AEI's weekly digest of top commentary and scholarship on the issues that matter most
AEI This Week
AEI's weekly digest of top commentary and scholarship on the issues that matter most
HIGH STAKES FOR AI
America's Superintelligence Dilemma
August 8, 2026
As the pace of AI development quickens, the possibility that artificial superintelligence—models that can vastly exceed human capabilities—could arrive within a few years is growing more plausible. In a new essay for Foreign Affairs, Hal Brands surveys ([link removed] ) America’s strategic options for responding to this geopolitically transformative scenario.
generative_ai_llm_reasoning ([link removed] )
America’s ability to compete with China for AI dominance faces a significant domestic hurdle: growing opposition to data centers. Energy and technology expert Roger Pielke Jr. empirically assesses arguments ([link removed] ) for banning construction and explains how they sidestep the real problem: the United States’ inability to build energy and water infrastructure.
The surge in data-center construction is also driving prices for memory chips sky-high. “Chipflation” is making goods from consumer electronics to cars far less affordable. Writing in Financial Times, Chip War author Chris Miller warns ([link removed] ) against the temptation to import cheaper Chinese chips to bring down prices.
One mechanism the administration has successfully used to address affordability concerns has been waiving the Jones Act since March. As the White House prepares to issue a third waiver, Benjamin Zycher explains ([link removed] ) how the law—which requires cargo between US ports to be carried on US-built, -owned, -flagged, and -crewed vessels—increases energy costs and harms national security.
On Monday, Education Secretary Linda McMahon issued a letter asking American university leaders to commit to reforms strengthening viewpoint diversity, increasing rigor, and lowering costs. Jenna Silber Storey, who helped broker engagement between the administration and the Association of American Universities, highlights ([link removed] ) the significance of this step forward in the relationship between the federal government and higher education institutions.
FREE Initiative's Agency Curriculum
Ian Rowe’s FREE Initiative helps ([link removed] ) children grow and mature through the four pillars of family, religion, education, and entrepreneurship. Last week, he released the new “Agency Curriculum.”
Developed in partnership with the Johns Hopkins Institute for Education Policy, this 30-lesson course of study helps students in the defining decade (between ages 14 and 24) build habits, values, and decision-making skills needed to exercise agency in their own lives through engaging discussions, real-world examples, and opportunities for reflection. Its flexible, self-contained seven-unit structure can be implemented as a full-year program or integrated into existing courses. FREE’s website ([link removed] ) provides educators with testimonials and resources to bring these materials into the classroom. This is a significant contribution to the character education movement and is desperately needed in our public schools. Register and download the full curriculum online here. ([link removed] )
More from AEI
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Milton Friedman Was Right ([link removed] )
Matthew Continetti | The Wall Street Journal
Adults Are Responsible for How They Use AI ([link removed] )
Michael R. Strain | National Review
Civic Renewal Is Alive Inside a Chick-fil-A on Long Island ([link removed] )
Samuel J. Abrams | Washington Examiner
Do Party Switchers Change Their Policy Stripes? ([link removed] )
Jaehun Lee and Kevin R. Kosar | Understanding Congress
On the Road to US Fiscal Ruin ([link removed] )
Desmond Lachman | AEIdeas
PODCASTS AND VIDEOS
The Business of AI: My Interview with Technology Analyst and Investor Azeem Azhar ([link removed] )
James Pethokoukis and Azeem Azhar | Faster, Please!
Presidential Tiers During a Liberal Turn ([link removed] )
Sean Trende and Jay Cost | Stubborn Things
Why Democrats Keep Losing Working-Class Voters ([link removed] )
Ruy Teixeira and James Hohmann | Make It Make Sense
Trump’s GOP and the Future of the Right ([link removed] )
Henry Olsen et al. | The National Affairs Podcast
H. R. McMaster ([link removed] )
Ben Sasse et al. | Not Dead Yet
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
While increasingly autonomous systems are not preferable in an ideal world, they are being developed in the real one. If the U.S. neglects to develop them proactively, it risks having to develop them reactively in a crisis, with far less time to conform with our ethical standards.
—John G. Ferrari and Dillon Prochnicki ([link removed] )
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