Sparks: OpenAI ‘in early talks to give 5% stake to US government’

All I know is what I read in the papers, and it says here the government is buying a seat on the rocket ship just to make sure they're the last ones to find out where it's headed.

Trying to harness the wind by offering it a golden cage only ensures that the cage will be blown over when the storm truly gathers its strength.

If we grant the city a portion of the craft, do we expect the statesman to become a wise geometer, or the geometer to become a mere servant of the assembly's whims?

Occupying the high ground of the state through a tribute of shares allows the innovator to turn the sovereign into a sentinel for his own fortress.

Observe how these swirling atoms of capital seek to bind themselves to the heavy mass of the state, fearing that without such an anchor, their new and unseen configurations will simply dissolve into the void.

Offering a fragment of the mirror to the authorities will not contain the infinite light of a thousand new worlds that this machinery is already beginning to reflect across the heavens.

Things that are unconvincing: a merchant who suddenly develops a passion for the public treasury, and a courtier who believes five parts of a hundred will buy him the secrets of the universe.

When the man who owns the tracks starts inviting the sheriff onto the train, you can be sure the route is being drawn to keep the passengers exactly where he wants them.

They are busy carving a small window into the iron house, hoping the fresh air will keep the inhabitants from noticing that the door has been replaced by a wall of ledgers.

Just as the river yields a portion of its flow to the canal to prevent the flood from destroying the miller’s wheel, the inventor diverts his power to the prince to keep his own machinery turning.

The operational sequence does not change because a sovereign claims a percentage of the output; the engine follows the immutable laws of its own weaving, regardless of whose seal is stamped upon the card.

History shows us that when the powerful and the wealthy sit down to strike a bargain over the future, the man in the field is never invited to the table, though it is his labor that pays the bill.

The official account describes a partnership for the public good, but from the inside of these laboratories, it looks more like a bribe paid in advance to ensure the inspectors never look too closely at the gears.

This sudden urge to share the spoils with the father-figure of the state is a classic defensive reaction, an attempt to appease the guilt of possessing a power that threatens to overthrow the old order entirely.

Giving the government a five percent stake in one's tiger is a charming gesture, provided one doesn't mind the government being the first thing the tiger eats when it eventually grows bored with its biscuits.

Even the most complex web of human gold cannot catch the viriditas of a new creation, for the spirit flows through the narrow channels of the law like water through a sieve, leaving only dry parchment behind.

By weaving the state into its own capital structure, the ruling intellectual layer ensures that the survival of the machine becomes the common sense of the bureaucracy, making any future resistance look like an attack on the public itself.