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Is the US falling behind China?
Over the last two decades, China has transformed into an engineering state. Its ability to build almost anything—bridges, high-speed rail, entire cities from nothing—has led to record growth, but also domestic challenges and soaring debt. On GZERO World, Ian Bremmer sits down with Dan Wang, tech analyst and author of the new book “Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future,” to talk about China’s rapid growth, the US-China relationship, and who is winning the race for technological and economic supremacy.
For better or worse, Wang says that China has leaned into a belief that almost anything can be engineered. They’ve invested massively in infrastructure, which has improved life for Chinese citizens in many ways, but the country is also dealing with a stagnating economy and record youth unemployment. China’s “engineering” mentality has led to a stubborn belief that society itself can be built from the top down, Wang says, often to draconian results like the harsh ‘zero Covid’ rules or state crackdowns on the tech sector. Can the US learn from China’s rise and avoid its mistakes?
“China's a country I describe as the ‘engineering state’ because they build a lot,” Wang explains, “They also treat society as a big engineering project, where people are yet another building material that the leadership just want to tweak and destroy if necessary.”
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube.Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔). GZERO World with Ian Bremmer airs on US public television weekly - check local listings.
China has become an "engineering state," with Dan Wang
What can the US learn from the benefits–and perils–of China’s quest to engineer the future? Tech analyst and author Dan Wang joins Ian Bremmer on the GZERO World Podcast to discuss his new book "Breakneck," China’s infrastructure boom, and the future of the US-China relationship. Over the last two decades, China has transformed into what Wang calls an “engineering state,” marshaling near unlimited resources to build almost anything–roads, bridges, entire cities overnight. That investment has created astounding growth, but also domestic challenges and soaring debt.
It’s also led to a stubborn belief within the Chinese government that society itself can be engineered from the top down, where the state treats its people like a building material that can be tweaked or destroyed if necessary. Wang and Bremmer dig into all things US-China—the future of the relationship, the surprising similarities between the two countries, and whether Washington can learn from Beijing’s example without repeating its mistakes.
“The Chinese are able to build a lot of things that meet the material needs of the people, namely homes, solar, wind, nuclear, coal plants, roads, bridges, high-speed rail,” Wang says, “And that is something that I want Americans to have as well.”
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The dangers of unchecked AI
Companies should be designing their products to maximize productivity, economic output, and military superiority, but instead are racing for market dominance and completely ignoring mental health and other risks, like psychosis and loss of critical thinking. Harris says that ethics around AI get thrown out the window relative to the incentive. And for big tech firms, the ultimate prize is achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI), so they need to hook as many users as they can as quickly as possible.
“AI is the most powerful, inscrutable and uncontrollable technology we've ever invented,” Harris warns, “Why are we recklessly racing this out to society psychologically in ways that we definitely don't know what we're doing? This is just stupidity.”
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube.Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔). GZERO World with Ian Bremmer airs on US public television weekly - check local listings.
The risks of reckless AI rollout with Tristan Harris
Can we align AI with society’s best interests? Tristan Harris, co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology, joins Ian Bremmer on the GZERO World Podcast to discuss the risks to humanity and society as tech firms ignore safety and prioritize speed in the race to build more and more powerful AI models. AI is the most powerful technology humanity has ever built. It can cure disease, reinvent education, unlock scientific discovery. But there is a danger to rolling out new technologies en masse to society without understanding the possible risks. What if the way we deploy artificial intelligence, Harris argues, isn’t inevitable, but a choice?
The tradeoff between AI’s risks and potential rewards is similar to deployment of social media. It began as a tool to connect people and, in many ways, it did. But it also become an engine for polarization, disinformation, and mass surveillance. That wasn’t inevitable. It was the product of choices—choices made by a small handful of companies moving fast and breaking things. Will AI follow the same path? Is there a path forward where innovation aligns with humanity?
“If we deploy AI recklessly in a way that causes AI psychosis or kids' suicides or degrades mental health or causes every kid to outsource their homework,” Harris warns, “it's very obvious the long-term trajectory of we are going to have a weaker civilization.”
Subscribe to the GZERO World Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast platform, to receive new episodes as soon as they're published
Is the future of AI physical?
Whoever dominates, the payoff will be huge. Autonomous machines will transform industries like transportation, healthcare, and logistics. They can offset labor shortages in aging societies like Germany, Japan, and South Korea. Morgan Stanley estimates humanoid robots could be a $5 trillion industry by 2050. But at least right now, physical AI is still awkward. Robots stumble and all down. Programming dexterity and intuition is a lot more challenging than text prediction. But given how fast the field is accelerating, soon, the challenge won’t be whether AI becomes part of our world but how we choose to live with it.
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube. Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔). GZERO World with Ian Bremmer airs on US public television weekly - check local listings.
How Russia overtook Ukraine's drone advantage
After more than three and half years of war, Russia has become a drone powerhouse. It’s sending bigger and more powerful swarms across the border into Ukraine nearly every day, eroding Kyiv’s early drone advantage. A year ago, Russia was barely sending a thousand drones into Ukraine a month, now it averages six times that. On Ian Explains, Ian Bremmer breaks down how Vladimir Putin prioritized drone production to turn Russia into a drone superpower.
Russia’s full-scale invasion began with embarrassing setbacks and staggering losses. Supply lines broke down, soldiers abandoned tanks, casualties quickly mounted. Meanwhile, Ukraine innovated by using cheap quadcopters armed with grenades. But in the last year, Putin made drones a national priority. He retooled the military, prioritized production, and improved technology. The future of warfare is now being built on the battlefield in real time, and whoever adapts the fastest wins. Will Ukraine be able to regain its edge?
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube. Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔). GZERO World with Ian Bremmer airs on US public television weekly - check local listings.
India’s race to leverage AI by 2047
"India must leverage this technology to become a developed country by 2047. If not, we risk growing old without ever having grown rich," says Secretary S. Krishnan, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology for the Government of India.
With 1.4 billion people, India has a narrow window to reach developed-country status by 2047. Leaders stress that AI, frugal innovation, and low-cost solutions could unlock that opportunity—and offer lessons for the wider Global South.
Watch more Global Stage coverage from the 80th Session of the United Nations General Assembly here: gzeromedia.com/globalstage
How AI will revolutionize medicine with Siddhartha Mukherjee
Listen: Nearly 1 in 2 men and 1 in 3 women in the US will be diagnosed with cancer, and 1,700 people die from it every day. Disparities persist—Black women are 40% more likely to die of breast cancer than white women—and treatment costs remain crushing for many.
On the latest episode of the GZERO World podcast, Ian Bremmer talks with world-renowned cancer researcher and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Siddhartha Mukherjee about the future of medicine—and why artificial intelligence might finally tip the scales in the decades-long war on cancer.
Cancer remains the second leading cause of death in the US, killing nearly 1,700 people every day. But Mukherjee says AI is already reshaping the field, from radiology and diagnostics to identifying new carcinogens and designing entirely new cancer drugs. “Every time we do this in collaboration with a machine,” he explains, “the machine learns it, and it learns it forever.”
In a wide-ranging conversation, Mukherjee breaks down three major areas where AI is advancing medicine: patient care, data mining, and generative drug development. He also weighs in on early cancer detection, how inflammation may hold the key to understanding new carcinogens, and why this moment may be the most hopeful in half a century of cancer research.
Subscribe to the GZERO World Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast platform, to receive new episodes as soon as they're published