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Trump's Economic Nationalism Won't Rescue the US Working Class
Placing the drive for profits before the needs of the human population is the normal operation of the capitalist system as ruling class interests use two-party politics to craft laws and policies that benefit elites, billionaires, and corporations.
Sep 04, 2026
The falling US share of the world economy—40% in 1960 versus 25% in 2026—is a driving force of economic nationalism stateside. Its rhetoric under President Donald Trump is America First, with abundant use of sanctions, tariffs, and war—directly with Iran and by proxy in Israel and Ukraine. On the note of warfare, the president has used military operations abroad as did Presidents Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden since the fall of the former Soviet Union on December 26, 1991, heralding a big change in the world order.
Another landmark change in the global order is China's share of the world economy (3.5-4% in 1960 versus 19-205 in 2026). Currently, China is a manufacturing world power. The nation is also blessed with a bevy of natural resources such as rare earth minerals like erbium and yttrium. Advanced electronics and artificial intelligence, prominent industries stateside in 2026, rely upon these two heavy elements.
Accordingly, given the history of US militarism and racism against Asians, the contradictions of economic nationalism, the America First rhetoric, are plentiful. President Trump refers to America's interest as "ours" and "we" when he speaks of other nations cheating the US. This is a bid to unite the class interests of elites (billionaires and corporations, key donors to Democrats and Republicans) with workers. Thus the economic rise of China is a big target of distortion.
China's prominent trading partners help to form the grouping of BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) nations. There is a BRICS summit in New Delhi, India set for September 12-13.
An affordability crisis of working and poor people stateside as their tax dollars flow away from them and into the congressional-military-industrial complex is the tip of a proverbial iceberg.
Speaking of military operations, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced increased economic warfare against Iran plus any countries doing business with that Persian nation, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) met in Kyrgyzstan. Nations’ heads of state attending this gathering ranged from China, Russia, India, Iran, and Pakistan to Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. The SCO also addressed measures to counter Uncle Sam’s deeds worldwide, including the US war against Iran and Israel's genocide of Palestinians.
In the SCO’s Bishkek declaration, the members also pledged to “support and strengthen an open, transparent, fair, inclusive, and non-discriminatory multilateral trading system based on generally accepted international principles and rules that promotes global economic development, ensures fair market access, and ensures special and differential treatment for developing countries.” Uncle Sam is looking at challenges to it alone calling the shots of a world order that gets its marching orders from Washington, DC. Meanwhile, the US is pursuing attempts to dominate other nations to boost the bottom line of America's elites.
Think of Uncle Sam’s taking of Venezuelan oil reserves, the details of which are emerging, glacially. Then there’s the talk from Washington of the US using tactical nuclear weapons to subdue Iran. The president has been threatening to take Greenland. He has also launched a trade war against Canada, a major US trading partner, claiming the neighbor to the north has been unfairly treating America.
Recall the president’s premise for his America First approach to jobs and economic gains? US global trade partners had been ripping off America. He was going to solve that problem, draining the swamp of Washington insider corruption, and so on. Wait. What?
For starters, US industry made the call to move abroad. To be clear, the deindustrialization of the Midwest and Northeast was a bipartisan priority that the political establishment facilitated, based on decisions made in corporate boardrooms. Democrats and Republicans supported corporate America moving production abroad to pursue higher returns on investment and weaker environmental policies.
Placing the drive for profits before the needs of the human population is the normal operation of the capitalist system. Ruling class interests use two-party politics to craft laws and policies that benefit elites, billionaires, and corporations.
The contradictions of economic nationalism and the world order are growing. An affordability crisis of working and poor people stateside as their tax dollars flow away from them and into the congressional-military-industrial complex is the tip of a proverbial iceberg. The worsening climate crisis that profits billionaires and corporations in the short-term as the political duopoly facilitates this ecocide is a wake-up call for movement politics.
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'Declare a Worldwide Climate Emergency': Death Toll in Nepal-Tibet Floods Tops 1,000
"The glacial collapse and deluge," one scientist said, "was the structural failure of a mountain itself, nature's latest commentary on the deadly consequences of human-caused planetary warming."
Sep 01, 2026
With more than 1,000 people dead as of Tuesday and rescue teams still searching for the thousands missing after a glacial collapse in the Himalayas that created a flooding crisis in Nepal and Tibet last week, campaigners, politicians, and scientists reiterated the need for global climate action.
China confirmed at least 16 people are dead and 546 are missing in Tibet, including 261 foreign nationals, while Nepal reported 1,003 deaths and 3,916 more unaccounted for, including 583 foreigners, according to The Associated Press. Among those missing in Nepal are about 900 workers from a dozen hydropower projects, 500 of whom are believed to be trapped in tunnels.
Thousands have been rescued since last Wednesday, and as the AP noted, "authorities in Nepal have been burying bodies in temporary graves until they can be identified. They are preserving DNA samples, photographing distinguishing facial features, and recording other identifying details. Each body is assigned a reference number to help families identify and claim the remains later."
Nepali Prime Minister Balendra Shah has emphasized in recent days that "the flood in the Bhote Koshi River in Rasuwa was not an ordinary flood," and "it is now time for us to strongly raise with the international community the issue of the disasters we are experiencing as a result of climate change."
In a Monday interview with The New York Times, Maheshwar Dhakal from Nepal's Ministry of Agriculture, Forest, and Environment also linked the disaster to human-caused climate change and said that "those who have contributed the least are suffering the most."
Dhakal estimated the recovery cost at $5 billion, and shared his government's letter to the United Nations' fund for such disasters, which says in part that "early action in Nepal would send a signal that the fund is capable of responding with humanity, speed, flexibility, and solidarity when climate-vulnerable countries face losses and damages beyond their capacity to address alone."
Declare a world-wide #climate emergency www.nytimes.com/live/2026/08... #nepal #floods #flooding
[image or embed]
— Nikolas Kozloff (@nikolaskozloff.bsky.social) August 27, 2026 at 4:29 PM
Stefan Rahmstorf, a scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, highlighted on social media Tuesday that experts have long warned about the kinds of disasters seen in the Himalayas over the past week.
"Why are climate scientists not surprised about mountains being destabilized by glacier melt and permafrost thaw?" he asked. "Because they have long predicted that as a result of global heating."
Bill McGuire, professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at University College London, wrote in a Tuesday column for The Guardian that "the increasingly temperamental behavior of the Earth beneath our feet teaches us that global heating is all-pervasive. It will intrude into every aspect of our lives and livelihoods, and leave no part of the planet untouched. As the world processes the horror of the events in Nepal and Tibet, it is a lesson that we ignore at our peril."
