Shows
I, scientist with Balazs KeglAlexander Bard part 4My fourth conversation with the philosopher Alexander Bard, on his new book project on mysticism, bliss, the importance of phenomenology, the philosophy of time, transcendence, and transformation.Related episodes:https://youtu.be/Y8cuqy6y0fo Alexander Bard part 1: sex, Zoroastrianism, embodied philosophyhttps://youtu.be/eASbv9WA-TQ Alexander Bard part 2: tantric sex, sex and spirituality, men's workhttps://youtu.be/3eAwktR3S3s Alexander Bard part 3: anthropology and AIBard on Sweeney, discussing the book project on mysticismhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v...2025-06-151h 21
I, scientist with Balazs KeglKevin MithcellMy conversation with Kevin Mitchell, neuroscientist and geneticist at Trinity College Dublin, on free agency and randomness, nested selves, mental causation and the tension between free choice and control, and artificial agents.Kevin's books:Free Agents: https://www.amazon.com/Free-Agents-Evolution-Gave-Will/dp/0691226237/Innate: https://www.amazon.com/Innate-How-Wiring-Brains-Shapes/dp/0691204152/Related episodes:Michael Levin: https://youtu.be/0nMXYdayQIUEmbodied AI: https://youtu.be/JZ8GTucClpMAlexander Ororbia: https://youtu.be/N83vBfz7_BIYogi Jaeger: https://youtu.be/5UJ4y2L2qpk2025-06-151h 25
The Meaning CodeAI Researcher and C S Lewis Scholar discuss Language, Randomness, Agency and Integrating Two WorldsBalazs Kegl, Head of AI Research for Huawei Paris, meets Annie Crawford, C S Lewis Scholar, to discover the crossovers between AI research and Lewis' concept of transposition of the higher into the lower, also looking at Michael Levin's Bowtie Theory, Chiastic Structures and Modes of Knowing. Timestamps: 00:00 Intro and overview of AI and Transposition 13:17 Exploring AI Text Generating and style adaptation 15:31 Understanding Randomness in AI Outputs 20:10 Consciousness and Communication27:04 C S Lewis' concepts of Transposition and Modes of Knowing 36:49 Creativity and Memory in relation...2025-05-221h 40
I, scientist with Balazs KeglMichael Levin part 1My first conversation with Michael Levin, a developmental biologist revolutionizing how we think about cellular collective, agency, and life in general. One of those conversations where I feel we dive deep and only scratch the surface, at the same time: nested agents, birth, aging, and death, third person and first person science. Related episodes:Embodied AI: https://youtu.be/JZ8GTucClpMAlexander Ororbia: https://youtu.be/N83vBfz7_BIBaudouin Saintyves: https://youtu.be/NmvzEpz9R84Laura Desiree Di Paolo: https://youtu.be/9txUwVtAOBkAnna Riedl...2025-03-251h 01
I, scientist with Balazs KeglEmbodied AI with Giuseppe Paolo and Jonas GonzalezMeet my two wonderful colleagues with whom we wrote a position paper last year "A Call for Embodied AI". We talk about the limits of the current "internet AI" paradigm. We agree that singularity, if even a thing, is very far, LLMs will not lead there, but that social media AI is already an embodied AI that is seamlessly rewiring us.Paper: https://proceedings.mlr.press/v235/paolo24a.htmlRelated episodes: Yogi Jaeger: https://youtu.be/5UJ4y2L2qpkAnna Riedl: https://youtu.be/w2ZiSWZNQsg2025-03-241h 34
I, scientist with Balazs KeglAlexander Bard part 3This is the brainiest of my three episodes with Alexander Bard.The deepest analysis I know of the US election, from a centrist/neutral point of view, from the psychoanalytical to the anthropological.A look at AI from an anthropological angle. AI cannot do abduction, lacks emotional intelligence thus creativity. Hallucinations, Wikipedia, and the St Tropez nude beach. Dreams and the psychoanalysis of AI. Netocracy and consumariat. The first part of our conversation: https://youtu.be/Y8cuqy6y0foThe second part of our conversation: https://youtu.be...2025-03-241h 23
I, scientist with Balazs KeglAlexander OrorbiaWe get deep into identity and death. If you are fascinated by Michael Levin and Jonathan Pageau, this conversation is for you.Fascinating discussion where we go beyond the Free Energy Principle, and even Levin's cognitive cones, and postulate that crucial internal structures, a subset of me, are what define identity. If they get damaged, I lose my identity. Deep self-transformation may also rupture my continuity. When does it happen, when do I die, as opposed to my subsystems dying? Very much a sequel to my conversation with Yogi Jaeger (https://youtu.be/5UJ4y2L2...2024-11-141h 20
I, scientist with Balazs KeglAlexander Bard part 2This is my second conversation with the philosopher Alexander Bard. Yoga and alignment, downwards in the body and upwards in the sociont. Archetypology and rituals. Tantric sex and the sex/religion/spirituality triad. The masculine drive towards the project. Collective purpose and men's work. The first part of our conversation: https://youtu.be/Y8cuqy6y0foProcess and Event seminar series on Parallax: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLSc7jFP5VeNHTwj4vzq7Tv6UIhAPCC4vpAlexander Bard is a philosopher and futurist specializing in the relationship between humanity...2024-11-141h 08
