HuxleysRazor

Peter Thiel's critique of European tech is sharper than most people quote it: "In the social democratic European societies, it's acceptable to be moderately successful. It's not acceptable to be wildly successful." That's not a cultural observation. It's a structural diagnosis. Look at the pattern: Skype sold to Microsoft. Spotify relocated to New York and listed in the US. DeepMind sold to Google before it could compound. Klarna — one of Europe's most valuable fintechs — spent years being investigated and regulated the moment it hit scale. The moment a European startup gets big enough to matter, the social contract shifts. Regulators, press, and public sentiment move from neutral to hostile. So founders learn to exit early — not because they lack ambition, but because the system taxes it. Europe produces world-class talent and early-stage innovation. It just doesn't retain the compounding. The constraint isn't capital. It's the ceiling culture places on acceptable ambition — and founders respond rationally to the incentives they're actually given.

This paper answers why confident idiots run the world. Cornell University published a psychological paper that explains every terrible boss, every loud influencer, and every broken corporate hierarchy. It’s called “Unskilled and Unaware of It.” they tested participants across logic, grammar, and humor to measure the gap between actual performance and self-perception. And the results are wild. participants scoring in the bottom 12th percentile consistently believed they were operating in the 62nd percentile. they were not lying. they were literally incapable of recognizing their own incompetence. the paper revealed a brutal paradox: the exact skills required to master a domain are the exact same skills required to accurately evaluate your own competence in that domain. if you lack the skill, you inherently lack the cognitive capacity to realize you are failing. this creates a dangerous systemic loop. the incompetent are blessed with absolute, blinding certainty. their brain protects them from their own ignorance, allowing them to speak first, demand authority, and never second-guess their decisions. meanwhile, the actual experts suffer the exact inverse. top performers in the study consistently underestimated their rank. because a task was easy for them, they falsely assumed it was easy for everyone else. they hesitate. they obsess over nuance. they assume they have nothing unique to add. we are biologically wired to confuse confidence with competence. the loudest person in the room gets promoted, gets funded, and gets the microphone, not because they know what they are doing, but because they are physically incapable of seeing what they don't. the only defense mechanism is building systems that stop rewarding absolute certainty and start demanding proof of work.

🚨The world’s biggest independent oil trader just warned the market could fall hard. Vitol’s CEO Russell Hardy told ADIPEC Exhibition and Conference today that there is “a lot of fear and risk in the price”. If the US and Iran reach a deal, he said, the correction could be “quite severe”. today oil fell about 7% on hopes for those talks. Why Vitol’s view matters? it traded about 8m barrels a day of crude and products last year, roughly 1 in every 12 barrels the world uses. Few people see the physical market from closer. The takeaways from his speech: 🔹 Demand will be about 3m barrels a day lower by the end of 2026, crushed by high prices 🔹 It will take more than a year to get back to pre-war levels 🔹 Stocks are low and spare refining is thin, so the market is balanced, but only just 🔹 After a quiet Christmas, spring could be “pretty difficult” if refineries in China, the Middle East and Russia stay offline 🔹 Coping isn’t the same as being resilient. Asked if the system can take a bigger shock: “The answer is no.” That’s 2 risks pulling in opposite directions. A peace deal takes the fear out of the price quickly. A failed deal meets empty tanks in spring. I just published a deep dive on it. Link 👇 themerchantsnews.substack.co…

La grande differenza tra il sistema politico cinese e quello nostro (italiano, UE et al) Da loro, chi è non competente viene espulso. Da noi, fa carriera Me ho parlato oggi sua TV di Stato cinese @CGTN ospite di @LiuXininBeijing che ringrazio per l’invito

Outcomes from the recently conclude Fifth Plenary Session of the CPC. China will use AI for anti-corruption supervision. This is done in 2 building blocks: 1️⃣A digital big data platform, where public power exercise data (procurement, contracting, fund allocation, approvals, project management, etc.) are all made transparent. 2️⃣AI is used as the analytical layer that scans the aggregated data, to detect hard-to-spot anomalies, hidden financial ties, and patterns of corruption that traditional methods often miss. This combats nepotistic financial ties and white gloves of party officials, it supervises the financial dealings of their families and relatives as well. The core message from the 5th plenary is the Institutionalization of Party-Governance. Put it simply, General Secretary Xi is setting up a robust system for a post-Xi China in 2032. In my opinion, he is the greatest leader of the PRC. May his machine spirit guide the Party long after he retires!