Also writing for the British newspaper on Tuesday, Michael Mann, a renowned climate scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, similarly stressed that "the glacial collapse and deluge in Nepal and Tibet was not a freak weather event; it was the structural failure of a mountain itself, nature's latest commentary on the deadly consequences of human-caused planetary warming. And it was the exclamation point on a summer of extremes, illustrating with a sole unnatural disaster the apocalyptic future that lies in store if we fail to take dramatic climate action."
Mann pointed to the lack of such action in the United States—the world's largest historical climate polluter—where President Donald Trump openly courted Big Oil on the campaign trail and has served the climate-wrecking fossil fuel industry's interests since returning to the White House last year, from declaring a national energy emergency and ditching the Paris Agreement, again, to waging a war on renewable power projects.
"Trump and enabling congressional Republicans continue to double down on policies favoring fossil fuel extraction and dependence at the very time we need to be moving even more quickly away from fossil fuels toward clean energy," Mann wrote. "These extreme events underscore the urgency of taking action now, and—while there are many things we can do—one of the greatest opportunities Americans will have to affect climate policy is the upcoming midterm election. You can make support for urgent and dramatic climate action a litmus test issue as you go to the voting booth."
Highlighting that dozens of Americans are among those still missing in Asia, the US-based watchdog group Public Citizen argued on social media Tuesday that "this isn't just a climate change catastrophe. It's a crime. For decades, Big Oil knew fossil fuels would lead to disasters like this. Big Oil must be held accountable."
In 2024, the group published a legal memo detailing how local or state prosecutors in the United States could bring criminal charges against Big Oil for deaths from extreme heat made more likely by the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency. With rapidly advancing attribution science, the approach could also be applied to other disasters linked to the human-caused crisis.
Greenpeace International also demanded accountability for the industry on Tuesday, saying that "it makes us SICK to think of people losing their homes, their livelihoods, and the people they love to fires, floods, and storms, while fossil fuel companies make billions. A FRACTION of those obscene profits could help communities rebuild. MAKE POLLUTERS PAY."
"Make oil, coal, and gas corporations pay their fair share for the damage they cause," the advocacy group added. "Introduce new taxes or fines on them to help communities at home and around the world rebuild from climate disasters and invest in climate solutions."
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Iran Says Trump's New Attacks Show Americans 'Stuck in the Massive Error They’ve Made'
"We cannot accept any orders being dictated upon us," said the spokesperson for Iran's Foreign Ministry. "If they continue with this philosophy, they will not get any different result.”
Sep 01, 2026
As US President Donald Trump returns to bombing Iranian territory, Esmaeil Baghaei Hamaneh, the spokesperson for Iran's Foreign Ministry, said at a press conference on Tuesday that it's only a sign of the quagmire he's found himself in, and emphasized that the only way out will be negotiation rather than force.
"It has become clear they are now stuck in the massive error they’ve made, and it’s their usual habit to raise excessive demands," Baghaei said, noting that mediation efforts by Pakistan were continuing even as the Trump administration claims that Iran is refusing "meaningful negotiations."
When Trump launched the war in February, he predicted that Iran would be brought to its knees in a matter of weeks. Six months later, there is no sign that an end to the conflict is in sight as Trump rejects a return to the negotiating table.
Baghaei said it's clear that the US was once again falling into "a state of miscalculation." Iran, he said, had been adhering to the Memorandum of Understanding reached in June, while the US refused to abide by its terms of ending its economic blockade, unfreezing assets, and ending threats of aggression, as well as ending attacks by US ally Israel in Lebanon.
Baghaei said Iran was willing to reach another agreement to end the war. The problem, he said, was that Trump had shown himself unwilling to follow any deal that included concessions to Iran and was demanding its full capitulation.
"We cannot accept any orders being dictated upon us," Baghaei said. "If they continue with this philosophy, they will not get any different result.”
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian echoed Baghaei's position on Tuesday, saying that Iran would “immediately reciprocate” if Washington honored its commitments under the June interim agreement.
Failing to break Iran with military might, Trump tried to switch last month to a strategy of "economic warfare," imposing "the toughest sanctions in history" and pressuring other nations around the world to do the same in an effort to isolate Iran and fully topple its government.
Baghaei acknowledged that US sanctions were having a devastating effect on the people of Iran. According to Reuters, Iran's foreign trade is down by 35%, and inflation reached 66% in July, cranking up the pain felt by the civilian population.
But efforts to create the "greatest coordinated economic isolation in the history of the world," as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent described it, have faced resistance, with Iran's major trading partners such as China and Pakistan refusing to cut ties.
"Six months of US bombing and naval blockade have produced no US victory, so the plan now is to starve Iran into capitulation," wrote Columbia University professor Jeffrey Sachs and UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network adviser Sybil Fares on Monday for Al Jazeera. "The new approach is illegal, cruel, and will fail for several reasons."
"To begin with, there is the historical record. Economic sanctions do not bring down governments determined to survive them. Yes, sanctions can impoverish populations, empower the security services that control smuggling, and hand the targeted nation a rallying point built on US malice," Sachs and Fares wrote.
They added that at a time when Iran's restrictions on travel through the Strait of Hormuz have spiked oil prices and sent shocks through the global economy, there is little incentive for the world to cut off Iran's oil exports as well.
"The US proposes to deepen a stagflationary shock already being borne by Europe, Japan, and its other allies, and orders those countries to enforce sanctions that will throttle their economies," they wrote.
And due to Trump's erratic policy, disregard for the United Nations Charter in launching a war of aggression, and the demonstration that his assurances are "unreliable," Sachs and Fares noted that countries are increasingly reaching agreements that rely less on US military guarantees and dollar-based trade.
"Pride goeth before the fall, and no government today is more arrogant than the US under Trump and his enforcer, Bessent," they wrote. "Governments around the world will not follow the US blindly into disaster."
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Rare Earth Minerals Don't Have to Feed the War Machine
A nation can spend billions building supply chains designed to manufacture the next generation of weapons, or it can use the same industrial capacity to build the infrastructure required for the next generation of human life. The minerals are the same.
Aug 31, 2026
On August 24, the Department of War announced a $750 million investment to secure rare-earth elements produced by Serra Verde at its Pela Ema project in Brazil. Combined with a $300 million purchase commitment from the Defense Logistics Agency and $500 million from a major bank, the arrangement represents a $1.55 billion investment structure aimed at reducing US dependence on Chinese-controlled supply chains.