I, scientist with Balazs KeglAlexander Bard part 1This is my first and definitely not the last encounter with the philosopher Alexander Bard. We discuss his grand oeuvre of metaphysics: Process and Event.Why should you only trust a philosopher with a great sex life? Shit happens: a philosophy that starts in the here and now. Boy pharaohs and pillar saints: the two faces of Gnosticism. Our issues with Christianity: lack of embodiment, lack of mature adulthood. How is the day of a good Zoroastrian?Exciting conversation, brotherly love at first sight. Enjoy!!Alexander Bard is a philosopher and...2024-09-161h 11
I, scientist with Balazs KeglDan ShipperDan Shipper (http://danshipper.com/)is an entrepreneur, writer, and the CEO and co-founder of Every (https://every.to/@danshipper), a daily newsletter on business, AI, and personal development read by nearly 75,000 founders, operators, and investors. He writes a weekly column at Every called Chain of Thought, where he covers topics like AI, tools for thought, and the psychology of work.I contacted Dan because he makes his living off the writing industry, yet instead of panicking, he took the LLM revolution head on, choosing to lead it instead of ducking. Join us...2024-09-161h 22
I, scientist with Balazs KeglCsaba SzepesvariCsaba Szepesvári is a prominent figure in machine learning and artificial intelligence, particularly known for his contributions to reinforcement learning. He is a professor in the Department of Computing Science at the University of Alberta and a Senior Staff Research Scientist at Google DeepMind.Our goal in life: keep eating Yann Lecun's cherry (inside joke, ask GPT).This was a wide-reaching conversation with my good friend Csaba. The first 50 minutes is about AI, we give you insight into what AI researchers and practitioners are dealing behind the scenes, a bit of history a...2024-09-161h 54
I, scientist with Balazs KeglJohannes JaegerYogi Jaeger is a philosopher at the University of Vienna, specializing in the philosophy of science and biology in particular. Are we rushing ahead into the unknown, scaring people, while also producing fake shelters for them to retreat into artificial small worlds? Are we losing our grip on the world or realizing our humanness in the mirror of AI? Will AI take our agency away? Are we willingly giving it away? Or they will extend our agency?Passionate conversation about the philosophy of science and the non-computational and non-formalizable nature of cognition. We...2024-09-161h 56
I, scientist with Balazs KeglBaudouin SaintyvesBaudouin Saintyves is an artist, physicist, and roboticist, inventor of Granulobots.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gnbdneho78Mhttps://arxiv.org/abs/2304.03125Research: https://voices.uchicago.edu/bsaintyveslab/Art: https://www.shapesofemergence.com/Fascinating conversation, starting with an intro of soft and swarm robotics and his work on designing Granulobots, self organizing aggregates of small wheels with magnets and a simple motor.We then dive deep into a deep dialogical out-loud thinking about self-organization, self-coordination, synchronization, and emergence. We are both at the...2024-09-161h 53
I, scientist with Balazs KeglLaura Desiree Di PaoloWhy are LLMs so alien?Is it because they lack goal-oriented behavior?Or because they are designed to please humans, which can be unsettling?Join me and Laura in this new episode where we discuss her paper "Active inference goes to school", AI and 4E cognitive science, active inference and child development, and AI in the classroom.My notes on Laura's paper: https://balazskegl.substack.com/p/active-inference-goes-to-school00:00:00 Intro00:05:44 4E cognitive science. Embodied, enacted, embedded, extended. Mirror neurons and meaning. Scaffolding. 00:20:03 LLMs...2024-09-161h 57
I, scientist with Balazs KeglAnna RiedlWhat, if anything, differentiates us from machines? Is cognition computational? Can self-preservation be externally imposed? How do you feel in your body when you hear the word "singularity"?Join us in a thought-provoking conversation with Anna Riedl, a distinguished cognitive scientist from Vienna, known for her work on rationality.We dive deep into psychology, cognitive science, and artificial intelligence. What I find exemplary about Anna is how she plants her feet firmly in the real world while embarking deep, wide-ranging, and sometimes controversial topics in one of the fastest moving fields in science.2024-09-161h 45The Meaning CodeBalazs Kegl: A Discussion of the Nature of Podcasting and This Little Corner of the InternetBalazs Kegl, AI researcher and host of the podcast, I, Scientist, joins me for a wide ranging discussion of the purpose and the nature of podcasting, and the reason for the and the experience of participating in This Little Corner.2024-03-281h 30
