22 comments

  • pebbly_bread 2 hours ago
    For my sanity I don't follow US politics too closely, if "super intelligence" is truly being pushed hard then it seems reasonable to assume the reason why is to assert control of truth. Who are you to disagree with Super Intelligence when it tells you that Haitians are eating dogs?
    • estearum 2 hours ago
      We just have an actual retard in the Oval Office, that's all. It's not much more than that.
      • sowhat1 1 hour ago
        I’m happy he’s dumb. If he were smart, he’d be way better at corruption. His lowbrow corruption of scam meme coins and fleecing tech CEOs for a couple million is pretty benign versus what an actually smart person could do.
        • timacles 1 hour ago
          Yeah I wouldn’t be so happy about that. He’s that dumb because he was chosen for the dumbness and plausible deniability

          There are much more incidious actors behind the scenes doing corruption at levels we can’t fathom whole Donald is the blunt force tool absorbing all the attention and negative press with his goofy corruption

        • estearum 1 hour ago
          I definitely can't use the word "benign" given the immense damage to our culture, economy, and national standing he's done, but directionally agreed. We're fortunate he's an actual stupid person.
        • tastyface 15 minutes ago
          Unfortunately, he's surrounded by intelligent people (Vought) who are somewhat adept at channeling his rage towards their own perverse goals.
        • bdangubic 14 minutes ago
          it is quite the contrary, the smartest people are/would be the worst criminals … :)
      • tstrimple 1 hour ago
        You're underselling decades of preparation from conservatives trying to lead to exactly this point. Pretending like it's just a Trump issue is incredibly myopic. Trump didn't write Project 2025 and he couldn't implement it alone. Furthermore, we have a significant portion of the voting public who fully support this. The fact that it's Trump's 3rd election and second win should tell you there's something deeply wrong with Republican voters. Trump is just the latest symptom of the sickness of this country.
        • estearum 1 hour ago
          No no, I think a lot is explainable by the dynamic you're describing. I just don't think this "superintelligence" schtick is one of them.
        • add-sub-mul-div 1 hour ago
          Right. No one believes he's smart enough to have engineered any of this, he's just a corrupt buffoon who was in the right place at the right time with the right amount of reality TV fame to benefit from all you just said.
          • ryandvm 12 minutes ago
            That's the only bright point about all this. Trump is kind of a 1000 year perfect storm of fame, corruption, and psychopathy; and he's fast approaching his expiration date.

            I don't expect any of us will live long enough to see a similar skid-mark on the underwear of humanity.

        • analognoise 1 hour ago
          > Furthermore, we have a significant portion of the voting public who fully support this.

          Define "significant" - Trump has the worst approval rating of any president ever measured. The "conservative coalition" was always going to Balkanize, anyone with a modicum of sense could see that, and they were unpopular before but now they're EXTREMELY unpopular.

          I mean, "a conservative win" in a country where 1/3 of people have no religious preference, 1/5 marriages is multi-racial and acceptance of legalized gay marriage is in the 70's. Winning a battle isn't winning the war, they were deluding themselves into thinking they were going to "reshape" anything.

          Now they've outed themselves as nutcases, but crucially, nutcases who aren't delivering on the economic promises that were cover for their fascistic impulses, in a coalition that was obviously going to implode once they reached power.

          Maybe looking back, this will be seen as the "dead cat bounce" of Conservatism than anything else.

          • gdulli 1 hour ago
            The way I broadly think of it is that the left has won the culture and the right has won the economy. But not for the entire right, just the ultra rich.
            • timacles 1 hour ago
              They won the power also
              • gdulli 51 minutes ago
                Zooming out of the intradecade view, all the power they have won't ever put gay and trans people back in the closet any more than they can reverse interracial marriage. And all the social media outrage about billionaires will do nothing to reverse wealth inequality.
          • mthoms 1 hour ago
            I hope you’re right but this is exactly what I thought about his first term. Yet, here we are.
  • speak_plainly 2 hours ago
    For many outside the US, and undoubtedly some within it, the term SI is a source of embarrassment. But it’s good to know who bends the knee.
    • sdcfgy 2 hours ago
      I read that as the US being the SI unit for embarrassment for a minute.
    • georgemcbay 2 hours ago
      > For many outside the US, and undoubtedly some within it, the term SI is a source of embarrassment.