There is a legitimate problem here.
There is also a troubling choice about how we intend to solve it.
Rare-earth elements such as neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium, and terbium are essential components of modern life. They are used in permanent magnets found in electric vehicles, wind turbines, electronics, industrial equipment, and other technologies. They are also used in fighter jets, guided missiles, nuclear submarines, drones, and other weapons systems.
A mineral dug from the ground does not know whether it will eventually become part of an offshore wind turbine or the guidance system of a missile. That decision is political.
China currently dominates this supply chain. According to the International Energy Agency, China accounted for about 60% of global mining of magnet rare earths in 2024, 91% of their refining, and 94% of sintered permanent-magnet production. That level of concentration creates a genuine economic vulnerability, particularly after Chinese export restrictions demonstrated how quickly access to these materials can become a geopolitical bargaining chip.
Diversification makes sense.
But listen carefully to the language the US government is using to describe it.
Assistant Secretary of War for Industrial Base Policy Mike Cadenazzi called resilient supply chains a “fundamental warfighting requirement.” The department says the agreement will guarantee materials necessary to manufacture “next-generation weapons systems.” Its announcement specifically highlights nuclear submarines, fighter jets, guided missiles, combat vessels, and drones.
That framing deserves scrutiny.
The United States is not simply securing minerals. It is incorporating another piece of the global economy into an increasingly militarized conception of national security.
A Mineral Can Power a Wind Turbine or a Missile
There is nothing inherently military about neodymium.
A mineral dug from the ground does not know whether it will eventually become part of an offshore wind turbine or the guidance system of a missile.
That decision is political.
And that is precisely why this $1.55 billion initiative should provoke a broader conversation about the kind of economy the United States is building.
If Washington treats critical minerals primarily as inputs for weapons, we should not be surprised when the industries surrounding them increasingly organize themselves around weapons production.
Serra Verde is an important source of these materials. Its Pela Ema operation began commercial production in 2024 and is the first large-scale producer outside Asia of all four critical magnetic rare-earth elements: neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium, and terbium. The company expects production to reach roughly 6,400 metric tons of rare-earth oxides annually by the end of 2027.
That makes Brazil potentially important to reducing the world's dangerous dependence on a single supplier.
But reducing dependence on China should not automatically mean subordinating a new international supply chain to the needs of the Pentagon.
Rare-earth resilience could instead be treated as civilian industrial policy: an effort to ensure reliable supplies for renewable energy, public transportation, resilient electrical grids, medical technologies, communications infrastructure, and other components of human security.
The difference is more than rhetorical.
Government priorities influence markets. Purchase guarantees influence production. Subsidies determine which industries expand. Billions of public dollars can create an ecosystem in which manufacturers orient themselves toward military customers because those customers offer enormous, guaranteed demand.
If Washington treats critical minerals primarily as inputs for weapons, we should not be surprised when the industries surrounding them increasingly organize themselves around weapons production.
Security Is Bigger Than Military Power
The Department of War's announcement actually exposes the contradiction.
The same release that celebrates rare earths as essential to fighter aircraft and nuclear submarines acknowledges that they are vital to “energy infrastructure, transportation, aerospace, and electronics.”
Exactly.
Those civilian applications should not be an afterthought.
The United States could reproduce the very system it says it wants to escape: concentrated supply chains organized around geopolitical blocs, each treating access to minerals as leverage against the other.
Climate change threatens lives. An unreliable electrical grid threatens lives. Fragile transportation and communications systems threaten economic stability. Supply-chain disruptions can close factories and eliminate jobs.
Those are security issues too.
Yet American policymakers repeatedly define security through the narrowest possible lens: military capability first, virtually everything else second.
A peace economy asks a different question.
Instead of asking only, "What materials do we need to maintain our technological advantage in warfare?" we should ask: "What materials do people need to live safely, sustainably and prosperously—and how can we obtain them without creating new forms of exploitation, environmental destruction, or international conflict?"
That would still require diversifying the rare-earth supply chain.
It would still require investment.
It would still require cooperation with countries such as Brazil.
But the purpose would be different.
Don't Replace One Dependency With Another
There is another danger in framing critical minerals as part of strategic competition with China.
The United States could reproduce the very system it says it wants to escape: concentrated supply chains organized around geopolitical blocs, each treating access to minerals as leverage against the other.
Minerals essential to decarbonization could become another source of great-power confrontation.
The result would not necessarily be resilience. It could be a global scramble for resources.
Countries possessing lithium, cobalt, nickel, and rare-earth deposits would increasingly become arenas for competition among powerful states. Supply agreements would become security agreements. Economic relationships would become tests of allegiance.
Minerals essential to decarbonization could become another source of great-power confrontation.
That is not a theoretical concern when officials explicitly describe access to raw materials as a “warfighting requirement.”
The alternative is not continued dependence on China. Diversification is necessary. The IEA itself has repeatedly warned that extreme concentration in rare-earth refining and magnet production represents a significant economic risk.
But diversification should mean creating many reliable suppliers and processing centers—not dividing the mineral economy into rival military camps.
Build a Peace Supply Chain
A different critical-minerals strategy is possible.
The United States could invest aggressively in recycling and recovery of rare-earth materials. It could develop domestic processing capacity while applying strong labor and environmental standards. It could enter long-term partnerships with Brazil and other producing countries that emphasize shared economic development rather than simply extracting resources for American strategic advantage.
And the government could prioritize civilian demand—renewable power, electric transportation, grid modernization, and other public infrastructure—alongside legitimate defense requirements.
It could guarantee that communities near mines and processing facilities benefit economically and retain meaningful influence over development decisions.
And the government could prioritize civilian demand—renewable power, electric transportation, grid modernization, and other public infrastructure—alongside legitimate defense requirements rather than allowing military procurement to dictate the direction of an entire emerging industry.
Serra Verde itself demonstrates why the choice matters. The company's rare earths can supply permanent magnets for electric vehicles and wind turbines just as surely as they can supply defense and aerospace manufacturers.
The question is not whether America should secure access to critical minerals.
It should.
The question is what we intend to do with the security that access provides.
A nation can spend billions building supply chains designed to manufacture the next generation of weapons.
Or it can use the same industrial capacity to build the infrastructure required for the next generation of human life.
The minerals are the same.
The economy we build around them is a choice.