I, scientist with Balazs KeglJakob NordinJakob Nordin is an observational astrophysicist from the Humboldt University, Berlin, member of the LSST collaboration building the Vera Rubin Observatory and the informational infrastructure to manage the immense data it will collect.Real-time astronomy & LSST: We discuss the intriguing potential of real-time astronomy, focusing on the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST), its technology and data processing challenges.Multi-messenger astrophysics & brain-like structure: Explored the fascinating concept of multi-messenger astrophysics, where various observatories act like sensors in a brain-like structure, collaboratively detecting cosmic events. Discussed how this network uses a semi-automatic system of alerts...2024-01-242h 00
I, scientist with Balazs KeglJoel GladdThe second hour is really just two guys trying to make sense of what's going on in the world as a reaction to AI and the meaning crisis, explored through the works of John Vervaeke. I'm sure the insights from this conversation will resonate with many educators and technologists alike. If you like it, please help the channel by signing up!00:00:00 Intro00:06:53 Path to teaching writing.00:15:36 Why do we write? Making an impact vs having a voice vs thinking something through.00:20:37 GPT vs human writing. The voice of GPT. Simile...2024-01-241h 58
I, scientist with Balazs KeglTatjana Samopjan00:00:00 Intro.00:03:18 Stories. Why do they fascinate us? Mechanism of emotional manipulation.00:06:45 True to life vs realistic. Startrek. Dramatic real stories are rarely good.00:10:08 GPT and stories. How to build stories word-by-word. What is creativity? Information and meaning. Saturation in the story space. Alignment of living and writing.00:19:25 Yellowstone. What makes a story good? Lioness. Average is OK but don't expect to get payed for it. 00:23:24 GPT and storywriting. Write us a joke about migrants. A new episode of Sherlock.00:28:54 Art = fire + algebra. A good story makes you...2023-11-211h 27
I, scientist with Balazs KeglKeith Frankish00:00:00 Intro. Why philosophy of mind is important for AI and for me as a human.00:04:53 Schools on consciousness, a historical perspective. Conscious person and conscious mental state, thought, experience, or perception00:13:16 Qualia and the hard problem. The objective/subjective divide.00:20:40 Some options: physicalism, dualism, panpsychism, illusionism.00:24:14 My reaction to the world "illusion" is that I get angry.00:26:37 Pain _is_ real in illusionism. What we can be wrong about is _what_ it actually is.00:29:15 Dual aspect monism and Mark Solms. Functional view of consciousness.00:33:35 Zombies, philosophical...2023-11-211h 54
I, scientist with Balazs KeglAnna Ciaunica00:00:00 Intro: empirical vs armchair philosopher. Visual vs tactile understanding.00:06:08 How subjective experience rises from physical matter. Entering wine into your body vs seeing a tomato. Perception of color, pain, interoception.00:14:09 Consciousness is not a thing, but conscious is an adjective.00:18:24 Brain is (part of) the body. The developmental biology view.00:21:23 Immune system: what is you, what is not you?00:24:30 Cells, tissue, (https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Rvmvt7gscIM) organs, body, how does hierarchical agency function? The relational ontology.00:27:08 Love, hate, and self, me and not me, at...2023-11-211h 26
I, scientist with Balazs KeglMark Vernon00:00:00 Intro: Mark's journey from undergrad physics to psychology, philosophy, and theology.00:05:17 Philosophy: "Who you are is directly related to what you know".00:06:25 The psychology of being a scientist. Lived dualism.00:07:49 Becoming a scientist is to become a certain kind of person, and this very much shapes the scientific worldview.00:08:46 AI is leaked from the lab and becoming a focal point around which the world is turning.00:12:05 Psychology and theology. How are they related? Developmental psychology. Thresholds, crisis moments, self-transcendence. 00:17:23 Intelligence is a deeply felt notion. Crisis, suffering...2023-11-211h 45
I, scientist with Balazs KeglGaël Varoquaux00:00:00 Intro. Gaels's journey from physics to AI through coding, then health and social science applications.00:06:17 Looking for impact. Are we using our energy to solve the best problems? How to estimate future impact?00:12:18 How did the interacting with a wide variety of sciences changes you as an AI researcher? Out-of-the box. Empirical research.00:13:19 Benchmarks. How they incorporate value and drive AI research. AI went from a mathematical to an empirical science. Fei-Fei Li and ImageNet.00:19:07 The Autism Challenge: predict the condition from brain imaging. How to avoid fooling ourselves?00:25:24 H...2023-11-211h 19
