Glad you enjoyed it! Was also fun to write (mostly) 😅

Regarding "how computation can breed desire to experience things", this starts mostly with Land (Machinic Desire, 2008). The idea is that mass computation is itself desire that is a self-regulating system. So experience isn't necessarily biological and can also be machinic (although it wouldn't exactly be the same thing as what we think of as experience). This is why theirs the general understanding that once AI reaches a point of super intellegence it will be indistinguishable from our understanding of sentience which is why I kind of breazed through all that and move right on to discuss deeper things in my article like meaning/purpose.

"How would established military powers react to rival nation's AIs colluding with their own, even if its in the best interest of humanity?" This question is part of the first section on politics where I'd argue such a situation is part of what can oportunistically bring about network states. I see militaries existing in the Future (vastly more powerful ones too), but the powers befins them would be in various and unfamiliare forms to what we have today. Where the Future really shines is in how humans join with AIs to bring this about (think Neuromancer but less indiferent and more chivalrous).