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After Bessent Comments, China Warns US That It Cannot Sanction Iran Out of Existence
A spokesperson for the foreign ministry of China, which receives 80% of Iran's oil exports, said that going along with Trump's "economic warfare" will "only lead to escalation that serves no one’s interests."
Aug 21, 2026
The Trump administration is once again threatening to carry out "regime change" in Iran, this time using what President Donald Trump described as "economic warfare" against the nation rather than military might.
But as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent demands the world play along with efforts to isolate Iran, the second-largest economy, China, is refusing to join the US sanctions campaign.
The Trump administration has failed to use military means to force Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz after it began restricting travel in retaliation for US and Israeli attacks in late February.
On Thursday, Bessent told CNBC that the new approach is to impose the "toughest sanctions in history” on Iran, ramping up a strategy that has inflicted suffering on the Iranian people but failed to force its leaders out of power for nearly 50 years.
Bessent emphasized that it would only work with the help of "all of our allies" carrying out the "greatest coordinated economic isolation in the history of the world."
He made very explicit the goal of ratcheting up pressure on the regime by inflicting pain on the nation's 90 million people, by causing "substantial inflation, both food inflation and ordinary inflation in Iran." He compared the effort to the use of sanctions to strangle the economies of Venezuela and Cuba, which have fueled humanitarian crises in both countries.
Bessent gave an ultimatum that every nation is "either with us or against us," and warned those who refuse to help with the administration's effort to "squash the economy" of Iran that the US would "put its full might and force toward enforcing against you."
He promised that any country that provides a "lifeline" to Iran would itself be sent into "economic oblivion."
Iran responded to the threats by vowing a fearsome retaliation. "With preparedness across land, sea, air, air defense, and cyberspace, Iran's armed forces will respond to the enemy's new threats with crushing, punishing, and devastating responses," said the chief of staff of Iran's armed forces, Maj. Gen. Ali Abdollahi.
Iran's parliament speaker, Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf, acknowledged that the impact of further sanctions could indeed be devastating.
"We must make plans to deal with the unjust sanctions so that we can overcome them," he said. "No matter how much military power we have, we won't survive if people are hungry and we don't have financial turnover, economic growth, and national production."
As the US imposes its own blockade on Iran's oil exports, Bessent called on China to "get with the program." China buys about 80% of the oil exported from Iran, and Bessent emphasized that half of China's energy comes from the Persian Gulf.
But Lin Jian, a spokesperson for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said during a press conference on Friday that China would not cooperate with efforts to isolate Iran.
"China believes that military means, sanctions, and pressure tactics are not the solution. On the contrary, they will only lead to escalation that serves no one’s interests. We call for efforts to solve disputes through dialogue and negotiation," Lin told an Iranian government broadcaster.
Asked about the potential effects on China's energy imports from Iran, he reiterated, "China opposes illicit unilateral sanctions that lack basis in international law and UN Security Council mandate."
The question now is whether Trump will make good on his administration's threats and retaliate against China. It's likely easier said than done, as an economic war with the US's third-largest trading partner could further exacerbate the economic turmoil Trump is seeking to ameliorate before the midterm elections in November.
Danny Citrinowicz, a senior researcher at Israel's Institute for National Security Studies, suggested that China would be unlikely to surrender easily in that fight.
"China has a strong interest in preserving Iran under the Islamic Republic and maintaining Tehran’s strategic relationship, and growing dependence, on Beijing," he wrote on social media. "Any economic strategy that assumes China will eventually fall in line with Washington risks being built on a fundamentally flawed premise."
Shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz is still far below prewar levels, with the daily number of ships passing through in the single digits, according to Reuters.
Crude oil prices are still 30% higher than at the start of the war, while US gas prices are still up by more than a dollar per gallon.
But Trump, seemingly unwilling to admit that his campaign there has been anything less than successful, is continuing to claim that the strait is wide open thanks to US military action.
As Gregory Brew, a senior analyst on Iran and oil policy at the Eurasia Group, explained, this has left the administration's messaging on why exactly it is now pivoting to ruthless economic warfare appear like disjointed doublespeak.
"Bessent and others cannot say what this policy is meant to achieve—reopening the strait—because in the admin's telling, the strait is already open," Brew said. "As a result, this return to maximum pressure feels oddly devoid of purpose. The US is inflicting economic pain, felt mostly by Iran's people, rather than its rulers, for no clear reason."
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The Real 21st Century Red Scare Is the Heat Index
President Donald Trump continues his pattern of setting fire to the future by fearmongering about "communism" while denying the climate crisis his policies are turbocharging.
Jul 28, 2026
Yes, it’s happening and by “it” I distinctly mean climate change. No question about it, this planet is simply getting hotter (and hotter, and hotter yet). Only recently, an international team of scientists reported that greenhouse gas emissions are at an all-time high globally. And if you happened to be one of the estimated 109 million Americans living in certain parts of the Midwestern, Mid-Atlantic, or Northeastern United States recently, then you undoubtedly experienced your sky turning a grim grey (or weird orange) with smoke from those Canadian wildfires that once weren’t but now are a regular summer experience along, of course, with startling heat.
And you might not even have noticed, for instance, that Europe was blasted by heat early, hard, and in a record-setting fashion this summer with its hottest June in history. (It wasn’t a good time to take the London subway, that’s for sure!). Meanwhile, even before those Canadian fires hit, much of the Midwestern and Eastern United States experienced a record-setting heatwave (with more to come). And oh, yes, then there was that report on Legionnaire’s disease breaking out in my hometown, New York City, possibly also linked in some fashion to climate change.
And yet, explain it as you will, surging climate hell (and it does now seem to be happening ever faster), including a possible “super” El Niño weather cycle in the year to come, seldom proves to be a truly headline-making story for long, not in this country, not in the age of President Donald J. Trump. In fact, he’s distinctly into what’s coming to be known as “climate hushing.” Unfortunately, “hush” isn’t really a word that can be used effectively in any context when it comes to him, since he’s not truly quiet about anything on this planet of ours—or, these days, do I mean his?
Under the circumstances (and, yes, I’m already sweating!), consider it strange that an American president should be so visibly set on doing anything he can to ignore—oh, sorry, that’s certainly understating the situation—I guess I mean, anything he can to actively promote the further overheating of this planet of... well, I might once have said “ours” but not in the age of You Know Exactly Whom.
Neither many of the Democrats, nor Donald Trump and his—and these days it is distinctly his—party seem ready to face the world that we’re truly in as the November 2026 elections approach.
