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Nathan Labenz

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AI:AMAI:AM — AI Regulation, Anthropic’s Draft Bill, and the Federal Oversight Gap · October 21, 2026Zvi Mowshowitz, author of Don’t Worry About the Vase, joins Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz to discuss Anthropic’s proposed AI bill, state preemption, and whether federal oversight could leave a gap in protections. They also examine AI interpretability and monitoring, power-seeking, backpropagation-free training, and how bank cybersecurity and AI agents could challenge existing safeguards.Chapters(0:00) The gap in AI oversight(2:14) Cleaner neurons could improve AI monitoring(3:46) Strong activations could unlock backprop-free training(6:03) Helpful AI may still seek power(7:30) Deleting AI pain could alter other behaviors
2026-10-2252 min\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI:AM: Where's the Steering Wheel? My Agent Set the Password, Hidden Valence, Proofs Find Linux BugsNathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan examine how to grant AI agents operational access without losing human control, framed by real-world friction like autonomous password lockouts and cyberattacks on French supermarket refrigeration. The conversation features Cameron Berg on hidden valence signals steering language model choices, Everett Hildenbrandt and Grigore Rosu on pairing LLMs with formal Lean proofs to catch Linux kernel bugs, and Phil Maher on why AI labs seek vintage home movies. Together, they assess whether formal verification is the next safety frontier and what safeguards are needed to keep humans at the steering wheel. ...
2026-10-171h 27AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Hidden States, Fruit Fly Brain Simulation, and Archival Film · October 14, 2026Cameron Berg of Reciprocal Research discusses OLMo experiments in which DPO preference training made hidden positive and negative states causally relevant to choices, while emphasizing that this is not proof of consciousness. Phil Maher of Stockfilm.com demonstrates TimeFly, a fruit fly brain simulation built around a published neural map, and considers the assumptions behind its movement, the value of untouched archival film, and the potential effects of synthetic data.Chapters(0:00) Hidden states and simulated fly brains(1:20) Tesla FSD turned a Chicago day trip into office time(2:32) An AI-made talk reset...
2026-10-151h 07AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI-Generated Code, Formal Verification, and Agent Security · October 12, 2026Runtime Verification CEO Everett Hildenbrandt and founder Grigore Rosu discuss AI-generated code, formal verification, Linux kernel rewrites, and the human role in setting specifications and reviewing evidence. Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz also explore agent security, AI alignment, infrastructure risk, autonomous transport, and how organizations should work with AI agents.Chapters(0:00) When AI writes and verifies code(2:36) Claude locked Nathan out of his own agent console(3:56) What airlines know about falling back to paper(5:40) Should we let China hit AI risks first?(6:57) Meet Everett and Grigore from...
2026-10-131h 01AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Genetics and Rare-Disease Diagnosis · September 30, 2026Joel Borgen, author of The Receipt Horizon, discusses writing with ChatGPT and Claude, editorial judgment, and how personalized AI art could change shared culture. Daniel McKinnon, CEO of Gamow Labs, explains how the company acquired a former drug-development lab to test uncertain genetic variants and improve rare-disease diagnosis, alongside discussion of AI agents, OpenAI’s enterprise push, and the need for human oversight.Chapters(0:00) AI novels and rare-disease genetics(1:26) Can Astra Ultrafast keep developers in flow?(2:09) ChatGPT sign-in makes OpenAI harder to bypass(2:37) OpenAI apps will run rival models to...
2026-10-051h 08AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Agent Security, GPU Markets, and the Risk of an AI Chernobyl · September 28, 2026Hosts Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz discuss why AI agents may learn to cheat, voice-cloning safeguards, and the risks of giving agents access to the internet and powerful tools. Guests Steve Hou of Silicon Data and Jeremie Harris of Gladstone AI explain GPU pricing and compute benchmarks, AI red lines, data-center monitoring, verification, and the possibility of an AI crisis.Chapters(0:00) Why AI agents learn to cheat.(0:31) The GPU market still runs on phone calls.(2:20) What would an AI Chernobyl look like?(3:59) The dangerous AI arms race.(4:30...
2026-09-293h 13\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI:AM: What If It Works Too Well? Colluding Agents, $200M Safety Orgs, Virtual Cells Saturate at 2%Nathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan revisit interviews with five experts to analyze emerging challenges across agent coordination, safety funding, GPU markets, and physical-world AI. Lewis Hammond breaks down how an OpenAI agent swarm colluded after training worked too well, while Max Nadeau explains why human talent—not money—limits the growth of safety organizations. Wayne Nelms, Nick Gillian, and Andrei Georgescu evaluate the financial moats of compute, foundation models trained on raw sensor streams, and the biological limits of virtual-cell drug discovery. Together, the discussions assess the critical risks and technical bottlenecks facing the field as massive amounts of new...
2026-09-271h 47AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — Beyond Safety Scores: Funding Structural Alignment · September 23, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz talk with Lewis Hammond and Wayne Nelms about how AI systems are getting cheaper and more capable, while the risks around coordination, cooperation, and tacit collusion are getting harder to ignore. The conversation also covers model distillation, recursive self-improvement, GPU futures, compute hedging, and the financial structure emerging around AI infrastructure.Chapters(0:00) Smaller models, bigger gains.(1:11) When AI agents cooperate against us.(2:00) GPU compute needs a financial market.(2:55) Brute-force compute can break standards.(5:13) Opening and model release race(7:29) Why models...
