None of that spending is subject to that much debate; all the remaining "debate" is over the remaining 6%.

I don't think defense is really as discretionary as it seems. A lot of it is effectively bribing and menacing trading partners to keep trading with the US on favorable terms through cash transfers, provision of military equipment, training, and mutual defense pacts among other diplomatic agreements.

Japan didn't just decide on its own free will to become a pacifist country dedicated to exporting cheap, high-quality manufactured goods to the United States. General MacArthur did that.

No one at GloboCorp asks themselves if they will live the rest of their lives as Excel monkeys, because we answer that question for them every day. The answer is Yes, you will fill out the little cells, and then we will kill you. We provide effective solutions to the problem of being. We transform existential dread into acceptance and peace and high performance.

Getting more precision and consistency in the images requires additional technical configuration and actual artistic skill such that it more resembles using Photoshop and similar software. But what can be done with prompting is a lot more impressive than what can be done with rudimentary Photoshop skills and a big photo library to work from.

A lot of people don't realize this because the work that they are having the AI do does not need to be either true or false. It just has to output media that seems like it fits. The system probably took many shortcuts to keep the resource use low while outputting something plausible but false.

And frankly this is sort of fine as long as you know what it's doing and what the limitations are. Hypothetically if you broke up the task into multiple steps that the system can actually ingest properly it might reduce the time that the task took overall, maybe even significantly, but not down to one prompt.

The problem with creating a quota system is that you have to be able to punish countries who cheat on the quota. Europe doesn't have the capacity to do this except internally. The regulatory superpower idea only really makes sense with the physical power to compel obedience and extract taxes.

In the US we solved these issues like the bankruptcy code with federal law because the federal government is the supreme physical power on the continent that all the states obey for reasons of self-preservation and because they are bribed to obey. US federal transfers to individual states are also much, much larger than the largest EU transfers to member stats and the EU is not a central military or police power either.

This is why the EU member states (and the UK member states as well) should become US territories so that they can benefit from federal law without necessarily destabilizing domestic US politics. They are already dependent on US military power but they do not receive the full benefits of becoming member territories.

This type of solution provides a simple system that requires very little administration and supervision. The problem with modern communications tech as it relates to children is that by default these systems provide access to every adult on planet earth to your child's inbox. That is not a feature that I need, but rather is a crippling design flaw much more likely to harm my kids than it is to help them.

Software in general has been subject to light touches in part because most of the damage that software can really cause is economic and not personal injury. The lines blur when the companies release products that cause mental injuries to users that courts interpret as physical injuries; or if the software reasonably contributes to someone e.g. going crazy and killing another person.

No one would seriously think of holding Microsoft liable if a kidnapper uses Word to draft a ransom note. But if CoPilot tells you to microwave a baby and you do it, many judges will want to take a close look at the operation of that software service irrespective of voluminous contract disclaimers. The only way the Microsofts of the world can escape that type of liability is with comprehensive regulation.

There is no way without the protections that could be afforded by regulation to offer such wide-ranging uses of the product without also accepting significant liability. If the range of "foreseeable misuse" is very broad and deep, so is the possible liability. If your marketing says that the bot is your lawyer, doctor, therapist, and spouse in one package, how is one to say that the company can escape all the comprehensive duties that attach to those social roles. Courts will weigh the tiny and inconspicuous disclaimers against the very large and loud marketing claims.

The companies could protect themselves in ways not unlike the ways in which the banking industry protects itself by replacing generic duties with ones defined by statute and regulation. Unless that happens, lawyers will loot the shareholders.