And hey, let me not simply dump all the bad karma on him, not when Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine almost four-and-a-half years ago, launching a war that still shows not the slightest sign of ending and war, of course, turns out to pour greenhouse gases into the atmosphere in a genuinely remarkable fashion. Not when Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu can’t stop blasting the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon. Not when the US Air Force almost daily continues to bomb what it considers its enemy in Somalia (something you can only hope to keep track of if you read Dave DeCamp at Antiwar.com). Not when Donald Trump (yes, him again!) just can’t stop blasting Iran (and the Iranians continue to respond by blasting their neighbors and US military bases in those countries).
And honestly, that’s just to start down a list—or do I mean to start into deep chaos?—on this distinctly crazed planet of ours. It’s generally growing ever harder to find any version of good news relating to the (yes, again!) distinctly (over)heating world we’re now living in. Under the circumstances, give China some credit. Admittedly, that country still pours more fossil fuels into the atmosphere than any other place on Earth, but in its imperial rise, it’s also taken something remarkably close to full-scale control over making (and selling globally) just about anything from solar panels to wind-turbine equipment that might effectively produce green energy or capture carbon. In fact, give China’s leadership full credit for realizing that the overheating of this planet could prove to be an imperial money-making proposition of the first order.
And yes, give President Trump credit as well. After all, in the end, he’s certain to lend imperial decline new meaning in a distinctly new age for Planet Earth. Can there be any question, in fact, that he’s intent on putting this country (and this planet, too) on the downhill slope of history, while offering China free rein (or do I mean reign?) to control the green energy market globally into what could be a distant (and, given the way things are going, distinctly devastating) future. Hey, hard as it might be to believe, he’s actually spending our taxpayer dollars to get energy companies to agree to cancel (yes, cancel!) planned offshore wind projects, so as not to offer any aid to what he’s labeled a “green scam.” And you really can’t do China a bigger favor (and the rest of us greater harm) than that, can you?
Setting Fire to Our Future
Of course, all of this would truly be funny if it weren’t so deadly serious. After all, to add to the climate mayhem, as The New York Times reported recently, the president appointed “a critic of mainstream climate science to oversee the federal government’s flagship report on how climate change affects the United States.” And why not, given that (as he’s stated more than once) climate change is a first-class “hoax” and “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world”? As for predictions about what climate change will do to this planet of ours (no less what it’s already doing), he summed them up this way at the United Nations late last year: “They were made by stupid people that have cost their countries fortunes and given those same countries no chance for success. If you don’t get away from this green scam, your country is going to fail.”
Meanwhile, in the world of Donald Trump, even the Democrats seem to be in a distinctly climate-hushing mood as the November elections approach. You would think that putting the finger on him for potentially setting fire to our future would be a politically effective approach in any election season. No such luck, though, explain it as you will.
In fact, neither many of the Democrats, nor Donald Trump and his—and these days it is distinctly his—party seem ready to face the world that we’re truly in as the November 2026 elections approach. After all, as part of his campaign season, the president has reached not into the future (god forbid!) but into the American past of my childhood years by starting to call liberal Democrats “communists.” Yes, commies! At Independence Day celebrations on July 4, for instance, he said: “Our warriors did not fight communism on battlefields across the world, only to have that menace rear its ugly head right back here in America. We’re not going to let it happen.”
In fact, as The Washington Post recently reported, “From January to June, [right-wing influencers and Republicans] used the words ‘communism’ or ‘communist’ in an average of about 626 posts per week, up from around 439 per week during the same stretch last year—a 43% increase.”
In sum, how truly apocalyptic of both him and so many of the rest of us. Or perhaps it’s simply all too human of us not to want to take in the truly bad news on this planet of... well, I was going to say “ours,” but if it ever was, it really isn’t anymore, is it? And you can certainly give Donald Trump and, of course, those who decided to vote for him a second (or do I mean third?) time around significant credit for running this planet into... well, yes, the ground.
I mean, the very fact that Donald Trump was elected to run the increasingly (dis)United States of America (into the ground) a second time should still be a stunning reality on this increasingly strange planet of ours. Once upon a time, you simply couldn’t have made this up, could you (and if you had, who would possibly have believed you)?
I’m already sweating!
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The AI Race With China Is a Lie Told by Big Tech to Justify the Data Center Invasion
The truth is, we don’t need hyperscale data centers to “beat China.” We aren’t racing China. We’re killing ourselves so Silicon Valley can race itself.
Jul 27, 2026
As Big Tech races to build water-guzzling, energy-hungry data centers for its artificial intelligence, talk of an “AI race” between the United States and China has permeated public discourse. Pundits, politicians, and the media have all joined tech corporations in selling this narrative. And it’s giving license to Big Tech and their political handmaidens to ruin our communities, exploit our every action (both online and via AI-powered surveillance), and steal the wealth of human knowledge for private gain.
But the idea of an AI race between China and the US isn’t grounded in reality. The researchers, companies, and governments behind Chinese and US AI development are pursuing completely different goals.
The discourse in the US assumes that achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI)—computers that mimic human consciousness—would be so momentous and earth-shattering that clearly this must be the goal of anyone pursuing AI development. But that’s not the main goal of Chinese AI development. And a competition in which the competitors are running toward different finish lines isn’t a race.
If we allow the myth of an AI race with China to give Big Tech free rein, we face a more polluted, less equal world.
A Race Doesn’t Have Two Different Finish Lines
While the US is focused on artificial general intelligence (AGI) powered by Large Language Models (LLMs), Chinese developers are focused on AI embedded in products. It’s ChatGPT versus robots.
Yes, China is developing LLMs, although largely in an open-source way as opposed to the for-profit competition in the US. Recent news stories report that China is “catching” the US in LLM development. Indeed, the latest Chinese model outperforms leading US models. But this isn’t evidence of an LLM-AGI race. Instead, it shows that without making AGI its main focus, China is capable of developing its own models almost as quickly as US companies.
If every environmental review, every question raised by a community, every issue around water usage and electricity prices can be dismissed or lessened as “helping China,” then meaningful political debate can be silenced.
More to the point, LLM development in China is incidental to the country’s real goal for AI. Its focus remains on products embedded with AI and robots. Or, as AI policy researcher Liang Zheng says, in China, “The first priority is to use it to benefit ordinary people” (debatable, but indicates the kind of AI they are pursuing).
In the US, the first priority is to exploit people so that the tech oligarchs can profit. It’s chatbots all the way down.
