April 2, 2024 - 6:00pm

→ Mark Cuban gets a free lesson on DEI

Billionaire Mark Cuban has claimed he is not aware of a single CEO who views the equity portion of DEI as equality of opportunity. Instead, he believes equity simply means playing to employees’ individual strengths.

Step in conservative activist Christopher Rufo to provide some helpful examples: 10 of them, in fact. Major corporations including Google, Raytheon, Walmart, Verizon and others have all promoted a version of equity in line with Rufo’s definition in their corporate DEI projects, according to his own reporting. In one instance, a Walmart training programme told white hourly workers that they were guilty of white supremacy.

The two men have been sparring on the sidelines of Cuban’s debates with X owner Elon Musk over DEI — and Cuban appears somewhat sympathetic to Rufo’s case, even quoting his book. Could this shark be the latest convert to the war on DEI?

→ Germany dims the light on electricity production

Will the last person to leave Germany please turn off the lights? Unfortunately, that may not be an option for much longer. New data shows that the country’s economy has seen a sharp drop in electricity production, falling by almost 10% in the first quarter of 2024 compared to last year. It is the lowest quantity of electricity the country has produced since 1990.

One reason for why this might be the case was the decision by Olaf Scholz’s government to say auf wiedersehen to nuclear power and complete the phasing out of the renewable energy source.

It’s not just electricity production where Germany has lost its spark either. Recently, the country’s finance minister admitted that the economy was in “troubled waters”, raising concerns about a Weimar-like situation in the European country. No wonder Scholz is among the most unpopular leaders in the Western world… 

→ Are we heading for a cyborg future?

Cyborgs are coming to a town near you. The RAND Corporation, an American think tank, has published a paper whose innocuous-sounding title — “Cultural and technological change in the future information environment” — conceals some troubling contents. The report claims that “advances in object connectivity may eventually extend to human bodies”, and that an “internet of bodies” may thereafter lead to an “internet of brains”.

What exactly is an “internet of brains”? Could be cool, right? Nope: try again. The scenario posited by the RAND report, which was commissioned by the UK Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, constitutes a logical endpoint of transhumanism, the belief that technological advances can circumvent the limits of human biology and longevity.

The timeframe suggested for the emergence of this neural ecosystem is between 2035 and 2050, and the paper cites developments in tracking implants such as biochips and sensors, “sensory augmentation technologies” such as hearing implants and smart prosthetics, and brain-computer interfaces. All well and good if you’re in control of the interface; less so if you’re on the receiving end of any cerebral manipulation.