I, scientist with Balazs KeglVava Gligorov00:00:00 Intro00:04:20 The LHCb experiment. Fundamental particle physics. Why isn't there as much antimatter as matter? Timescales.00:17:18 Shortcomings of the Standard Model. Dark matter. The LHC.00:22:24 The LHCb collaboration. Organization of a scientific experiment beyond the Dunbar number. Carrier development in academia and physics.00:27:03 The skills and day job of an LHC physicist. The messy organization of a big experiment. Technical vs physics work.00:32:33 The (lack of) management levers and incentives. 70+ institutes. Where does meaning come from?00:38:26 Vava's journey from war-torn Yugoslavia through Vienna and Oxford to CERN...2023-11-211h 53
I, scientist with Balazs KeglBogdan Cirstea00:00:00 Intro. Bogdan's journey through the French system towards PhD in AI. Inspiration by early DeepMind papers, research on LSTM and other recurrent architectures.00:05:29 Oxford postdoc between ML and Neuroscience, theory of mind. Turn towards safety. Influence of Nick Bostrom's 2014 book Superintelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superintelligence:_Paths,_Dangers,_Strategies.00:07:29 AI acceleration. AlphaGo, Startcraft, BART, GPT-2. Language. Learning people's preferences.00:10:24 The curious path of an independent AI safety researcher. 80000 hours https://80000hours.org/, the Alignment Forum https://www.alignmentforum.org/, LessWrong https://www.lesswrong.com/, effective altruism. 00:18:15 GPT: in-context learning, math.2023-08-161h 39
I, scientist with Balazs KeglJonas Gonzalez00:00:00 Intro.00:01:34 Jonas' story. Math, physics towards computer science, AI, and robotics.00:05:09 Embodiment in intelligence.00:07:25 LLMs in robots. Should we put LLMs in robots? Can we teach them as kids if they can speak? Will they develop their personalities depending on their unique experience? Should we add episodic memory to them?00:19:02 Relevance realization. How to filter important information from the immense incoming flow of signals? The top-down aspect of perception. Cultural learning and binding.00:23:30 Limits of GI. Is there an inherent limit to how intelligent a being can be? What...2023-07-201h 08
I, scientist with Balazs KeglGiuseppe Paolo1:35 Screwdriver hands: how Giuseppe became a scientist.6:07 Reinforcement learning (RL) explained to Giuseppe's grandma.9:01 Model-based reinforcement learning: how to fry an egg.10:45 The three components of model-based reinforcement learning: the actor, the model, and the planner.16:29 Planning = thinking: ham & eggs and Google map19:01 RL is responsible for collecting its own data22:05 Vervaeke's first two Ps: propositional (GPT) and procedural (RL)24:05 Fear from AI: the paperclip scenario, evil, indifference, and foolishness28:19 Should we add agency into AI? Can we socialize AI as we do...2023-07-1856 minThe Meaning CodeIs AI Alignment Possible before we have Aligned Ourselves? Learning to Trust the Goodness of BeingBalazs Kegl, a computer scientist with a PhD in AI joins today for a discussion about recognizing the danger inherent in the fears that surround the rapid development of AI. Also available on Youtube.A wide ranging conversation that includes ideas that come from the following resources: Balazs Kegl's Substack: https://balazskegl.substack.com/p/the-case-for-aligning-the-ai-scientist The AI Dilemma: https://youtu.be/xoVJKj8lcNQ Alignment experiments, here both the text and the video are vital. https://community.openai.com/t/agi-alignment-experiments-foundation-vs-instruct-various-agent-models/21031 John Vervaeke on AI: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-_RdKiDbz4 Quote from Martin Shaw: "...2023-05-091h 20
Navigating ForwardSeason 2 Navigating Forward Highlight EpisodeAre you the type of person who loves sampler platters, Cliff's Notes, and productivity hacks?Well, today is your lucky day! Feast your ears on this highlights episode of Navigating Forward with Lisa Thee, where we look back at the most thought-provoking and data-centric episodes, featuring:1. Sadie St. Lawrence, Founder and CEO of Women In Data.2. Dr. Micahel Blum, Founding CEO of BeekeeperAI and Chief Digital Transformation Officer at the UCSF center for digital healthcare innovation.3. Mike Amato, Author and Keynote Speaker.4. Balazs Kegl, Head of Research at Huawei.2022-10-0441 minNavigating ForwardThe Potential of AI with Balazs KeglOur sense of purpose and community makes us uniquely human. Is Artificial General Intelligence (#AGI) changing that?Balazs Kegl, Head of AI research at Huawei Technologies joins our host and Data for Good Sector lead Lisa Thee to discuss how digital infrastructure leads to positive change, the future of AGI, and the industry impact of the recent Chips Act.ABOUT THE PODCASTAt the crossroads of uncertainty & opportunity, how do you Navigate Forward? This podcast focuses on making smart choices in a rapidly changing world. We investigate the challenges of being a...2022-08-3042 min