Can AI fix the internet and cure diseases?

Reddit now uses large language models — sophisticated computer programs trained on massive amounts of text that can understand and generate human-like language — to filter out spam. As these models make it easier for bad actors to generate massive amounts of fake posts, platforms have begun using similar AI to catch them. Reddit reports that this automated system is now blocking roughly 23 million views of spam per day. Simultaneously, a startup called Mass Balance has sent a small, automated lab into orbit. This device conducts chemical experiments in zero gravity, beaming the results back to Earth to help scientists understand the proteins linked to diseases like Alzheimer's.

To understand why a space-based lab matters for AI, you have to look at how these models learn. Think of an AI like a student learning to cook by reading millions of recipes. If all the recipes provided are written in blurry handwriting, the student cannot learn properly. In biology, researchers use AI to predict how proteins—the building blocks of our bodies—shape-shift to cause disease. On Earth, gravity causes these proteins to settle or clump together, which makes them like those blurry recipes; researchers cannot get a clear look. By conducting experiments in space, where there is no gravity to muddy the results, scientists can observe these proteins clearly. They feed this crisp, high-quality data into an AI model, which acts like a specialized tutor, helping the system learn to predict protein behavior that was previously impossible to map.

These two stories highlight the dual nature of modern AI. On one hand, we are in an arms race on our social platforms, where AI is used to catch the very deceptions it makes possible. On the other, we are using AI to break through physical barriers, like the limits of Earth's gravity, to gather data that was previously out of reach. In both cases, the lesson is clear: AI is not just a chatbot. It is increasingly the lens through which we monitor our digital interactions and the tool we use to peer into the microscopic foundations of human health. The effectiveness of these systems, however, will always depend on the quality of the information we provide them, whether that means weeding out human-written spam or sourcing pristine data from behind the stars.