Marius Schober

Progress Through Consciousness

  • This is AGI

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    2 min read

    I say that current AI is AGI. It is not obvious yet, because we haven’t yet connected very complex and fragmented software and data environments – and for R&D to turn into real-world change is a multi-year process anyway.

    Even if we stopped and freeze AI development here and now, we’d only realize that we indeed have AGI 2 or 3 years down the road. In some niches it will be faster (software or law) in others slower (complex logistics).

    However, AI development is not stopping here and now. It continues to improve – I say exponentially. Even if you are more conservative, then the linear growth still has undoubtedly a large rate of change.

    Today (!), we have AI models that evolved from barely completing sentences to writing code that ships to production, we have AI doing PhD-level research, and achieved gold medal-level performance on the International Math Olympiad. AI is solving medical problems that baffle experts.

    Again – what is currently mostly manually prompted work in long chat conversations will soon develop into agents that can do almost all knowledge work fully autonomously.

    I’m not talking about AI as an assistant, as a co-pilot. It will just straight up finish the work while you are napping on the beach.

    The difference between the GPT-3 model and today’s models – whether Grok 4, Gemini 2.5 Pro, or ChatGPT o4 – is like comparing a Nokia 1011 to an iPhone 16 Pro. We went from purely text based chats to multimodal understanding – models that can see, hear, and reason across domains simultaneously. AI is starting to genuinely understand context and nuance in ways that feels human.

    The next phase is not purely larger AI models, but models that learn continuously. They can remember you, plan and execute multistep tasks over days, weeks, or months.

    An AI system that perfectly remembers, understands context, who never sleeps, and gets smarter every day. This is being built today in AI labs around the globe.

    We have AGI today, and it is only a matter of time for us to arrive at superintelligent AI systems. Is it 2 years? 3 years? 4 years? 5 years? Irrelevant. Whether it is 1 year or 10 years, the implications are the same: everything is going to change forever.

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  • Invisible Genius

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    1 min read

    Every time I wish the minds I admire would open up and show the full depth of their thoughts, ideas, and experiences, I realize – I’m doing the same thing by staying too silent online.

    The idols I look up to – for example Ido Portal, Bruce Poon Tip, Dr. Nun Amen-Ra, my Sifus, countless peers – are all masters of mind and body in private but leave little or no footprints online. The wisdom is real, yet it’s undocumented and the world barely sees it.

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  • Why a Marathon?

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    2 min read

    Marathon running is socially encouraged orthopedic self-harm disguised as virtue. 42 km of joint erosion, cardiac overreach, and dopamine-chasing disguised as discipline.

    Before you commit to run a marathon, take a moment and pause. Ask yourself: Why is running a marathon my goal?

    Odds are, you’re either unconsciously copying someone else’s coping mechanism or seeking social reward and Instagram likes through performative suffering – and calling it “fitness”. That’s not discipline. That’s mimesis. Read Girard. You’re not chasing health but someone else’s pain prescription, hoping it will fix your own.

    And if you really need to suffer publicly to feel alive, maybe it’s not your body that needs training, but your fear of sitting still without applause.

    If the idea of running a marathon truly comes from your heart, then you’d run 42 km on a Tuesday at dawn with no witness. If you need a start line, a medal, a round of applause, and pictures for social media, then you are suffering through a socially accepted identity crisis.

    Let’s get physiological. Marathons attack your hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, suppress your immune system, and can induce irreversible joint damage – knees, hips, ankles, worn one kilometer at a time. Cardiac scarring is a real risk. Cortisol floods. Lymphocyte counts crash. This really isn’t health but a ritualized system failure.

    Discipline is not a spectacle. Movement is not masochism. Read Body by Science (Doug McGuff & John Little). Explore movement systems like Ido Portal’s (or try Kung Fu). Train for capacity, not applause.

    Stop running from the void. It keeps up.

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  • How We Use AI

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    2 min read

    Whether current AI systems qualify as AGI is beside the point. Five years ago, if you had asked me to define AGI, my answer would’ve closely described what GPT o3 or Gemini 2.5 Pro are now. So if this is AGI, then where are the breakthroughs?

    Valid question. The answer: we are the bottleneck.

    The limitation is no longer the model. The real limitation is that we haven’t really figured out how to use LLMs properly. Even if AI development froze today, and all we have available are o3 and Gemini 2.5 Pro level LLMs, then we would still see a decade of profound disruptions and innovations across entire industries.

    Most users treat AI like Google, a friend, a mentor, or a novelty. Few understand prompting. Those who do don’t even scratch the surface of what is possible when you give AI the right prompt, the relevant context, and access to specific or perhaps proprietary data.

    Worse, we are not augmenting human intelligence, we are outsourcing it. TikTokified workflows, mindless automation, and prompt-template copy-paste culture are commoditizing subpar outcomes. Instead of expanding our minds, we’re paralyzing them.

    The real potential lies hidden in tandem cognition. Reimagining how we work with AI systems in a way that ensures our uniquely human traits (intuition, creativity, vision, …) aren’t ignored, but amplified. Without this shift, outputs will commoditize (across humans and organizations).

    We urgently need two things: first a methodology for extracting maximum value from LLMs and second a philosophy for not replacing our human genius, but empowering it.

    The future is not AI versus human. It is human with AI, at full capacity. Currently, the focus is on maximum capacity for AI compute. Now it’s time we focus on maximum capacity for human genius.

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  • NOW

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    1 min read

    The future is an illusion. Just as is the past.

    There is only now.

    Everything that is truly meaningful is happening now.

    You shape the future by your actions now, by your thoughts now, by your love now.

    Any moment is the future.

    There is only now.

