🍫 Breakthrough: Chocolate without sugar is no longer a bitter dream
Researchers in Switzerland have developed a method to produce chocolate without added sugar. The entire cocoa fruit is used in the process, which reduces food waste. The method can increase income for cocoa farmers and create jobs in countries of origin.
🥵 Reduced mortality due to heat waves
Heat waves cause many deaths globally – but the trend is pointing downward. The number of deaths per capita caused by heat waves decreased by 7.2% per decade globally.
🔥 BurnBot performs controlled burns to reduce the risk of forest fires
BurnBot has developed a robot that performs controlled burns without flames and smoke. The robot reduces the need for personnel and minimizes the risk of fire spreading uncontrollably.
🧐 I've built an AI book editor (that yells at me like Steve Jobs)
The AI editor is my digital twin. It understands me and my vision, and brings out my very best.
💡 Warp News #245
🏝️ Several atolls are growing despite rising sea levels. 🚗 Waymo doubles the number of paid robotaxi trips. 🔋 Solar power and batteries help Texas.
🔋 Solar power and batteries help Texas handle record-high energy consumption during heat waves
Texas power grid has broken new records for electricity consumption during the summer of 2024. Solar power has met record-high demand during the day, and batteries have covered the need in the evening.
💡 Fact-based optimistic news from August
🌾 Lower food prices, thanks to record harvests. ⚖️ Global inequality decreases. 🌅 Wind and solar energy surpass coal power in the EU, in the US and in China. 🔥 Much lower risk of fire in electric cars. 🦾 AI Scientist can write science papers on its own.
🏝️ Several atolls are growing despite rising sea levels
Scientists have discovered that many coral islands are growing or maintaining their size despite rising sea levels. Over 1000 islands have been studied and shown surprising resilience to sea level rise.
💡 AI solves difficult problem of how molecules react to light – may lead to better solar cells and LED lights
Researchers at DeepMind have used AI to create a new method for calculating how molecules behave when hit by light. The technology could lead to improvements in solar cells, LED lights, and other light-sensitive technologies.
🚗 Waymo doubles the number of paid robotaxi trips to 100,000 per week
Waymo now provides over 100,000 paid robotaxi trips per week in the USA. The company has expanded its service to new areas in California and Arizona. Waymo is now testing driverless vehicles on highways around the San Francisco area.
🏭 Wind and solar energy produce more electricity than coal in the US
Wind and solar energy generated more electricity than coal in the USA during the first seven months of the year. In the USA, almost twice as much solar energy will be added compared to last year.
🦾 Keep calm, AI is not a bubble
The stock market went down, panic arose and the pessimists proclaimed in panic: The AI bubble is bursting. That is nonsense.
💡 Warp News #244
🌾 Lower food prices thanks to record harvests. 🌅 Wind and solar energy surpass coal power in China and the EU. ⚖️ Global inequality decreases.
🌞 Solar and wind surpass fossil fuels in EU electricity production
Wind and solar power generated 30% of EU's electricity during the first half of 2024. For the first time, 13 EU countries produced more electricity from wind and solar than from fossil fuels.
💡 Musings of the Angry Optimist: Whatever, keep writing in a complicated way, I understand anyway
What Martin Luther and a double unicorn founder can teach us about AI, and the first Swede on Mars.
📚 Top Reads
We're honored to present these top reads from world-class writers, who contribute to Warp News because they believe in our mission of spreading fact-based optimism all over the world.
🆙 Warp Levels - an idea to level up humanity
Humanity is doing the high jump without a bar. We have no goal. With Warp Levels, we determine what the next level for humanity should contain, so we can level up and make progress faster.
📚 Kevin Kelly: Focus on the biggest opportunities, not the biggest problems
We talk about some of the 450 advice in his new book, but also about his new project: Protopia - the hundred-year desirable future. And Kevin Kelly give advice for how Warp News should grow faster: "Wrap it around people and their dreams."
💡 A new mindset for humanity can impact billions of people now and in the future
If we succeed in giving humanity more optimism about the future, it will not only affect those living now but also all generations and billions of people who will live in the future.
💰 Wall Street legend: “Pessimists sound smart – optimists make money”
Jim O'Shaughnessy is a legendary investor on Wall Street. He shares what he thinks is the biggest opportunity for the future and explains how the world is going through a great reshuffle.
🔋 Northvolt and the benefit of understanding the future
The story of Peter Carlsson and Northvolt teaches us two lessons: You need to understand the future to see all the possibilities, and you must be a fact-based optimist to grab them.
💡 David Deutsch: Optimism, Pessimism and Cynicism
With so much progress in the world, how can pessimism still be widespread? It is because of cynicism, denying that “so-called-progress” is progress, argues David Deutsch, professor at Oxford University and one of the world's leading intellectuals on optimism.
