Nov 21, 2025 04:16 AM
(This post was last modified: Nov 21, 2025 05:04 AM by C C.)
SABINE HOSSENFELDER
https://youtu.be/iH0aij_A08A
VIDEO EXCERPTS: What is wrong with Europe? It's hard to ignore that we're dangerously and depressingly falling behind in technological developments.
This is particularly obvious when it comes to artificial intelligence, on which the entire European Union missed the boat. And after we missed the boat, we formed a committee to study the pier. What is going on? Let me illustrate the problem.
This is a bottle of melatonin I bought in a supermarket in the United States. 5 mg a piece. It's almost empty. This is why I recently bought a new one.
EU product. 0.5 mg a piece. If you want 5 mg per pill over here, you need a prescription. So now I have to take 10 pills instead of one because our government assumes that adults are too dumb to make their own decisions.
If you're located in the United States, you should see the t-shirts that I'm selling with Einstein's field equations and so on. If you're located in Europe, you can't see them because the feat doesn't fulfill some obscure regulation. And God knows it could be dangerous to buy a t-shirt on YouTube.
Self-driving cabs? No, no, can't do this here. Too much could go wrong. Embryonic stem cell research? Heaven forbid. Drone deliveries? Oh, wait. We first need a framework for a strategy for an initiative. It will stand on six pillars. And then we'll pass laws until anyone who remembers what they're about has died.
Did you know that the largest tech company in Europe is American? It's because the American companies register some branch in Ireland for tax reasons...
[...] For one thing, you can't buy painkillers in bottles. Oh, no. That's way too dangerous. And if you want more than 50 pills a pack, you need a prescription. You can buy 5 packs of 20, all right, but not one pack of 100. Way too dangerous. We can't allow this. It has to be regulated. And then there are the bottle caps that no longer detach...
No, the problem isn't the bottle caps. The problem is that the European Commission spent years on coming up with regulations and plans to solve a problem that didn't exist in the first place.
I understand why the Brits left the European Union. Not that I think it was a good idea to leave a trade union with literally all of your neighbor countries. Not super smart, but I understand the sentiment. The European Union is not a country. All its members are unhappy in their own ways.
[...] I think Europeans have become too damn complacent and also totally ignorant of what's going on in the rest of the world. This graph shows how the GDP in the EU stopped growing in pace with that of the US sometime in the 1980s.
The major reason for this becomes clear if you look at the GDP per working hour, which is basically the same both in the US and the EU. This means the reason Europeans are less productive is simply that they work less...
[...] The major problem with the welfare state is that it has too much inertia. It's too slow. This is why we're seeing trends towards authoritarian governments all over the world because any other political system is just too slow at this point to keep pace with technological progress. I'm not saying authoritarian governments are good. I'm saying, they're an easy way to make fast decisions. And this is why authoritarianism is thriving...
What the hell is wrong with Europe? ... https://youtu.be/iH0aij_A08A
https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/iH0aij_A08A
https://youtu.be/iH0aij_A08A
VIDEO EXCERPTS: What is wrong with Europe? It's hard to ignore that we're dangerously and depressingly falling behind in technological developments.
This is particularly obvious when it comes to artificial intelligence, on which the entire European Union missed the boat. And after we missed the boat, we formed a committee to study the pier. What is going on? Let me illustrate the problem.
This is a bottle of melatonin I bought in a supermarket in the United States. 5 mg a piece. It's almost empty. This is why I recently bought a new one.
EU product. 0.5 mg a piece. If you want 5 mg per pill over here, you need a prescription. So now I have to take 10 pills instead of one because our government assumes that adults are too dumb to make their own decisions.
If you're located in the United States, you should see the t-shirts that I'm selling with Einstein's field equations and so on. If you're located in Europe, you can't see them because the feat doesn't fulfill some obscure regulation. And God knows it could be dangerous to buy a t-shirt on YouTube.
Self-driving cabs? No, no, can't do this here. Too much could go wrong. Embryonic stem cell research? Heaven forbid. Drone deliveries? Oh, wait. We first need a framework for a strategy for an initiative. It will stand on six pillars. And then we'll pass laws until anyone who remembers what they're about has died.
Did you know that the largest tech company in Europe is American? It's because the American companies register some branch in Ireland for tax reasons...
[...] For one thing, you can't buy painkillers in bottles. Oh, no. That's way too dangerous. And if you want more than 50 pills a pack, you need a prescription. You can buy 5 packs of 20, all right, but not one pack of 100. Way too dangerous. We can't allow this. It has to be regulated. And then there are the bottle caps that no longer detach...
No, the problem isn't the bottle caps. The problem is that the European Commission spent years on coming up with regulations and plans to solve a problem that didn't exist in the first place.
I understand why the Brits left the European Union. Not that I think it was a good idea to leave a trade union with literally all of your neighbor countries. Not super smart, but I understand the sentiment. The European Union is not a country. All its members are unhappy in their own ways.
[...] I think Europeans have become too damn complacent and also totally ignorant of what's going on in the rest of the world. This graph shows how the GDP in the EU stopped growing in pace with that of the US sometime in the 1980s.
The major reason for this becomes clear if you look at the GDP per working hour, which is basically the same both in the US and the EU. This means the reason Europeans are less productive is simply that they work less...
[...] The major problem with the welfare state is that it has too much inertia. It's too slow. This is why we're seeing trends towards authoritarian governments all over the world because any other political system is just too slow at this point to keep pace with technological progress. I'm not saying authoritarian governments are good. I'm saying, they're an easy way to make fast decisions. And this is why authoritarianism is thriving...
What the hell is wrong with Europe? ... https://youtu.be/iH0aij_A08A