💡 Warp News #319
🏫 327 million more children – a 30 percent increase – are in school today compared to 2000. ☀️ Solar cells reach 130 percent energy conversion – more energy out than in. 🌔 Artemis 2 astronauts flew past the moon — set new distance record.
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Free newsletter with fact-based optimistic news about technology, science, and human progress with the angry optimist, Mathias Sundin. If you are not a subscriber, become one here.
🖖 Check out Conjecture Institute
David Deutsch is my intellectual hero. His book The Beginning of Infinity is number one among all the non-fiction books I’ve read.
So when I saw that he was an advisor to Conjecture Institute, I immediately became interested.
A couple of weeks ago, one of their founders reached out, and we spoke. He told me more about their work.
They want to contribute to answering the question of how knowledge grows, which is one of the most fundamental questions humanity has ever asked.
It affects everything we do, from research and politics to AI, business, and everyday decisions.
Karl Popper, David Deutsch, and others have shown that knowledge grows by formulating ideas and testing them through criticism.
The difference compared to, for example, Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, and Albert Einstein is that their discoveries transformed specific fields, such as physics and biology. Here, it is instead about how all knowledge is created and improved (epistemology). It is not a single discovery, but a way of understanding how all discoveries become possible.
If more people think this way, we can avoid unnecessary obstacles and make better decisions, often without even realizing what we previously missed.
Check out Conjecture Institute and don’t miss the opportunity to attend their conference, Conjecture Con, in September.
Mathias Sundin
The Angry Optimist
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🤷 How can baseless claims about AI spread so widely?
Despite being incorrect or greatly exaggerated, claims about AI are spreading far and wide, both in the news media and among individuals. Is it a conspiracy? No, something even more powerful.
💡 Fact-based optimistic news of the week
🌔 Artemis 2 astronauts flew past the moon — set new distance record
The Artemis 2 crew traveled farther from Earth than any humans before — 406,778 kilometers (252,760 miles). It is the first time in over 50 years that humans have visited the moon, and the first time in history with a woman, a non-American and a Black person on board.
🏗️ More than 80 percent of China's steel production upgraded to ultra-low emissions
Emissions have already fallen by 34 million tonnes of CO2 – equivalent to permanently shutting down eight coal-fired power plants. The steel industry accounts for 7 percent of global emissions, and China produces more than half of the world's steel.
☀️ Solar cells reach 130 percent energy conversion – more energy out than in
Researchers have achieved solar energy conversion at an efficiency of 130 percent, exceeding the theoretical limit of 100 percent. The method is based on a process called singlet fission, where a single photon can produce two energy carriers instead of one.
🧮 AI solves math problem that researchers failed to crack for six years
An AI system has for the first time solved a problem from FrontierMath, a benchmark consisting of real research problems that mathematicians have failed to solve. Multiple AI models have now demonstrated the ability to solve the problem, including GPT-5.4 Pro, Gemini 3.1 Pro, and Claude Opus 4.6.
🏫 327 million more children – a 30 percent increase – are in school today compared to 2000
Since 2000, the world has seen one of the most extensive expansions of education in history. Enrollment in preschools has risen by 45 percent, and in higher education by 161 percent over the same period.
🧠 You don't just inherit general intelligence – ability in math and language is also more than half determined by genes
There has long been strong evidence that general intelligence is heritable. Now a large meta-analysis shows the same applies to abilities like math and language. The findings open up the possibility of using genetic profiles to tailor education to each child's cognitive strengths and weaknesses.
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