This isn’t to argue that China is doing it “right” and the US is doing it “wrong.” Either approach will lead to a future in which citizens become increasingly disempowered. In which work becomes more scarce and less lucrative for most people. And in which a handful of billionaires grow wealthier and more powerful.
But the arguments being hauled out to support the destructive growth of hyperscale data centers are based on a fallacy. There is no need to “beat China.” China and the US are racing on separate tracks, in different races, with different finish lines.
These two separate approaches also explain the mind-boggling scale of the data center invasion we currently face. The massive hyperscale data centers—recent proposals would demand up to 5 gigawatts, enough electricity to power roughly 3.75 million US households—are only “required” because the US is racing toward AGI. Meanwhile, the embodied AI dominating in China does not require the same amount of computational power.
The truth is, we don’t need hyperscale data centers to “beat China.” We aren’t racing China. We’re killing ourselves so Silicon Valley can race itself.
How Big Tech Is Weaponizing the “AI Race” to Build Data Centers
Yet, the “AI race” story is a convenient lie for Big Tech and its political protectors. It is a neat political argument designed to insulate the industry from criticism and regulation.
If every environmental review, every question raised by a community, every issue around water usage and electricity prices can be dismissed or lessened as “helping China,” then meaningful political debate can be silenced. Real regulation—if even possible—can be avoided. Fear becomes a substitute for policy.
We understand why O’Leary and the other Tech Broligarchs don’t understand the grassroots opposition to data centers building across the country. It’s hard to spot the grassroots from the window of a private jet.
At the same time, data center developers and their minions in Washington have tried to weaponize false claims about foreign ties to the anti-data center movement. Kevin O’Leary of Shark Tank fame has explicitly said that our movement is being funded by China. He has no evidence because evidence of a falsehood can’t exist. In fact, Fox News has been forced to retract its coverage of his claims.
We understand why O’Leary and the other Tech Broligarchs don’t understand the grassroots opposition to data centers building across the country. It’s hard to spot the grassroots from the window of a private jet. But the opposition is real and organic, and no amount of disinformation and pushing the “AI race against China” scare tactic will derail the movement.
Big Tech Is Selling Us a Dystopian Future
The myth of an AI race with China threatens to propel us into Big Tech’s vision of the future—one that’s more unequal than ever. Yes, tech leaders suggest their algorithms will cure cancer, but their real goal is and has been to increase their power and wealth at the expense of the rest of us.
Even as American Tech Broligarchs have distanced themselves from earlier prophecies of widespread job loss, their vision of the future will see the vast majority of us out of meaningful work. We’ll be subject to living off whatever meager handouts are created in an attempt to mollify us.
Even if there were an AI race, is it worth running, let alone winning, if the prize is a dystopian future of mass misery with a thin layer of super wealthy tech oligarchs at the top?
At the same time, our movement will be traced whether or not we use the electronic gadgets they sell us. Already, surveillance devices linked to AI can recognize our faces, record our license plates, and report our movements. Companies and governments can buy this data in order to track us.
Meanwhile, “surveillance pricing” allows companies to change prices in an instant so that they can exploit our needs for their profit. Deepfake videos have already added to the rapidly decaying trust in a commonly shared world and a basic set of facts necessary for a functioning democracy. And this is but a scratch of the surface.
Even if there were an AI race, is it worth running, let alone winning, if the prize is a dystopian future of mass misery with a thin layer of super wealthy tech oligarchs at the top?
Big Tech’s Dystopian Vision Isn’t Inevitable
But we should be clear. This dystopian vision is not the inevitable outcome of unstoppable technological “progress” as the Tech Broligarchs would have us believe. Each and every decision being made to advance AI is a political decision. And, for now, we still have the ability to determine our political future.
Across the country, there is a growing resistance to the nightmare being shoved down our throats. Communities are coming together to fight the spread of destructive hyperscale data centers. Already in 2026, more than $130 billion-worth of proposed data center projects have been defeated and canceled.
That’s the real “AI Race.” Not China versus the US, but us versus Big Tech.
Communities are taking control of their futures by placing moratoriums on new data centers. New York enacted a one-year pause on new centers, and there is growing support for a nationwide pause in Congress.
We aren’t destined to live in Elon Musk’s fever dream. We have the power to stop him and his fellow Broligarchs. When we organize, we win. That’s the real “AI Race.” Not China versus the US, but us versus Big Tech. That’s not only a race worth running—it’s one we have to win.
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Who Wants to Be Tied to the Energy of War?
Renewable energy comes without the emissions, without the climate consequences, and without the oil wars that have plagued the last 30-plus years.
Jul 23, 2026
Renewables are not just for highfalutin hippies, they’re cheaper and avoid the volatility of wars and chaotic leaders. We are not living the 1970s oil shock moment; there are alternatives to fossil fuels. Those who embrace renewable energy will be better off—from health benefits for communities to reducing energy shock burdens for households. The reality unfolding during this latest oil war is that many nations really do not want to be tethered to volatile energy resources. And who can blame them?
With yet another peace process collapsing and conflict renewed, the Iran war will continue to create the largest disruption to oil markets since the Covid-19 pandemic. In mere months, it’s increased the costs of oil and gas, food, and everything in-between, amplifying the global cost of living crisis. We’re at the beginning of a very bumpy ride ahead.
New pipelines that would avoid the Strait of Hormuz altogether are underway. But this type of infrastructure can take up to a decade or more to come online. In the meantime, national petroleum stockpiles are at an all-time low. Governments have a limited amount of time to buoy oil prices and stave off high fuel costs. If the Strait of Hormuz does successfully open and peace is achieved, it could take years for petroleum output to stabilize back to pre-war levels, thanks to destroyed infrastructure. Liquefied natural gas and oil processing facilities have been targets for bombing by both sides—amounting to $58 billion in damages so far.
Adding to this tableau is the reality that the days of so-called "easy oil" are now in the rearview mirror. Shell CEO Wael Sawan recently forecast that oil prices will continue to rise long after peace is achieved due to a combination of energy infrastructure damages and a need to access more expensive, more environmentally risky oil reservoirs. It’s worth calling out here that we’ve already burned through enough fossil fuels to achieve 1.5°C of warming. Every year has been another record-breaking year for global warming and global climate damages to the tune of billions of dollars.
The US and Israeli war with Iran is making renewable energy more attractive, more economically competitive, and may help us achieve our global climate targets to triple renewables by 2030.
In a world where we are witnessing the climate consequences of burning fossil fuels—where renewables like wind and solar are cheaper—just why should nations continue to rely on petroleum?
