By Mike Whitney
The Unz Review
January 27, 2025
In part:
“Freaking out” is probably the understatement of the century. Silicon Valley is in a full-blown emotional meltdown and the path forward is far from certain. As we will see further along, western tech mandarins are going to have to return to Square 1 and modify their approach to the new reality. In short, the agenda is being set by people with different priorities, values and beliefs who live 10,000 miles away. They do not ascribe to the idea that advances in technology should reinforce police-state surveillance or other repressive forms of social control.(as they do in the West) Their vision of the future is altogether different, but invariably optimistic.
Did you notice that “DeepSeek R1 scored as high or higher than OpenAI’s o1 (while) under a strict embargo imposed by the US”?
In other words, these Chinese whiz-kids created their cutting-edge version with one hand tied behind their back. They shrugged off Washington’s onerous sanctions and beat Uncle Sam at his own game, which is quite an accomplishment.
<snip>
It sounds like a lot of people are very concerned, and for good reason. DeepSeek is a nuclear bomb detonated in the heart of Silicon Valley. It is a straight-up challenge to America’s de facto Royal Family of tech Brahmins who thought their reign would last forever. Now they find themselves playing ‘catch-up’ with an upstart cadre of bluestocking brainiacs who are bringing their world crashing down around them. More importantly, the future of AI is being decided in Hangzhou not Palo Alto which means we might see a lull in the warmaking as Uncle Sam finds it harder to finance his endless bloodletting. What a welcome reprieve that would be.
Recent Comments