      Speaking as one of those in the US, we have so much to be embarrassed about that the "super intelligence" thing barely registers on the scale.

      I mean, yeah, it is stupid, but it is relatively quaint when compared to:

      the stupidest war we've ever gotten ourselves into (high bar), the random murderous boat strikes, the immigration debacle and continued state-sanctioned murdering of both innocent immigrants and American citizens, the concentration camps (yes, we have concentration camps), the abandonment of the previous rules-based world order, the constant threatening of our own allies, the ongoing religification, loyalty purge and subsequent weakening of the US military, the quadrupling down on a fossil fuel economy in the face of very real climate change impacts globally, the very real and IMO likely possibility the current administration will attempt to nullify our upcoming election if it doesn't go their way, etc, etc.

      • LastTrain 55 minutes ago
        You forgot public executions!
      • dofm 2 hours ago
        A silly joke until being on the right side of it becomes a loyalty test, like election fraud, Trump’s intellect, height and weight, etc.

        The point of something stupid like this is the power he gains by making you agree to say it.

        It shocks me that people don’t understand who he is. Ignorant yes, vile, bigoted, cruel, illiterate, all those things. But he is not domain-generally stupid: he is a terrible genius at humiliation, at breaking people, at hollowing them out.

        It may not be work, finally. But he is better at it than any other living person.

  • getfacl 2 hours ago
    The thing about this is, that when a new technology truly succeeds the name fades away. The same will happen with .ai or .si if anyone takes that seriously.

    We don't call HDTVs that anymore. We just call them TVs. Like what happened when Color TVs became the norm.

    At some point a Self-Driving Car will just be a car.

    At some point mentioning that a product includes AI will sound silly because it will just be a given.

    At that point having ai inclusion be part of the products name will sound as outdated as saying Color TV.

    • TheFuzzball 1 hour ago
      It already does sound outdated.
    • tomrod 1 hour ago
      or it becomes the name.

      Kodak. Kleenex. PC. etc.

      SI has no network effects. I reject it.

  • Charly_HW 17 minutes ago
    And dont think OpenAI Marketing and PR thinks the same
  • aatd86 2 hours ago
    I am simply not purchasing a .si domain.

    If really a new expression need to be coined, that should be something that means derived Intelligence/type II Intelligence etc. What is intelligence anyway?

    It's just a weird attempt at cementing some legacy. The rest of the world is not going to go along with it.

    Then again, flattering thinking machines is not too bad, ... just in case :D

    • usern20260720 2 hours ago
      “Don’t call it AI, call it ‘American Skynet System’”.

      Chatgpt.ass

      • dylan604 2 hours ago
        That's already in use for a subtitle format. I have many .ass files lying around.
  • dieselgate 2 hours ago
    Is there more context anyone can give to help understand what’s going on: I read the post but curious if AGI is just morphing into SI in lingo? Why is it being politicized?
    • mattm 1 hour ago
      https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2026/09/inau...

      > The terminology used by the Federal Government should reflect the transformative capabilities of these technologies and the limitless opportunities they create for the American people. Accordingly, the term “Super Intelligence” more appropriately captures the promise, potential, and rapidly advancing capabilities of these technologies. It is therefore the policy of my Administration that, to the maximum extent permitted by law, the executive branch shall use the terms “Super Intelligence” and “SI” in place of “Artificial Intelligence” and “AI” and will not acknowledge the usage of “Artificial Intelligence” and “AI” in any applicable setting.

    • kyle-rb 2 hours ago
      A few weeks ago Donald Trump put a series of polls via Truth Social and Twitter with 3 choices for a replacement name for Artificial Intelligence (which according to him makes it sound like it's fake when it's actually real).

      The initial choices were: "Supreme Intelligence", "Superior Intelligence", "Extreme Intelligence". [0]

      Then he removed "Supreme Intelligence" because he said it reminded people of the failing Supreme Court, and it was down to just "Superior" or "Extreme". [1]

      Then, presumably after some industry people talked him into a compromise, he decided it was actually between "Superior" or "Super Intelligence", and the latter won. [2]

      [0] https://x.com/realDonaldTrump/status/2101350559328416142

      [1] https://x.com/realDonaldTrump/status/2101698074166882517

      [2] https://x.com/WhiteHouse/status/2102067457506611585

    • daemonologist 2 hours ago
      No, the directive is that all AI should now be called super intelligence (SI), and this stems from a single decision from the president rather than being an ongoing political debate. (AI was of course political before, but this terminology seems to have come out of nowhere.)

