Synthetic Minds | Exo-Computing: When Intelligence Leaves the Grid

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AI: the Permanent Operating System of Humanity

We’ve hit the Terrestrial Wall. Not because we ran out of ideas, but because we ran out of grid. AI didn’t just raise demand; it rewrote the definition of “enough” power, “enough” cooling, “enough” land, “enough” political patience.

Alphabet issuing 100-year debt is the clearest signal yet that AI is no longer treated like a tech cycle. This is utility financing. Railroad logic. Build now, amortize across generations, and accept that the people approving the spend won’t be alive when the bill comes due.

Musk is making the other bet: stop fighting terrestrial constraints entirely. The only way to win the inference economy is to leave the planet’s atmospheric and energy limits behind. Musk's vision is to turn the “cloud” from a metaphor into an address.

SpaceX has filed with the FCC for a solar-powered “orbital data center” constellation, up to one million satellites linked by lasers, explicitly framed as space-based compute.

Zoom out and it gets stranger: we’re watching sovereign-level borrowing by private firms.

The fiscal health of the Magnificent Seven is now tied less to consumer products and more to tokens-per-watt, cost-per-query, and who controls the next layer of energy and compute.

That should force a strategic reset. The three-year ROI model for AI is dead. The new mandate is generational integration: capital allocation that assumes AI is the permanent operating system of humanity, running safely 500KM above earth.

And there’s a second-order shock coming for energy and grid operators. If Big Tech starts exiting terrestrial grids via orbital compute, utilities could be left with massive upgrades, higher debt, and fewer high-paying anchor tenants to justify it.

This is the birth of Exo-Computing, and with it, inference colonialism: whoever controls orbital power and downlink capacity dictates the cost of intelligence for everyone else.

In a world where intelligence is abundant, judgment is scarce. The only responsible posture now is to verify the physics, verify the economics, and verify the governance before we fund the hype. Who, exactly, is governing the off-planet infrastructure of cognition before it governs us?

'Synthetic Minds' continues to reflect the synthetic forces reshaping our world. Quick, curated insights to feed your quest for a better understanding of our evolving synthetic future, powered by Futurwise:

1. In a world where LLMs are increasingly being used to support decision-makers, the question of whether they can cooperate to avoid global catastrophe is more pressing than ever. A new study shows LLMs can't always cooperate, but we can steer them towards good outcomes. (Less Wrong)

2. Password managers have become essential security tools, but the security of password managers has been called into question after researchers revealed vulnerabilities in popular password managers. (ArsTechnica)

3. China showcased its advancements in humanoid robots during the annual CCTV Spring Festival gala, a highly-watched event comparable to the Super Bowl. Already, China's humanoids sector accounts for 90% of global shipments last year. But what does this mean for the future of manufacturing? (CBC)

4. Consulting firms like McKinsey, PwC, EY, and BCG have deployed thousands of AI agents to transform their operations and advise clients. They are now trying to measure the true value of these AI agents. (Business Insider)

5. The AI-driven memory chip shortage is causing 90% price surges and production delays for tech firms, with significant implications for tech giants. (AInvest)

If you are interested in more insights, grab my latest, award-winning, book Now What? How to Ride the Tsunami of Change and learn how to embrace a mindset that can deal with exponential change.

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Thank you.
Mark