This Week’s Awesome Tech Stories From Around the Web (Through November 29)

Artificial Intelligence

The AI Boom Is Based on a Fundamental MistakeBenjamin Riley | The Verge

“The problem is that according to current neuroscience, human thinking is largely independent of human language—and we have little reason to believe ever more sophisticated modeling of language will create a form of intelligence that meets or surpasses our own.”

COMPUTING

Why Google’s Custom AI Chips Are Shaking Up the Tech IndustryAlex Wilkins | New Scientist ($)

“Nvidia’s position as the dominant supplier of AI chips may be under threat from a specialized chip pioneered by Google, with reports suggesting companies like Meta and Anthropic are looking to spend billions on Google’s tensor processing units.”

Biotechnology

What’s Next for AlphaFold: A Conversation With a Google DeepMind Nobel LaureateWill Douglas Heaven | MIT Technology Review ($)

“It was five years ago this week that AlphaFold 2’s debut took scientists by surprise. Now that the hype has died down, what impact has AlphaFold really had? How are scientists using it? And what’s next? I talked to Jumper (as well as a few other scientists) to find out.”

ROBOTICS

A Humanoid Robot-Shaped Bubble Is Forming, China WarnsRobert Hart | The Verge

“Speaking at a press briefing, National Development and Reform Commission spokesperson Li Chao said China’s humanoid robotics industry needs to balance ‘the speed of growth against the risk of bubbles.’ Investment has been pouring into the sector despite there being few proven use cases for the bots, Li said, risking a flood of ‘highly similar’ models as funding for research and development shrinks.”

Supermassive Dark Matter Stars May Be Lurking in the Early UniverseLeah Crane | New Scientist ($)

“We may have seen the first hints of strange stars powered by dark matter. These so-called dark stars could explain several of the most mysterious objects in the universe, while also giving us hints about the true nature of dark matter itself.”

Tech

Crypto Winter Will Be Different This TimeKen Brown | The Information ($)

“[Stablecoins’] broader use also creates more ways for a stablecoin crisis to emerge and spread across the globe. It is here that the links to the traditional financial system matter. If investors dump their stablecoins, as they did with Circle, the companies sell the assets that back them, potentially causing turmoil in Treasurys, money markets, and the like.”

Future

MIT Study Finds AI Is Already Capable of Replacing 11.7% of US WorkersGrace Snelling | Fast Company

“In an interview with CNBC, Prasanna Balaprakash, ORNL director and co-leader of the research, described [the Iceberg Index model] as a ‘digital twin for the US labor market.’ Using that base of data, the index analyzes to what extent digital AI tools can already perform certain technical and cognitive tasks, and then produces an estimate of what AI exposure in each area looks like.”

Future

AI Isn’t Just Automating Jobs. It’s Creating New Layers of Human WorkEnrique Dans | Fast Company

“When an AI drafts a report, someone still has to verify its claims (please, do not forget this!), check for bias, and rewrite the parts that don’t sound right. When an agent summarizes a meeting, someone has to decide what actually matters. Automation doesn’t erase labor; it just moves it upstream, from execution to supervision.”

COMPUTING

The First Large-Scale Cyberattack by AINury Turkel | The Wall Street Journal ($)

“A state-backed threat group, likely Chinese, crossed a threshold in September that cybersecurity experts have warned about for years. According to a report by Anthropic, attackers manipulated its AI system, Claude Code, to conduct what appears to be the first large-scale espionage operation executed primarily by artificial intelligence.”