      Why, I don't know. The OP's "purity test" theory is a possibility.

      • dylan604 2 hours ago
        This is coming from the same person that didn't realize there was a b in dumb. The same person that likes to rename bodies of water. The same person that wants his name and/or his face on everything. It did not come out of nowhere unless nowhere is the void in the brain space of said same person.
    • Supermancho 2 hours ago
      > Why is it being politicized?

      The US (without the imagined AI valuations) is in a full blown recession. The US treasury/administration is leveraging belief/investment in AI to keep the numbers up (oversimplified, but not by much). This means the administration has a vested interest in keeping AI churning and investment growing with no fallback except maybe the chaos of trying to start off a wartime economy? Because there are few recognizable AI players and the administration is not above extortion (choosing winners), they are leveraging the DOJ regulatory powers (witholding introducing barriers) to push a new grift. The situation is not strictly political, as much as it's a form of corruption.

    • LastTrain 51 minutes ago
      You can't seriously, this far into Trump, be asking this question. It is a loyalty test and those that are loyal will get more rewards.
    • api 2 hours ago
      Trump is doing another of his loyalty test stunts: give a ridiculous order, see who complies.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hD5eqBDPMDg

    • well_ackshually 2 hours ago
      The US's shit head in chief has unilaterally decided that it's no longer artificial intelligence but super intelligence. Now it's a game of waiting to see which of the lapdogs is the fastest one to obey.
  • techblueberry 3 hours ago
    I might challenge the idea this is “smart politics”. Like I can get the tactics, but it feels disconnected from a greater strategy.

    The best I can figure out is I guess good for the next two years having people subordinate to your administration.

    • trescenzi 3 hours ago
      The keyword is `regime`. It’s smart if the goal is to run a political regime where you separate your friends and enemies and prove to your friends that you can make them jump when you say jump.
  • Heronsunny 2 hours ago
    Legacy framing feels off to me, the loyalty tests usually have a much shorter horizon than that, they're about who shows up this quarter.
  • xvxvx 2 hours ago
    It may not even be as thought out as that. I think he’s simply trying to link his Presidency to AI in a way that lasts. So of AI does take over the world, which it won’t, it will be his legacy, of sorts.

    But yeah, in the meantime it’s a humiliation ritual. Good.

    • genxy 2 hours ago
      He wants "naming rights" and a way to pump the ccTLD for Slovenia, which he used to have connection to.

      If you name it, you own it.

      • rubikscube09 2 hours ago
        lmfao i didn't even think of the slovenia part.
        • jjgreen 2 hours ago
          Look at the price of .si domains the weeks before the announcement, gravy train ...
  • ncr100 1 hour ago
    Humiliation is a key part of dictatorships.

    - https://psyche.co/ideas/the-history-of-humiliation-points-to...

    Political humiliation needs audiences. We're seeing that by being unable to stop hegseth from live streaming a firing squad execution of a criminal. We can't stop it, as Americans. That's humiliating and that's a loss of control.

    So they're pulling out all the stops, this current American Administration, on the dictatorship show.

  • ddoolin 2 hours ago
    I hate this "it sounds ridiculous and it is BUT it could just be 4D chess and here's why..."

    Stop justifying this crap. It's just the drivel of a decaying mind.