Regular readers may have noticed that I have been a little quiet over the past few days. That is because Andrew Fox and I have been in Israel, taking The Brink on the road. On Sunday night in Jerusalem, we teamed up with Haviv Rettig Gur for a live recording: we interviewed him in the first half, then he turned the tables and interrogated us, before we threw it open to the audience. It was one of our most enjoyable recordings, and the episode drops for The Brink members tonight. Last night, in Tel Aviv, we were joined by two former IDF spokesmen, Jonathan Conricus and Peter Lerner, to thrash out how Israel might fix its chronic PR problem. That one – another fascinating discussion – will be out in the coming days. But there is a strange atmosphere in Israel this week, and it has little to do with podcasts. With Americans going to the polls in the midterms today, the US launched secret strikes on Iran overnight. Iranian state media reported five explosions on Qeshm Island, a strategic military site in the northern part of the Strait of Hormuz, which is home to an underground missile facility and naval base. In the background, the US has been assembling one of the largest concentrations of firepower in the Middle East in years. A third aircraft carrier, the USS Theodore Roosevelt, is on its way, along with thousands more troops and a Marine Expeditionary Unit. A Patriot battery has been pulled out of Texas and sent to the region. According to reports, Washington has warned Gulf capitals to prepare for a “short, intense military campaign against Iran” once the votes are counted. Everybody in Israel is asking the same question: when? But the more interesting question is why now, and what each of the players actually wants. Because the answer reveals that the American midterms elections, the Israeli coalition talks and the war with Iran are all chapters of the same story... New post. Link in first reply

The US manufacturing boom is real. The headline ISM index rose to 55.5 in October, above consensus estimates. The production index rose to a five-year high of 59.0, while new orders also rose to 55.5. The employment index is also expanding at 52.4. The biggest surprise was the 2.7-point fall in the prices paid index, although it remains elevated and must come down faster.

What is meant by Oppressor vs. Oppressed.

Dear @benjaminfmoser , I am a Jew from the former Soviet Union. Many Russian-speaking Jews joined the Bolsheviks and became communists. Is communism a Jewish tradition? Hardly. Your logic, that Jews (pre 1948) were against Zionism and joined the Bund and then the Yevsektisya means that there is a long tradition of Jewish antizionism is, quite literally, low level critical thinking. But I am here to tell you something else. My mother and father were abused by the Soviet regime. They were marked as Zionists and thus harassed and quite literally beaten up. Close to 2 million Jews left the Soviet Union because they were marked as rootless cosmopolitans, at other times, Zionists. Here’s the historic record no one can deny: the “rich tradition” of antizionism harms Jews. Wherever this lethal ideology proliferates, Jews run. Yours, יהודי מציון

Dear Arab Israelis, I have a short message for you, and I'm laying it out of love and compassion but, as always, I'm completely sincere and direct. The problem everyone in Israel is talking about has nothing to do with you being Arabs or Muslims or Christians. The problem is (forgive my bluntness) that the majority of you still identify as "Palestinians," and that in private gatherings you always talk about the "dream of destroying Israel", something I've personally heard a couple of times. I have a secret formula that would make every citizen of Israel vote for you and bring you into any coalition: 1. Unequivocally condemn Hamas and radical Islamic movements. 2. Acknowledge that you are Arab Israeli citizens, not Palestinians. 3. Acknowledge that Israel is the Jewish state of the Jewish people, 3,000 years old and 78 years young. 4. Learn more about the history of the land that prophets, kings, and heroes of Islam called "the land of Israel." Is that too much to ask? Honestly, that's the least expected of any ordinary citizen of a country. In so many of those private gatherings, you say the Israeli passport is so strong, that you can travel to Europe without a visa and many of you brag about traveling to the US because of the waiver program... So is giving back to the Jewish state that gave you this good life really too much to ask? Food for thought. 🌹

🚨 عاجل | انشقاقات في أمريكا : النائبه الأمريكية هيلي ستيڤنز تفاجئ الحزب الديمقراطي في ولايه مشقن الامريكيه وتدعم مرشح الحزب الجمهوري في ولايه تعتبر مصيريه لكلاً الحزبين. الدوافع النائبه الامريكيه الديمقراطيه اعلنت عن عدم رغبتها في دعم مرشح حزبها بسبب تطاوله على دوله اسرائيل وكونه الإيميل قيمها او مبادئها او قيم الحزب الديمقراطي ايضا. ماهي خطوره ذلك خطوره ذلك قد تكمن في انشقاقات قد نراها ربما تتلاحق بسبب سياسات بعض مرشحي الحزب الديمقراطي الأمريكي الذي يسعى إلى سيطرته على — مجلسي الكونغرس والشيوخ — وسط منافسه محتمدمه ومعركه انتخابيه قويه وسط تنافس كبير بين مرشحي الحزبين. الأخطر من ذلك في إعلانها انها صرخت ذلك قبيل الانتخابات فقط ب 48 ساعه ويزا محللون ان ذلك قد يؤذي الى هزيمه السيد الذي قد كان متقدم على منافسه الجمهوري.