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  • Creativity and Commoditization

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    1 min read

    Most products and technologies became commoditized. I believe this is mostly due to a lack of creativity.

    When was the last time you saw a product that totally caught you off-guard in absolute amazement?

    Nobody dares to create something uniquely NEW.
    Commoditization happens because everyone is just focused on incremental improvements, calling it proudly innovation. It is a delusion.

    Creativity is not listening to customers. It is creating something completely new that your future customers don’t even know can even exist. It is possible in your imagination but impossible in their imagination.

    Vision, creativity, intuition.

    I 100% believe that listening to customers is a trap that leads to mediocrity. True innovation comes from ignoring the noise of customer feedback and daring to invent what they can’t yet imagine – yes, it’s risky, but the only way to avoid competition.

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  • Meritocracy Without Balance

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    2 min read

    Meritocracy without equality is basically a ladder with missing steps, which only the fortunate few can climb. The rest is basically left at the ground to gaze up.

    Furthermore, a pure focus on meritocracy can become a weakness if it’s a zero-sum game. While talents thrive in systems that value it, without fairness, you ultimately get exploitation, resentment, or fragility.

    Ergo: meritocracy needs to be balanced with equality, and equality needs to be balanced with meritocracy.

    In a meritocratic system, you basically need that the fortunate and the able are compassionate towards those less fortunate and able.

    If you are more on the libertarian side, you need the fortunate individuals to compete as capitalists and then be socialists within their communities and families.

    If you prefer a state, then the state must encourage meritocratic contribution of everyone that is able, to the best of their ability, while balancing it with a fair welfare system that nurtures and supports those less able and fortunate.

    I think this is something Germany did historically quite well, but at one point we lost the balance: we lost the culture of merit by putting too much emphasis on equality – even to a point that Germany now cares for millions of non-citizens that never contributed, when it should instead demand these individuals to contribute to the best of their ability.

    If we want to have a state, then we don’t want a welfare state, and – I think – we should also not want a pure capitalistic state. We need balance and thus a social meritocracy.

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  • Trump Tariffs

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    2 min read

    I don’t believe that Trump uses the current tariffs as a negotiation leverage – at least not across the board.

    The U.S. will not go back to 0% or < 10% tariffs, because Republicans (JD Vance) will with absolute certainty lose re-election.

    Trump promised to revive the Rust Belt, which are the swing states. He can only “save” them through tariffs against China and all current and future China alternatives.

    Some regions, and I’d include the EU, UK, Argentina, Australia, New Zealand here, now have the unique chance to negotiate towards free trade or at least a friendly ≤ 10% tariff.

    Yet, speaking of the EU, I think they are mostly too arrogant or stupid to do so. 10% seems to be the new base anyhow.

    The relevant question is how the EU will respond.

    Currently, it looks that the EU is looking for sovereignty. This could mean new entry barriers for US technology products. Perhaps even a straight out ban of key technologies like Palantir to replicate local key players.

    This in turn is the ultimate and biggest threat to the USA. A world that is shifting away from US technology will erode the vital pillar that is currently keeping the US dollar alive.

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  • Corporate AI vs. Visionary People

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    1 min read

    BCG says that 83% of firms prioritize innovation, but only 3% feel able to execute.

    I ask: what’s the bigger flaw: overestimating corporate AI or underinvesting in people?

    Probably both.

    I see a trend where AI is seen as the cure-all.

    Instead of investing in visionary and creative leaders plus the engineers to execute, companies invest in AI gimmicks whose ROI is (for now) mostly in efficiency – not real innovation.

    Everyone – at this point – basically pretends it will lead to proprietary innovation.

    At the same time, the innovation companies end up running after, are the innovations that AI tells them to – and because AI is commoditizing logic, it simultaneously commoditizes innovation.

    Congratulations: You end up in a red ocean instead of blue ocean.

    Therefore, innovation becomes competition, and is not innovation anymore.

    The biggest mistake companies can make today is investing all in AI and not investing in the human genius of their workforce: visionary leadership, their collective intuitive intelligence, Human-AI-Symbiosis

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  • Decentralization versus Authoritarianism

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    2 min read

    Erdoğan’s calculated elimination of Imamoglu through academic technicalities and alleged ties to PKK is not really an isolated Turkish case but an example of democracy’s global collapse.

    Yesterday, Germany rushed constitutional changes without proper scrutiny and with a majority that was already voted out of office, Romania disqualifies candidates on procedural grounds. The list goes on: Hungary under Viktor Orbán, Serbia under Aleksandar Vučić, Israel under Netanyahu, Poland under the Law and Justice party – the democratic backsliding transcends regions and political systems. 72% of humanity now lives under authoritarian control.

    There is a new playbook: weaponize legal institutions against opponents, manufacture legitimacy through procedural theater, and dismantle democratic safeguards while maintaining the illusion of constitutionality.

    We’re witnessing not democracy’s dramatic assassination but its methodical strangulation through bureaucratic manipulation. This erosion isn’t coincidental but the inevitable outcome of centralized power structures that invariably corrupt even well-designed systems.

    I believe that our only viable path forward lies in radical decentralization: distributing governance to local communities, financial sovereignty through crypto networks, and communication via censorship-resistant platforms that no single entity controls.

    Decentralized systems restore human dignity by establishing unbreakable cryptographic guarantees rather than depending on the hollow promises of centralized authorities, career politicians, and unelected bureaucrats .

    The future belongs to networked individuals collaborating voluntarily through systems designed with liberty as their foundation. Decentralized and globally networked societies are antifragile societies that unleash innovation by enabling thousands of concurrent experiments instead of single-point failures.

    Only decentralization can safeguard freedom in an increasingly authoritarian world.

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