By Michael Moline | Editor in Chief
"Data centers are the reality. We want the internet. We want cloud computing. We want e-commerce. We want lots of things that these data centers provide. Not just AI. The real issue only comes into focus when you talk about one of these hyperscale centers because of their enormous size and impact." — Jonathan Schaeffer, University of Alberta
Interior of a modern data center. (Stock photo by Imaginima/Getty Images)
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei scared people when he wrote over the weekend of AI’s threat to humanity, but the issue was already hot with the public. David Jolly, the Democratic candidate for Florida governor, is attempting to turn the matter against Byron Donalds, his GOP rival. Donalds has been moderating his earlier support for AI data centers, but AI-related interests are contributing heavily to his campaign. “We know what he’s doing,” Jolly says. “He’s doing everything but saying, ‘We should keep data centers out of the state," because he’s furthering the special interests of people who are benefitting from them.”
“Floridians work hard for what they have. Government should not spend it all and then come back for more,” says RPOF Chairman Evan Power. “Amendment 3 puts money back in the pockets of people who own their homes.” Meanwhile, the Florida Chapter of the American Planning Association is worried that the Legislature put too little thought into the proposal before placing it on the ballot. “We are really concerned about making a decision, especially a constitutional decision, without having that data before you make the decision,” Allara Mills-Gutcher, president of the Florida Chapter, told us.
mRNA vaccines have demonstrated efficacy in treating some forms of cancer, but will patients embrace them? “Many doctors and researchers are concerned that vaccine misinformation — amplified by the Trump administration — and the resulting increase in vaccine hesitancy could blunt the impact of the new vaccines. In particular, they cite the false claim, which originated with mRNA COVID vaccines, that mRNA vaccines can super-charge tumors, creating so-called turbo cancer,” Stateline reporter Sofia Resnick writes.
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