How long would you live relying only on Google’s AI?

One small pizza, extra cheese, extra glue. [Bloomberg]( This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, the rambling drivel of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. [Sign up here](. PSA: Right before we published this newsletter, Donald J. Trump was [found guilty]( on all 34 counts of falsifying business records. He is now officially the first American president to become [a felon](. You can follow [Tim O’Brien]( and [Bloomberg Opinion]( on X for more updates. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming ... Today’s Agenda - There aren’t enough [women]( in tech. - Frank Barry’s [cross-country trek](. - Kicking [nicotine]( is hard as heck. - Francis Ford Coppola wrote [a big check](. Small Rocks and Glue Sauce Here’s a question: How soon would you be dead if you relied on Google’s AI to run your daily life? I’m thinking a week, tops? Let’s imagine what a day might look like, shall we? As you take your morning vitamins, next to your iron deficiency pill is [a small rock](. You swallow it with some water. Now time for some web surfing … American history is so cool! Did you know Barack Obama was America’s first and only [Muslim president](? Or that [13 presidents]( went to the University of Wisconsin? Go Badgers! After that it’s lunchtime, but your stomach hurts. Could that rock be stuck in your kidney somehow? A good way to pass a kidney stone is to drink [two liters]( of urine. You then feel a little woozy, so you decide to get some fresh air and sunshine. You stare at the sun for 15 minutes — which is a “[generally safe](” period of time — and then head back inside. Soon enough it’s [pizza night](. But the cheese isn’t sticking to the sauce. So you grab 1/8 cup of Elmer’s glue from the craft closet and just [mix it in](. It works! there’s [no cheese slippage](, and the pie pairs perfectly with the carafe of slightly chilled urine you uncorked at lunch. You couldn’t pay me to do any of the above, but Business Insider’s Katie Notopoulos can’t say the same. Last week, she [actually made]( (and ate) the glue pizza. While she didn’t perish — no less an authority than Google’s AI Overview says ingesting small amounts of glue will only [cause]( minor stomach upset — the stunt highlights how unreliable and dangerous the search engine has become. As Parmy Olson [says](: Google CEO Sundar Pichai “has tinkered with one of the most successful and profitable technology products of all time and made it completely unreliable, even dangerous. The countdown has begun for when he takes it offline. The sooner he does, the better.” Or, Chris Bryant [says](, we could just ... stop Googling things. Yes, “eat a small rock a day” is terrible health advice, but the habit of Googling every ailment, every problem we encounter, is also bad for the brain: “Looking [stuff up]( on Google often results in us not being able [to recall it]( later — either because our brains are conditioned to think we don’t need to [remember it](, or because the internet, mobile phones and social media scatter our attention, or both,” he writes. But even if we distance ourselves from Google’s [hallucinations](, AI’s underlying issues will remain and fester. Not only does the technology have a loose relationship with the truth, it contains layers of biases, many of which are engineered from the get-go. Consider ChatGPT’s [latest upgrade](, the cringy, [Scarlett Johansson](-[sounding]( chatbot that giggled at the antics of OpenAI’s male researchers and swooned over their outfits. As Parmy [says](: “The world’s leading AI builders are creating software that reinforces stereotypes about women. And there’s a big reason why: There are simply too few of them involved.” Source: Glass.ai Just 122 of the 686 people at OpenAI whose job involves building AI systems are women. On the bright side, at least there’s never a wait for the office bathroom! But for real, what are they thinking? And it’s not just Sam Altman’s company. Parmy says “image generators have [made women appear more sexualized]( than men, while an [investigative report]( by Bloomberg News found that Stable Diffusion, the open-source AI image maker, tended to forget women existed altogether.” Did Amazon’s sexist [recruiting algorithm]( not teach us anything? On the off chance that these companies somehow manage to pull it together, there’s real money to be made in AI. Just look at Nvidia. “When ChatGPT launched, the Santa Clara-based chipmaker was worth more than $2 trillion less than Apple. Now, only 18 months later, it has almost closed that gap,” John Authers [writes](. And it’s not just Big Tech that stands to benefit from AI. If we’re fortunate, Daniel Moss [says]( AI will help the [middle class]( claw back some ground and plug holes in the baby bust. Either that, or glue pizza will cause the human race to go extinct. Book Talk It’s rare that you see me peddling wares around here, but this is a free newsletter. It’s time I embrace capitalism, baby. And by that, I mean, let me