The Social Community forScholER

New data from energy think tank Ember shows that solar supplied 12.8% of US energy generation in May — marking not only the highest share ever recorded for the clean energy source, but also the first time it’s surpassed coal. #ScholER #Data is beautiful https://sherwood.news/world/solar-generated-more-power-than-coal-in-the-us-for-the-first-time-ever/?utm_source=snacks&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=snacks_20260615&utm_content=f56f3bdef8972461ef7ae51424d69b7b

Europe has already shattered meteorological records this summer, and things are likely to get worse https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/29/world/europe/summer-heat-wave-fires-climate-change.html?unlocked_article_code=1.1VA.awhz.XBvirZKfGWbn&smid=url-share&utm_source=snacks&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=snacks_20260730&utm_content=20964af6990a9ea2bb51dc7b9d41dd79

The Trump administration is weighing sweeping semiconductor tariffs that could extend to data-center servers and other chip-powered goods, alarming tech companies already facing high-end chip shortages and potentially undercutting US ambitions to lead in #Artificial Intelligence . https://www.politico.com/news/2026/08/27/data-centers-chips-tariffs-threat-01050957?_bhlid=7fa0cee2288aec9f0561ff866de2dcc1ebdfef89

Nica took a screenshot of the discussion · 2 months ago

Elon Musk lamented a global “crisis of power” on Tuesday as the Tesla and SpaceX CEO spoke virtually at a G20 innovation event hosted in North Carolina by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and the Commerce Department. Musk cited a likely 15 gigawatt shortage of power next year for AI chips, calling on other countries to build data centers that could service AI companies desperate for computing capacity. In a brief virtual interview with Office of Science and Technology Policy director Michael Kratsios, Musk predicted that AI will grow the global economy by 20-30% annually. He also predicted that a billion humanoid robots—including those Musk’s Tesla are building—will be available in the next decade. The robots will be five times more productive than humans, he said. Musk’s compensation package at Tesla is partially tied (https://e.customeriomail.com/e/c/eyJlbWFpbF9pZCI6ImRnU2kwUVlDQUplSkJwYUpCZ0dnWWNjano1b2hGeUFIRnpKR3RWWT0iLCJocmVmIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZHcuY29tL2VuL2Vsb24tbXVzay1jb3VsZC1iZWNvbWUtYS10cmlsbGlvbmFpcmUtdGVzbGEtc3BhY2V4L2EtNzQ2ODQ3NTY_dXRtX2NhbXBhaWduPSU1QlJFQlJBTkQlNUQrJTVCVEktQU0lNUQrVGhcdTAwMjZ1dG1fY29udGVudD0xMDk1XHUwMDI2dXRtX21lZGl1bT1lbWFpbFx1MDAyNnV0bV9zb3VyY2U9Y2lvXHUwMDI2dXRtX3Rlcm09MTI0IiwiaW50ZXJuYWwiOiJhMmQxMDYwMzg2NGE5Nzg5MDYifQ/a6ad138ba89190de25044ef71637c8334dd437c5b380a8e7717ca9153adda268) to the success of the company’s robot product, dubbed Optimus. Opening the program, Kratsios said the event is designed to build consensus around the “Carolina Principles, or guidelines that encourage companies to invest in frontier technologies while adopting limited regulation. After Musk spoke, former White House AI czar David Sacks derided the idea of the U.S. government building a “FDA for AI” that would approve new AI models before companies release them to the public. The Information reported (https://e.customeriomail.com/e/c/eyJlbWFpbF9pZCI6ImRnU2kwUVlDQUplSkJwYUpCZ0dnWWNjano1b2hGeUFIRnpKR3RWWT0iLCJocmVmIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly93d3cudGhlaW5mb3JtYXRpb24uY29tL2FydGljbGVzL3RydW1wLWFkbWluaXN0cmF0aW9uLWV4ZWN1dGl2ZS1vcmRlci1uZXctYWktcmVndWxhdG9yLXN0YWxscz91dG1fY2FtcGFpZ249JTVCUkVCUkFORCU1RCslNUJUSS1BTSU1RCtUaFx1MDAyNnV0bV9jb250ZW50PTEwOTVcdTAwMjZ1dG1fbWVkaXVtPWVtYWlsXHUwMDI2dXRtX3NvdXJjZT1jaW9cdTAwMjZ1dG1fdGVybT0xMjQiLCJpbnRlcm5hbCI6ImEyZDEwNjAzODY0YTk3ODkwNiJ9/602a94a544e156ae964b42a15efde0f20a0aefc18dcf7ffdac6f2e0814bd7058) last week that an executive order draft that would establish a self-regulatory organization for AI companies has stalled within the Trump administration. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman are expected to speak on Wednesday during the second day of the event.

The Pentagon added Starshield AI's Grok for Government and ChatGPT Mil for unclassified work, providing the AI tools to 3 million-plus military personnel https://thehill.com/policy/defense/6061714-pentagon-adds-grok-chatgpt-ai/?_bhlid=d2d277239fbb64b52d0be2d2e95d4b9fe5cac4a3

The Supreme Court may wade into a battle between state lawmakers and prediction markets companies after New Jersey regulators filed a petition with the highest U.S. court to rule on whether sports bets offered by startups like Kalshi and Polymarket fall outside of state gambling regulations New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport made the application on Wednesday, asking the U.S. Supreme Court whether prediction markets can offer sports bets without following state sports gambling laws, if those bets are made on markets registered with the federal Commodity Futures Trading Commission. The prediction market companies have argued that their contracts, which allow people to bet ‘yes’ or ‘no’ on the outcome of an event, are swaps contracts regulated by the CFTC. State lawmakers argue the prediction market firms are flouting state gambling regulations. Appeals courts last week split on the matter. Sports betting generated nearly $17 billion in revenue for U.S. states last year, New Jersey said. The state said because trading swaps outside of CFTC-regulated markets is prohibited, traditional sports betting would become illegal outside of contracts listed on CFTC-regulated markets if the Supreme Court rules in Kalshi’s favor. https://focusgn.com/new-jersey-asks-supreme-court-to-settle-prediction-market-dispute

The Trump administration backed OpenAI in its legal battle with the New York Times, arguing in a brief that barring AI companies from training their models on publishers’ output would be unfair and hurt U.S. technological competitiveness. #The Most Important Thing The legal brief, filed by lawyers for the Department of Justice with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, argues that the Times is seeking an overly narrow definition of “fair use” that would improperly restrict how large language models are trained. The Times sued OpenAI and its early partner and backer Microsoft in 2023, alleging that the companies had violated the news organization’s copyright protections by training OpenAI on its content. The Trump administration’s brief argued that training AI models on copyrighted material doesn’t inherently violate copyright laws, and that defining fair use too narrowly would hurt competition for the U.S. broadly and among AI companies, because smaller companies might not be able to afford licensing fees. “It is not in the public’s interest for the largest technology companies to have an oligopoly on LLM training due to licensing entry barriers that function primarily as large subsidies for old mainstream media companies,” the brief says. The brief is consistent with both the administration’s longstanding antipathy toward the Times and other mainstream news outlets and President Trump’s prior statements that AI progress is too important for U.S. competitiveness to be hampered by stringent copyright protections. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/sep/02/trump-new-york-times-lawsuit-ai