- Microsoft Research’s VASA-1 demo shows a new talking-head avatar system; participants note its lip-sync quality is still behind the recent EMO paper.  
- A Marginal Revolution post on the ongoing Adderall shortage is shared, highlighting a regulatory stand-off between the DEA and FDA as a case study in drug-access constraints.  
- The “Human Gigafactory” Substack article is circulated, framing libertarian “baby-mamma international” surrogacy networks as a scalable path to large-scale human production.  
- Extended debate links intelligence, conformity, and libertarianism: higher g may increase autonomy preference, but fitness trade-offs could also reinforce conformity; Kegan’s developmental-stage model (with ~58 % of adults below full self-determination) is referenced as background.  
- Discussion of evolved classism analogizes elite privilege to driver-licensing: society grants “dangerous-tool” rights only after demonstrated competence, yet hypocritical moral universalism erodes legitimacy and fuels anti-authoritarian sentiment.  
- An ALIFE 2024 “Emerging Ecosystems” video is shared—participants praise its soft-body physics simulation but question whether it truly constitutes progress on open-ended evolution, noting that the genetic/behavior layer appears external to the physics engine.