Before the Iran War, renewable energy was already growing at a rapid speed. It’s now cheaper to employ solar and wind than oil and gas. Now that petroleum costs are more volatile and associated infrastructure is in duress, the pivot to renewables will be inevitable. This March in the US, renewable energy accounted for half of all energy generation. Globally, solar energy is making up the largest share of new energy projects. If oil is the energy of warmongering and dramatic cost fluctuations, perhaps renewable energy could be the energy of peace and economic security.
Spain, China, and others leading on renewable energy power generation have seen costs remain relatively stable during this time. Now other nations are seeking that same stability. Since the war started, many fossil fuel dependent nations increased their renewable energy targets to levels that exceed their national climate goals. Egypt announced a goal to increase renewable energies like wind and solar from 10% today to 45% of energy needs in just two years. This new target overshoots any climate goal Egypt has previously set during annual United Nations climate conferences. South Korea, India, and others have likewise elevated their renewable energy targets to help lessen energy cost burdens for citizens, decrease dependency on the ebbs and flows of oil and gas, and the military whims of chaotic leaders. Now Turkey and Australia are pushing for a commitment at the next UN climate conference for nations to reach 35% renewable energy use by 2035.
The path toward a renewable energy economy will not be easy. Petroleum interests are doing everything possible to wed us all to fossil fuels through a long-established playbook of climate denial, climate skepticism around emissions and renewable energy, and wielding political influence. In the US at least, those actions have paid off. The second Trump administration has been all about tying us to oil and gas. A mere $445 million in campaign contributions to the Trump presidential campaign and related political action committees gifted a windfall of deregulation and incentives to what should be a declining energy industry on the way out.
Many Biden-era renewable energy incentives have been revoked in the second Trump administration, diminishing the potential for America’s solar, battery, and wind manufacturing to compete with China. Instead, incentives and kickbacks for oil and gas companies are everywhere, from opening public lands to reducing environmental reviews and even connecting trade agreements to oil and gas. These actions have not stymied renewable energy uptake. Last year, solar overtook coal in overall global energy consumption for the first time.
While the United States is focused on controlling the energy of the past, China has been laser focused on the energy of the future. A rapid global pivot away from fossil fuels will benefit China’s burgeoning renewable energy industries the most. Today, 80% of all renewable energy—like wind, solar, and battery storage—is manufactured by Chinese companies, with US companies a faraway second at 10% of the market.
The US and Israeli war with Iran is making renewable energy more attractive, more economically competitive, and may help us achieve our global climate targets to triple renewables by 2030. The reality is no one wants to rely on economically toxic energy sources. Renewable energy comes without the emissions, without the climate consequences, and without the oil wars that have plagued the last 30-plus years. Embracing renewable energy today means being more resilient and better prepared to weather future petroleum shocks; all while helping to reduce emissions and lessen climate impacts—a win-win if ever there was one.
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As Trump Denies and Delays, the World Races to Meet the Climate Clock Deadline
It may sound like all is lost. On the contrary: Solutions abound, and there are many reasons for hope.
Jul 22, 2026
On July 22, the Climate Clock—whose numbers Greta Thunberg, King Charles III, and other climate champions have for years used to demand urgent action—will drop below three years for the first time, signaling a rapidly shrinking window to avert worsening Climate Catastrophe by preventing global warming from rising above 1.5°C. We will pass this critical climate red line before the next FIFA World Cup in 2030 and by the time this year’s cohort of undergraduate students earn their degree. This is not doomerism. This is simply what the world’s best science has been telling us, clearly and accurately, for nearly a decade.
It may sound like all is lost. On the contrary: Solutions abound, and there are many reasons for hope. But first we need to understand where we are and how we got here.
The anti-progress, self-sabotaging direction of the current US administration has now all but assured that the planet will blow past this critical global deadline in three years, setting the world on a dangerous track toward increased chaos and disruption, from extreme heatwaves to increased devastation by floods to collapsing food systems.
President Donald Trump has not done this alone. Under Trump, the federal government has acted as a direct appendage of the Fossil Fuel industry, seeking profits at all costs while sabotaging the most viable climate solutions and undermining any sustainable alternatives to oil, gas, and coal.
"The best time to avert climate disaster was 10 years ago. The second best time is now.”
This administration has ended clean energy tax credits, terminated emission standards for cars and trucks, and eliminated the scientific and legal foundation for federal greenhouse gas regulations by revoking the Environmental Protection Agency’s Greenhouse Gas Endangerment Finding. With a special spite, Trump has also forced money-losing coal plants to continue operating while cancelling perfectly good already 80% complete offshore wind projects.
And once again the world finds itself embroiled in yet another “War for Oil,” this time over the Strait of Hormuz with a running price tag of over $100 billion. The economic, social, and ecological costs of fossil fuels have become so great, that some have likened it to “Energy From Hell.”
Despite these frightening realities, there is a surprising amount of good news. While the US stumbles backward, the rest of the world races forward.
The pace of China's renewable energy growth has been staggering. China reached its 2030 wind and solar targets six years ahead of schedule. China installs 3 gigawatts of solar power per day—meaning it builds the rough equivalent of a large coal-fired power plant worth of renewable energy every eight hours. Renewables now account for over 60% of China's total power generating capacity. Climate activist and author Bill McKibben describes China as the "Costco of energy"—its massive production of solar panels is one of the key drivers of the global solar revolution. In the race toward renewables, China is now kicking the United States butt outright, having installed five times the capacity of the US.
Riding the global glut of cheap Chinese solar panels, Pakistan is undergoing one of the fastest grassroots energy transitions in the world. In over just two years, ordinary citizens independently installed an estimated 27 gigawatts of solar capacity. This consumer-led boom made solar the nation's largest single source of electricity.
India’s renewable energy sector is the world's third largest, with non-fossil sources exceeding 51% of the country’s total installed capacity, hitting its 2030 targets five years ahead of schedule. Powered by offshore wind, Denmark leads Europe's remarkable green transition, now sourcing roughly 88% of its net electricity from renewables, and aiming for 100% renewable electricity by 2030. Uruguay now generates nearly 99% of its electricity from renewable sources. This massive transition slashed production costs by half, created 50,000 jobs, and allows the country to export surplus clean energy to Argentina and Brazil. Even the Vatican is getting in on the action, driving forward hard on an ambitious initiative to make Vatican City the world's first carbon-neutral state.
