AI, robots, solar, electric cars, gene editing, wearables, satellites,
quantum. You are being sold nine separate futures. They are one story with nine
surfaces — and this is an honest account of how much is already decided.
Red — constrains AI. A hard ceiling. Arrow points inward.Blue — complementary. AI accelerates it. Arrow points outward.Violet — both ways.Thickness — strength of the coupling26The number on a bubble — how tightly that technology is coupled to AI,
0–100. It is not an ownership score. Hidden on small screens, where it is too
small to read; the line thickness says the same thing.Score 0–100 — how much of the tech that bloc owns, not where it
sits. Hover a bubble for the scale.ownerOwnership flag — the parent is in another bloc. Boston Dynamics is
American-built and Korean-owned.Hover or tap a bubble
Horizon
The frame
The orbit above is the conclusion. This is the reasoning that gets you
there, in five plain sentences.
If you read nothing else
The world
What we're assuming
Named so you can argue with them. An assumption you can't see is one
you can't attack.
Who decides which one happens
Usually left out — which makes forecasts read like weather. These are
choices, made by people, and they select the branch.
Who owns each layer
Attributed by ultimate owner, not by headquarters — which is why Taiwan,
Korea and Japan appear as themselves rather than folded into "US and allies".
The four costs, and why cheap is not the same as arriving
Three charts the whole frame rests on. The first is the claim, the second
is the counter-example, the third is why it does not feel true from where you stand.