-to-8 scale, Goldfarb says, it’s an 8. Buyer beware.’
https://www.wired.com/story/ai-bubble-will-burst/ - The odds of a U.S. stock market crash caused by the “AI” bubble popping are growing. It will probably push the U.S. into a brief recession and drag down other countries that have heavy investments in our stock market or depend on us to buy their exports.
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2025/11/13/how-markets-could-topple-the-global-economy - Many companies report that their rate of incorporation of “AI” into work processes has slowed and even reversed. It looks like early hype about “AI” being able to automate office work is fading.
https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2025/11/26/investors-expect-ai-use-to-soar-thats-not-happening
The dour buzz about an AI bubble was counterbalanced by Nvidia announcing record earnings.
https://apnews.com/article/nvidia-earnings-artificial-intelligence-boom-bubble-6feaf871d527436f98fbd8d228377b30
A leading Pakistani newspaper printed an article written by ChatGPT and forgot to delete the prompt at the end.
https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/south-asia/an-embarrassment-pakistan-newspaper-trolled-after-chatgpt-prompt-appears-in-news-story
Google Deepmind is the most accurate hurricane forecasting model ever made.
https://michaelrlowry.substack.com/p/this-hurricane-season-two-forecast
So many job applicants are using LLMs to write cover letters that hiring bosses are starting to ignore them. The letters no longer convey an applicant’s writing ability or level of interest in the position.
https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2025/11/13/how-ai-is-breaking-cover-letters
There’s no evidence that “AI” has caused a net decrease in jobs.
https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2025/11/06/dont-blame-ai-for-your-job-woes
‘Coming just seven months after the Gemini 2.5 release, the new model is Google’s most capable LLM yet, and an immediate contender for the most capable AI tool on the market. The release also comes less than a week after OpenAI released GPT 5.1, and a mere two months after Anthropic released Sonnet 4.5 — a reminder of the blistering pace of frontier model development.’
https://techcrunch.com/2025/11/18/google-launches-gemini-3-with-new-coding-app-and-record-benchmark-scores/
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has come out of retirement to start his own AI company, “Project Prometheus.”
https://techcrunch.com/2025/11/17/jeff-bezos-reportedly-returns-to-the-trenches-as-co-ceo-of-new-ai-startup-project-prometheus/
Famed AI researcher and critical voice Yann LeCun has quit Facebook to form his own company. This essay argues that his recent fame is undeserved and that he has repeatedly claimed other peoples’ ideas as his own.
https://garymarcus.substack.com/p/the-false-glorification-of-yann-lecun
After X started listing on user profiles the countries where users were located, it turned out that many high-profile, right-wing accounts with large fan bases in the U.S. and Europe were actually run by people in Africa and India. As I predicted years ago, verification of social media user identities will become crucial.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/top-maga-influencers-accidentally-unmasked-as-foreign-actors/
https://reason.com/2025/11/26/elon-musks-account-based-in-feature-has-already-improved-x/
Years ago, I predicted that humanoid robots would be able to move their bodies in “unnatural ways.” The Unitree G1 robot proves I was right.
https://youtube.com/shorts/8n21aqnwPgg?si=wNzHVah-0Qdx5lK5
The Unitree G1 can also be teleoperated by a human. Even if autonomous, intelligent androids are never created for some reason, androids (and other robots) remotely controlled by humans definitely will be. This will have a major impact on the economy and on demographics since it will let manual labor work be outsourced.
https://youtu.be/24h4FTH7plY?si=rgRZT3pn2a47rioZ
Chinese electric car maker XPeng unveiled a new android called “Iron” that has an almost perfect human walking gait.
https://youtu.be/jPT92iKb9pg?si=OqC7xheG3tpZxh0p
A Russian company also unveiled a humanoid robot called “AIDOL.” It fell on its face shortly after walking onstage.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15286075/russia-humanoid-AI-robot-collapse-stage-elon-musk.html
Waymo has a strong lead in the U.S. autonomous taxi sector and is expanding to more cities.
https://techcrunch.com/2025/11/20/waymo-enters-3-more-cities-minneapolis-new-orleans-and-tampa/
China’s budding electronic air taxi sector is hamstrung by aircraft range limitations.
‘The biggest challenge for developing eVTOL aircraft is maintaining longer flights and overcoming battery capacity limitations, said Guo Liming, co-founder of Shenzhen-based Skyevtol, whose single-seat manned eVTOL aircraft, priced at around $100,000, can only fly 20 to 30 minutes before it must be charged.’
https://apnews.com/article/china-flying-cars-drones-evtol-airspace-72e7eb6883bd0b865a05cbb041d505fb
Jeff Bezos’ New Glenn space rocket landed itself after launch for the first time. Only Elon Musk’s rockets have achieved the feat before.
https://youtu.be/pviGlY1PiHQ?si=S764KQNbMrXjmPkP
America’s GPS network was the first of its kind, but for that reason, uses the oldest technology. Europe and China have more recently built counterparts that are more accurate and jam-resistant. The U.S. military will soon fix this by launching improved GPS satellites to replace the old ones.
https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2025/10/29/america-is-upgrading-gps-to-catch-up-with-rivals
In Council Bluffs in 1977, several unrelated witnesses saw a strange object fall from the sky. At the “crash site,” they found a large blob of molten steel. No one has come up with a believable explanation for the event.
https://www.thehistoricalsociety.org/h/ufo.html
A new UFO documentary has been released that features interviews with very high-ranking government officials.
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2025/11/the-age-of-disclosure.html
A person’s facial features provide clues to their future earnings and reliability as employees.
https://www.economist.com/business/2025/11/06/should-facial-analysis-help-determine-whom-companies-hire
Genes have been found that influence what kinds of academic subjects people are interested in.
‘By examining genetic clustering across specializations, we uncovered two key dimensions: technical versus social and practical versus abstract.’
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41588-025-02391-z
Each human might share 99.9% of their DNA with any other random human, but that 0.1% of difference still translates into large biological differences. The “99.9% the same” figure has been misused over the years to support false claims like “race does not exist.”
https://www.aporiamagazine.com/p/are-human-populations-999-identical