    • LastTrain 44 minutes ago
      But it isn't. He has a couple of tools he uses to measure loyalty of and to debase his followers. This is the former, it makes it very easy to see who is loyal and who is not. The tool to debase those that are loyal to him: he makes them repeat lies and accept increasingly morally decrepit things, kind of like how a pimp operates. We're currently on the "public executions" phase of that tool. These are not things that should be ignored and aren't simply the actions of a decaying mind.
  • dfxm12 2 hours ago
    I've noticed it has another benefit of giving the administration an out when they get hard questions about AI. They can huff and puff about calling it SI instead of answering the question.
  • anramon 1 hour ago
    The US has been falling so hard on its PR and propaganda department in the last, I don't know, 20 years?, that China actually seem to look like the good guys. People forget those extensive news reports, articles, stories and so on about the "chinese totalitarian dystopia" 15 to 25 years ago, now those seem like a joke in sight of what the US, and a great bunch of the anglo-germanic sphere, are doing.
  • charcircuit 2 hours ago
    Their name wasn't OpenAGI. They can be OpenAI who is a company working on super intelligence.
  • malshe 2 hours ago
    There is also the consipracy theory that MAGA people in Trump's inner orbit started buying up .si domain names in June.
  • burger_moon 1 hour ago
    I thought it was all going to blow over as just Trump yelling into the void as he does. Then I saw NIST updating all their docs to conform to this new naming standard as fed govt agencies don't have a choice but to follow the EO of the week. https://www.nist.gov/super-intelligence
  • LogicFailsMe 2 hours ago
    At some point you have to start laughing maniacally at the spinelessness of America's top paper billionaires, or it gets very dark, very fast.
    • malshe 2 hours ago
      When Jack Ma disappeared for months because he pissed off Xi, I thought this would never happen in the US. We aren't there yet but moving in that direction at a swift pace.
    • UltraSane 2 hours ago
      I really don't understand what the point of being so rich is if it doesn't let you tell a moron like Trump to fuck off.
      • estearum 2 hours ago
        You must remember that the current top-of-the-top are fundamentally psychologically broken people. They started as emotionally stunted weirdos, got bullied for it, became more reclusive for it, built their mega-businesses with maniacal fixation, and now have huge sums of money to inflict their psychological traumas on the world.
      • serf 2 hours ago
        they got rich by wanting to get rich and make money; that's the entire motivation and it doesn't have a ceiling.

        you don't just get rich and stop, it doesn't stop for these people. They aren't rich enough. They aren't powerful enough.

        Most folks at that table with Trump are way beyond the joy of creation; they're playing politics now, and their game is the competition with the 200 other hyper-elite for positional vying.

        • UltraSane 1 hour ago
          The way they suck up to Trump doesn't make them look powerful, it makes them look pathetically weak. I wonder if they feel like they are cleverly manipulating a moron.
      • dfxm12 59 minutes ago
        Don't discount that these guys might be true believers.

        It's a big cult and you ain't in it.

        • UltraSane 56 minutes ago
          I don't believe any of the CEOs currently sucking up to Trump so publicly respect him or think he is competent or smart. They are all smart enough to understand exactly just how stupid Trump is.
      • ramesh31 2 hours ago
        >"I really don't understand what the point of being so rich is if it doesn't let you tell a moron like Trump to fuck off."

        Because they aren't really that rich. It's all a house of cards built on numbers in a spreadsheet, vague IP valuations, and server racks. The people controlling the true wealth are getting exactly what they want in the form of inflation on commodity and asset prices.

  • ForHackernews 1 hour ago
    This seems fine to me. The AI people all decided we have to talk about "Alignment" and "The Singularity" like members of some millenarianist cult, so turnabout is fair play: force them to adopt some incongruous jargon representing an out-group's worldview.
  • elzbardico 2 hours ago
    [flagged]
    • RealityVoid 2 hours ago
      As someone from outside the US, I was surprised to find out impeachment does not mean removal from office, you need a senate supermajority and (to my even greater surprise) only 33% of senate is up for re-election at each election cycle.

      So knowing this, I understand he might get impeached, but unlikely to be removed so I don't see a whole lot changing after midterms, sadly.

      • estearum 2 hours ago
        Yeah he's probably unlikely to be removed from office, also in part because JD Vance would be worse (more competent, more actively malicious).

        But that said, Dem control of the House and Senate can absolutely functionally hobble POTUS. He can (and should) be inundated with nonstop investigations, funding freezes, and so on.

        Quite a lot will change after the midterms.

    • lolakutty 2 hours ago
      buffon?
      • readthenotes1 2 hours ago
        A misspelled "buffoon."

        I believe that is an example of irony.

  • BLKNSLVR 2 hours ago
    Meta commentary warning.

    WTF platform has to split that over three posts. I mean, at least it's not Twitter, but choose a platform that's fit for purpose.