shamelessly recommend some books that my colleagues have written. “What does it mean to be a Jew?” Noah Feldman — a Harvard Law professor and Bloomberg columnist — spent 544 pages answering that question in [his new book](, To Be a Jew Today. Kyla Scanlon — our short-video [extraordinaire]( — dared to create [an illustrated guide]( to the entire economy, titled, appropriately: In This Economy? Talk about multitasking! While I was busy supplying you with rambling drivel, they were writing entire tomes, the spines of which are destined to grace bookshelves for centuries to come. If anyone should be worthy of that achievement, it’s Frank Barry. Instead of spending his pandemic playing Animal Crossing or baking sourdough, our columnist bought an RV and drove the [old Lincoln Highway]( — the nation’s first transcontinental route — from New York City to San Francisco. In his new book, [Back Roads and Better Angels: A Journey into the Heart of American Democracy](, he says he and his wife Laurel “found the largest vehicle we wanted to drive and the smallest one we wanted to live in: a 25-foot 2017 Winnebago with thirty thousand miles.” In my completely unbiased opinion (Hi Frank! He sits two desks away) this tale of a cross-country journey is a must-read for anyone feeling down about the vibes in this country ahead of the election. Telltale Charts In case you needed [any]( [more]( [evidence]( that we’re in for a [nicotine-filled summer](, Natalie Portman and Paul Mescal were spotted [smoking cigs]( and giggling together on the streets of London this week. Meanwhile in New York, smoke shops [say]( they’ve [run out]( of Zyn, the synthetic nicotine pouches sold in little round cans. Although they’re probably better for you than a cigarette, Lisa Jarvis [says]( low-dose Zyns “could create a welcoming entrée into nicotine use for teens — the way wine coolers or spiked seltzers are often more appealing to teens and twentysomethings than neat scotch or gin martinis.” Who knows what this chart will look like after The Great Nicotine Shortage of 2024: Ever since Variety’s Matt Donnelly sent this [brain-melting tweet](, I have been so curious about Francis Ford Coppola’s new film Megalopolis. The movie, a decades-long passion project on which Coppola spent $120 million of [his own money](, is “an audacious mash-up of science fiction fantasy and Roman empire-inspired speculative fiction, combining wide-eyed optimism and unapologetic sexual hedonism,” in [the words of]( Jason Bailey. While all that may be true, Jason says it begs the question: “Why does the man who made the Godfather trilogy, Apocalypse Now, and Bram Stoker’s Dracula, among the most acclaimed and commercially successful pictures of their respective eras, have to go into his own pocket? Is this man not owed?” At the end of the day, it comes down to Coppola’s commercial track record, which hasn’t included a big hit in more than two decades. Further Reading The [poker chips]( of crypto markets must be regulated. — Bloomberg’s editorial board Even the NRA [deserves]( First Amendment rights. — Stephen L. Carter The Fed’s interest rate target is a [miscalculation](. — Bill Dudley UBS’s [CEO frontrunners]( get a big chance to impress. — Paul J. Davies Marco Rubio just turned into another [Trump enabler](. — Mary Ellen Klas The [Hong Kong 47 case]( is testing China's tightening grip. — Karishma Vaswani The UK election has kicked off with [an unresolved paradox](. — Chaminda Jayanetti A new strategy for [defending Ukraine]( starts with defining victory. — Marc Champion ICYMI [Salesforce]( is struggling in a major way. Babe, wake up, Texas just dropped a new [hail description](. Giving birth on [a planet in crisis]( is not easy. Planned Parenthood is [in cahoots]( with Raytheon. How that [“All Eyes On Rafah”]( image went so viral. Kickers [Debut fiction]( is hard to launch. [Social media babies]( are adults now. The most important [girl band]( on the planet. Baz Luhrmann is [just another guy](to Gen Z. POV: You’re the last ninth grader [without an iPhone](. Those “are we dating the same guy?” Facebook groups are [a force for good](. Notes: Please send Altoids Sours and feedback to Jessica Karl at jkarl9@bloomberg.net. [Sign up here]( and follow us on [Threads](, [TikTok](, [Twitter](, [Instagram]( and [Facebook](. Follow Us Like getting this newsletter? [Subscribe to Bloomberg.com]( for unlimited access to trusted, data-driven journalism and subscriber-only insights. Before it’s here, it’s on the Bloomberg Terminal. Find out more about how the Terminal delivers information and analysis that financial professionals can’t find anywhere else. [Learn more](. Want to sponsor this newsletter? [Get in touch here](. You received this message because you are subscribed to Bloomberg's Opinion Today newsletter. If a friend forwarded you this message, [sign up here]( to get it in your inbox. [Unsubscribe]( [Bloomberg.com]( [Contact Us]( Bloomberg L.P. 731 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10022 [Ads Powered By Liveintent]( [Ad Choices](