An Islamic Republic official admits the regime lied about the massive damage inflicted by U.S. and Israeli strikes, blaming explosions at military sites on natural events such as thunder and lightning. Mohammad Sadegh Koushki, a hardline regime figure appearing on state television, described the deception openly. Israeli strikes on the Kermanshah drone base were publicly blamed on thunder and lightning, while repeated attacks on missile facilities and other sensitive military sites were never announced. This was not an isolated cover story. It was part of a systematic campaign to hide the scale of the regime’s military losses while exaggerating its remaining strength and supposed victories. “Gas leaks” are another standard cover story used when explosions occur at or near sensitive military, missile and IRGC-linked facilities. Like the lightning excuse, the explanation allows the regime to disguise a possible attack or act of sabotage as an ordinary domestic accident. In June 2020, a massive nighttime explosion near the Parchin military complex was officially blamed on a gas leak at a storage facility in a public area. Satellite imagery later revealed extensive damage and scorch marks at the adjacent Khojir missile-production complex, directing attention toward a facility associated with missile propellants rather than the harmless location described by the regime. The same pattern resurfaced after the July 2025 explosion at the Pamchal 9 complex, a residential building connected to the Armed Forces Judicial Organization. State and judiciary media blamed owner negligence and a gas leak. Residents reportedly disputed the explanation, saying the building was not connected to the municipal gas network and that the damage across several floors did not resemble an ordinary domestic explosion. Other explosions near military and industrial facilities have been attributed to gas leaks, aging infrastructure or routine accidents. In some cases, regime-linked outlets initially raised the possibility of Israeli involvement before deleting those references and adopting the official accident narrative. When U.S. and Israeli strikes damaged drone bases, missile-production facilities, air defences, naval assets and command centres, the regime responded with silence, weather excuses and restrictions on reporting from the affected areas. Evidence of destruction was concealed from Iranians because acknowledging it would expose the failure of the military system that consumed enormous national resources while proving unable to protect itself. The regime simultaneously manufactured stories of overwhelming retaliation. State television and IRGC-linked outlets claimed Iranian missiles had destroyed strategic Israeli sites, devastated American forces and achieved extraordinary success rates. Many of these claims relied on recycled footage, manipulated imagery, fabricated casualty figures or targets that independent evidence showed remained operational. The strategy was simple. Hide Iranian losses, invent enemy losses and preserve the illusion that the regime remained in control. The actual damage was substantial, although American assessments differed over its permanence. U.S. Central Command described severe degradation across Iran’s missile, drone, naval and defence-industrial infrastructure. It reported that launch rates had fallen dramatically and that large portions of production capacity and major naval assets had been destroyed. More cautious American intelligence assessments concluded that Iran retained significant missile stocks, mobile launchers and access to many underground facilities. That means the regime was badly damaged but not disarmed. It still possesses dangerous capabilities and could rebuild parts of its arsenal over time. Both assessments, however, contradict the Islamic Republic’s claim that its forces emerged largely intact or even stronger. Koushki’s admission reveals why official Iranian accounts cannot be trusted. The regime was not merely offering an optimistic interpretation of battlefield events. It was knowingly concealing strikes on sensitive sites and inventing alternative explanations for explosions that it understood were caused by enemy attacks. The deception also reveals the regime’s political vulnerability. Admitting the true losses would force Iranians to ask why decades of missile spending, proxy warfare and military expansion failed to prevent foreign aircraft from reaching some of the country’s most sensitive facilities. It would also expose the collapse of the regime’s deterrence narrative. The Islamic Republic promised that its missiles, drones and regional proxies would prevent attacks on Iranian territory. Instead, its leadership watched military infrastructure burn and then instructed state media to blame lightning, gas leaks and industrial accidents. These excuses are effective in the immediate aftermath because independent reporting is restricted and ordinary industrial accidents do occur. By the time satellite imagery, witnesses or insiders challenge the official account, the regime has already established its preferred narrative across state media. The regime still retains weapons and the capacity to inflict serious damage. But that is different from the image of invulnerability it projects. Koushki has now confirmed the method from inside the system. Real losses are hidden, imaginary victories are amplified and natural phenomena are blamed when the destruction becomes impossible to ignore. The Islamic Republic did not withstand the strikes as confidently as it claimed. It concealed the damage because the truth would expose how deeply its military power and deterrence had failed.