And in spite of Trump’s efforts to undermine it, the USA’s transition to renewables rolls forward. This May, for the first time in the USA, solar power generated more electricity than coal. A huge milestone. Despite the reduction in federal subsidies, demand by US consumers for renewable energy continues unabated, simply because it’s the most affordable option.
Over the last decade, solar energy has become 10 times cheaper, onshore wind three times cheaper. Renewable energy is now the cheapest source of new power in most markets. Falling prices mean renewables accounted for over 90% of total worldwide new electricity-generating capacity added, pushing renewables to account for roughly one-third of global power. In 2024 alone, global power generation from renewable sources saved US$467 billion in avoided fossil fuel costs.
If it wasn’t for the relentless deluge of Climate Denialism and anti-science rhetoric muddying our public discourse (much of it paid for by the Fossil Fuel industry), these incredible human achievements in the face of catastrophe would be sources of great national and international pride, akin to World Cup victories.
Just this spring, frustrated by the United Nation’s COP process that year after year has been undermined by petro states and fossil fuel lobbyists, 50 governments, including Colombia and the Netherlands (the birthplace of oil giant Shell), gathered for a First Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels. This "coalition of the willing” charted out concrete next steps to accelerate the global transition to renewables.
The renewables revolution being pursued across the globe is delivering real results. The most real result: Newsflash! we’re not going to go extinct!
Recently, scientists have determined that the most dreaded, worst-case scenario of a 4.5°C-plus global temperature increase is now, thankfully, off the table. Thanks to the combined efforts of governments, activists, scientists, engineers, and consumers, we have—for now—slowed the runaway climate train from crashing at full velocity into a horrific future. This is a massive success story of the global climate movement that has gotten far fewer headlines than it deserves.
Perhaps the part of this global crisis that future generations may have the hardest time understanding is how clear and doable the climate solutions we need are. While the rapid transition from Fossil Fuels to Renewable Energy is the foundation, other solutions reinforce the gains: Gender Parity in government (aka more women in leadership) delivers better, measurable pro-climate outcomes, while protecting 30% of our land by the year 2030 would maintain critical global biodiversity and mitigate climate impacts.
The Clock also tracks the dollar cost of inaction, currently $32 trillion! Yes, that’s right. According to an extensive recent study from the journal Nature, acting now to mitigate climate change would potentially prevent $32 trillion in damages by 2050. Meanwhile a new analysis by Bloomberg Intelligence reports that the US spends nearly $1T per year on climate damages, exceeding 3% of US GDP.
The Climate Clock has been doing it’s part to hasten progress, branching out from our monumental time keeper in New York City’s Union Square to dozens of countries, putting handheld clocks in the hands of hundreds of climate activists across the world to pressure leaders to take action. Climate champions from presidents to TV meteorologists have now used the clock to push for urgent implementation of the solutions.
The threats are very real and time is of the essence. But the solutions available to us are vast and achievable.
All these solutions are displayed on the Clock in real time, tracking our forward progress as the deadline counts down. The Climate Clock was never an “End of The World” clock, but a “How to Save The World” clock.
To paraphrase an old saying: "The best time to avert climate disaster was 10 years ago. The second best time is now.” Every fraction of a degree counts. It’s never too late to fight for people and the planet. Even as the Clock ticks toward zero, we must—and can—act in time.
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Amid Fears of Killer Robots, Humanoid MMA Fight in China Ends With Decapitation
"One brutal kick sent the robot's head hanging loose."
Jul 17, 2026
Amid warnings from experts and political leaders about "killer robots," a Chinese robotics company on Thursday hosted an unprecedented combat tournament in which one humanoid robot decapitated another.
The fight featuring the decapitation—footage of which quickly circulated online—was part of the opening night of the Ultimate Robot Knock-out Legend (URKL) competition in Shenzhen, organized by the company EngineAI, which developed the humanoid.
The Chinese Embassy in Ireland was among the accounts on the social media platform X that highlighted the moment when one robot's "head" was dislodged.
The "white humanoid robot, named 'White Eagle' landed a high kick to the head of its black opponent, 'Matador,' which made the robot's head rock precariously in its socket before rolling completely out of place," according to Newsweek. "The two continued to spar as Matador's head was swinging from its socket until eventually the robot fell, crushing its head underneath its body."
Unveiled last year, the humanoid is called T800, a nod to the Terminator franchise. EngineAI's website features videos of T800 executing various mixed martial arts (MMA) moves, from a combination punch and a roundhouse kick to punch-kick combos.
EngineAI announced UKRL, the "world's first" humanoid robot combat league, early this year, seeking 32 teams from universities, enterprises, and research institutions worldwide to compete using its robots. The first round of competition is scheduled for July-August, followed by another round in September-October, and the grand finals in November-December.
As the Chinese tabloid Global Times reported when the tournament was announced in February:
Pan Helin, a Beijing-based veteran analyst, told the Global Times on Monday that such competitions help enhance public awareness of humanoid robots and expand potential application scenarios.
Pan noted that humanoid robots still face technological and practical limitations, and real-world application is key to their further development. Such events could yield positive effects in the entertainment and performance market, which is a necessary step forward in paving the way for further applications in factories or households, Pan said.
Tian Feng, former dean of SenseTime's Intelligence Industry Research Institute, said that the free provision of T800 robots will lower research and development barriers for smaller companies and promote the integration of applications involving industry, academia, and research bodies.
The tournament's opening night came on the heels of a series of artificial intelligence events hosted by the United Nations earlier this month, during which Secretary-General António Guterres said that "if AI is to be powerful, it must be governed," and "my main concern is with 'lethal autonomous weapon systems.'"
"Let us call them what they are: killer robots," Guterres continued. "Machines selecting and engaging their target and taking a life—without human control and judgment. That is morally repugnant. It is politically unacceptable. And it must be banned by international law."
"States are already at the discussion table. But let us not wait for atrocity to act. Some decisions must remain forever human—none more than taking a human life," he added. "Some might claim that governance is the enemy of innovation. But innovation needs guardrails. The technologies we trust most—in aviation, in medicine, in nuclear energy and beyond—earned that trust because we acted to hold their makers to account."
As Wired detailed in Friday reporting, "the US military has a long-standing interest in humanoids," and Sankaet Pathak's startup Foundation Future Industries aims to "produce an all-American robot supersoldier."
The startup's "unique in its targeting of the military market, and so far it's been lucrative," the outlet added. "The company has government contracts worth millions of dollars and high-profile backers to spread its message: Eric Trump, the president's son, is both an investor and the company's chief strategy adviser."
This article has been updated to include the Wired reporting.
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