Francesco Moiraghi (@FraMoira)

What technologies will rewrite our institutions? What institutions will govern technology?

48h to Unruly Futures 2026. Stacked lineup:

- post-agi economics / future of markets: @izakaminska @JulianDJacobs
- AI and institutional architecture: @sebkrier @ObadiaAlex @leoquattrucci @jujulemons
- what’s rot and what’s not: @curtis_yarvin @tomough @stefanobernardi
- new technoscientific institutions: @jamiec_24 @AndriesKerp
- after the biosingularity: @julian_englert @moelzek

and more in frontier real estate, post-UN humanitarian response, agri and food sovereignty etc

Thanks to our sponsors @RenPhilanthropy @RonitKanwar, @cartainc

Francesco Moiraghi @FraMoira Oct 23

Good read.

There’s an infinite number of analogies between Europe today and late Qing China. I like universities devolving from qualification systems into a mandarinate printing certifications of loyalty to a gangrenous, economically unproductive, self-serving bureaucracy etc

What strikes me is that late imperial times have this unsettling quiet, as if a death drive had taken hold. An eerie atmosphere where we’re sleepwalking into irreversible (for 4/5 generations depending on how the AI industrial cycle plays out) decline, but there’s ~no sense of panic or urgency whatsoever. You look at folks around you falling straight down a cliff, and instead of screaming they light themselves a cig and pull an espresso. Amygdala off, survival instinct knob turned down to absolute zero.

Oh but we still have great research, advanced industry yada yada

It doesn’t matter what we have if we’re making choices that are going to make us lose it all. We only really have what we can pass down to the next generation, which at the current 10Y OAT yield is very little

Après nous le déluge, but we have Mistral until then

Zondark Verified account @ZondarkAI Oct 21

为什么我认为，今天的欧洲，本质上就是一个穿着高定西装、端着红酒杯的福利版大清。

如果把19世纪的晚清和如今的欧洲放在一起对比刨析，你会发现这两者的病灶、心态和衰弱的剧本都一模一样。

何出此言，论据如下：

其一，欧洲把道德与合规当成天朝礼法，把中美科技看作奇技淫巧

当年乾隆和晚清士大夫面对英国的蒸汽机、火车和洋枪洋炮，第一反应不是恐慌，而是居高临下的道德鄙视，认为那是毫无教化的奇技淫巧，只有大清的孔孟礼治才是人类文明的最高形态。

今天的欧洲老爷看中美，心态一模一样。

他们打心底里瞧不起硅谷的野蛮生长的科技新贵，更瞧不起中国没日没夜卷出来的超级供应链。

在欧洲老爷们眼里，中美这是没有灵魂的野蛮内卷，只有欧洲高举的环保主义、数据隐私、多元平权和每周35小时工作制，才是人类文明的天朝礼法。

他们沉溺在道德审美上的优越感里，用文明裁判的姿态掩盖自己在生产力上的全面阳痿。

其二，欧洲的奢侈品和燃油车，就是当代的茶叶、丝绸与瓷器

大清曾经靠着农业文明攒下的极致老底，茶叶、丝绸、瓷器，赚走了全球大量的白银，甚至狂妄地认为外国人不喝大清的茶叶就会便秘而死。

欧洲过去几十年吃的老本，本质上就是工业2.0时代攒下的茶叶和瓷器，包括法国的LV与爱马仕、德国的BBA燃油车与精密阀门、瑞士的手表与医药。

欧洲人同样产生了一种致命的幻觉：

认为无论科技怎么改变，中美的新贵们永远得排队买欧洲的皮包和机械，欧洲永远可以靠着祖传的品牌溢价和专利护城河，躺着收割全世界的财富。

直到中国出现的新能源车直接打穿德国汽车工业的底裤、AI 的兴起开始重构工业软件与研发范式，欧洲才惊觉自己的丝绸瓷器不再是不可替代的硬通货了。

其三，布鲁塞尔的罚单经济，就是当年的广州十三行

大清闭关锁国，但又馋洋人的白银，怎么办？

搞出了一套广州十三行体制：

自己不搞工业、不搞航海，就在通商口岸设卡，制定最繁琐的规矩，向外国商人征收高昂的规礼银和买路钱。

今天欧盟总部的布鲁塞尔，正是数字时代的广州十三行。

自己孵化不出OpenAI、英伟达、字节跳动，就写全世界最厚的《AI法案》和《数字市场法案》。

你美国科技巨头想进欧洲4.5亿人的市场？

可以，先按我的规矩交几十亿欧元的反垄断罚单。

用行政设卡和司法敲诈来代替产业竞争，结果把真正的创新者全挡在门外，把自己彻底锁死在旧时代。

其四，从入关八旗退化成提笼架鸟的铁杆庄稼

满清八旗刚入关时（对应欧洲的大航海和早期工业革命），那也是敢拼命、敢流血的凶悍战力。

但承平日久，八旗子弟拿上了国家包养的铁杆庄稼（世袭俸禄），迅速退化成只会提笼架鸟、抽大烟、听戏的寄生阶层。

到了晚清财政破产，朝廷哪怕敢克扣一点点旗饷，八旗兵不打洋人，先在京城闹事。

今天欧洲的高福利选民，就是当代的八旗子弟。

二战后几代人吃尽了工业霸权的红利，把高福利、长休假、终身不解雇当成了天经地义的铁杆庄稼。

现在老本吃光了，法国国债飙到GDP的120%，政府刚想砍610亿欧元预算自救，这群平时连班都不愿多加的当代旗人立刻冲上街头，把143年历史的市政厅烧成灰烬。

其五，既得利益死保风水，把每一次洋务运动扼杀在摇篮里

晚清不是没有明白人，李鸿章、曾国藩也想搞洋务运动，也想修铁路、架电线。

但为什么搞不成？

因为朝堂上的清流派御史、地方上的乡绅和漕运利益集团百般阻挠：

说修铁路会惊动祖宗龙脉、破坏风水，买机器会夺了纤夫的饭碗，最后连修好的淞沪铁路都能被清廷买回来亲手拆掉扔进海里。

当一个帝国把祖宗留下的存量当成永恒，把既得利益的枷锁当成道德皇冠，它的结局在两百年前的紫禁城就已经写好了。
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Francesco Moiraghi @FraMoira Oct 15

"Also what the fuck is a moat"

MAILER-DAEMON Verified account @hassanrahim Oct 14

ok genuine question and i’m not being obtuse — what is the whole discourse around “taste” right now?

i’ve only ever worked in the creative industry so taste is literally a prerequisite, never really discussed bc you would otherwise not be in the room

so is this “taste” conversation happening bc the world is now run by engineers who are trying to “solve” creativity?

also what the fuck is a moat?

i’m sorry
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Francesco Moiraghi @FraMoira Sep 29

How many decades of elite overproduction do you need to believe that a "code" can generate anything in the real world, other than your own ultimate demise in the form of historical irrelevance

the industrial revolution was cheap coal, pig iron, newcomen engine cost/efficiency curves, flying shuttles, canal navigation (Leonardo's miter gates) etc

build the thing, all is downstream of resource access + infra buildout

Politics UK Verified account @PolitlcsUK Sep 29

🚨 WATCH: Andy Burnham says he will create a "global code" for AI so Britain can "capture the benefits"

"We led the world's first industrial revolution from the Midlands and the North of England. So why can't we lead the next one? We can, and we will"

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Francesco Moiraghi @FraMoira Sep 17

The next decades of discovery will run on tissues that best capture human biology

@thematthewosman @FabioZB_I and now @vqctran are building that physical + in silico substrate

Rare kind of company

Matthew Osman Verified account @thematthewosman Sep 17

Today we’re announcing we’ve raised $20M in seed financing led by @QuietCapital , with participation from @GradientVC , @haystackvc and @CompoundVC and other amazing folks to build the verification layer for AI-driven biology.

We are also delighted to be welcoming @vqctran who is joining us from @GoogleDeepMind as a co-founder.

AI is not going to cure all diseases without a verification substrate - a scalable environment where models can test predictions and learn against living human biology.

AI is becoming increasingly capable of generating biological hypotheses, therapeutic candidates and experimental designs. But generating ideas is advancing much faster than our ability to test what those ideas will actually do in human biology. Existing systems force a tradeoff: the most biologically relevant approaches are slow and expensive, while faster in vitro and computational systems often lack the fidelity needed to capture human response.

Polyphron’s bet is that tissue is the fastest, cheapest, most parallelizable verification substrate that still contains the biology that matters and we believe the path to biological superintelligence runs through closed-loop interaction with these living and simulated human systems.

Thank you to @axios for covering the announcement.

Link to our new website in the thread.
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Francesco Moiraghi

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