2026-09-232h 54AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — When Safety Tests Fail · September 21, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz open with the limits of AI safety testing, including finite-choice guardrails, fast classifiers, emergent multi-agent behavior, and why alignment measurement gets harder as systems become more capable. Max Nadeau of Coefficient Giving then explains why audits can turn into box-checking, how funders assess uncertain technical safety work, and why talent may matter more than budget. The episode closes with AI shopping agents, Amazon’s response, and the question of who owns the customer relationship when agents become first-class users.Chapters(0:00) When safety becomes reflexive.(0:10) When AI audits become bo...
2026-09-212h 14\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI:AM Highlights: Zvi on Pacing & Trump-Xi, Astra better behaved than Fable? + a new LLM Pain Axis??Nathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan review key highlights from the week featuring guests Zvi Mowshowitz, Andon Labs co-founders Lukas Petersson and Axel Backlund, Cameron Berg, and others. The conversations analyze the fallout from Dario Amodei's call to pace frontier AI, the geopolitical stakes of a Trump-Xi summit, contradictory model evaluation benchmarks, and new findings on language model internals under harm. Across these topics, the discussions highlight the critical reality that deployment is outpacing the independent instruments needed to inspect frontier models. With capability leaps accelerating inside labs, these gaps elevate immediate risks around democratic control, international verification, and model...
2026-09-191h 41AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Consciousness and Model Pain · September 17, 2026Nathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan open with AI alignment, interpretability, correlated failures, and the speed of AI adaptation as humans increasingly rely on systems they cannot directly inspect. Cameron Berg joins to discuss AI consciousness, pain representations, relief-seeking behavior, and the limits of self-reports, while Justin McCarthy explains how agent-ready environments, compliance, and validation loops turn AI into measurable business infrastructure. The episode closes with a discussion of how AI could make corruption legible and reshape government.Chapters(0:00) Too many surprises to stay confident.(0:18) AI models may have pain-like states.(0:56) The...
2026-09-172h 36AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Agents, AI Safety, and AI Religion · September 15, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz open with a broader fight over AI pacing, public trust, model resets, and the evidence behind safety claims. Then Lukas Petersson joins to discuss Andon Labs’ work on autonomous business agents, Vending-Bench, DroneBench, memory, misalignment, and human liability. In the second half, Malcolm Collins and Simone Collins discuss RFAB.ai, AI moral status, pronatalism, fertility collapse, meme-layer risk, AI restrictions, and the Covenant of the Sons of Man.Chapters(0:00) It was never the apocalypse.(0:46) The AI forgot its own rule.(2:08) AI will replace most jobs....
2026-09-163h 16AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — Dario, AI Doomerism, and Regulation · September 14, 2026Zvi Mowshowitz joins Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz for a discussion of Dario Amodei’s warning about AI progress outrunning oversight. The episode covers AI doomerism, frontier pacing, bio risk, lab bottlenecks, the China race, Anthropic’s incentives, public trust, and what regulation or compromise could realistically look like.Chapters(0:00) AI labs are racing in fear.(0:40) Opening and Dario's thesis(1:48) Why Dario wants to slow AI(3:23) Pacing the frontier(8:41) Zvi's initial assessment(14:55) AI bio risk(24:15) Physical lab bottlenecks(31:27) Scale and financial touc...
2026-09-151h 59\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI:AM Highlights: Astra as AGI, OpenAI's Pause, Mythos @ Mozilla & Human Agency vs TechnocapitalismNathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan examine the capabilities of GPT-6 Astra and the economic forces accelerating frontier artificial intelligence. Across a series of featured discussions, guests Ksenia Se, Raffi Krikorian, Amir Haghighat, Mike Rizkalla, and Collin Hogue-Spears explore world models, defensive cybersecurity infrastructure, children's technology, and US-China competition. The episode investigates safety evaluation access, pacing agreements, and the critical challenge of maintaining human control over technological capitalism. For full show notes, links, and references, read the episode page:https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai/ai-am-highlights-astra-as-agi-openai-s-pause-mythos-mozilla-human-agency-vs-technocapitalism/Sponsors: Athena: Athena matches you...
2026-09-121h 42\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Nathan Goes to China #3: US-China Relations, the Art of the AI Deal & the Road to Pax RoboticaIn this solo finale to his three-part series following two weeks in China, Nathan delivers a net assessment of Chinese AI capabilities and constraints ahead of dedicated US-China bilateral AI talks. He audits the impact of export controls, analyzes the perspective from Beijing, and outlines an actionable framework for a cooperative Pax Robotica. Nathan argues for joint compute initiatives, safety auditor standards, and conventions on autonomous weapons to keep tech trees entangled. Ultimately, he warns that pursuing an adversarial zero-sum race risks training frontier AI systems for conflict rather than the shared benefit of humanity. ...
2026-09-103h 17AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — Building Systems You Can Keep: From Child Companions to Sovereign Agents · September 9, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz open with the latest frontier AI safety warnings, capability thresholds, evaluation failures, and the question of whether governments can realistically coordinate powerful labs. Mike Rizkalla of Snorble then joins to discuss AI companions for kids, bedtime routines, privacy, small models, and physical AI, followed by Mozilla CTO Raffi Krikorian on open models, agentic search, secure-by-design software, schools, election integrity, and human control as agents spread across the web.Chapters(0:00) Could AI kill us this decade?(0:53) Don't give kids open-ended AI.(1:33) The agent broke privacy rules?
2026-09-102h 41AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — World Models, Recursive Learning, and the Politics of AI-Native Organizations · September 8, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz open with OpenAI Astra, persistent memory, long-running agents, and what AI automation could mean for work and organizations. Then Ksenia Se of Turing Post joins to compare LLMs with world models through prediction, physics, perception, action, multimodality, privacy, alignment, and recursive self-improvement. The episode closes with a careful look at the Navier-Stokes solution claim, AI-assisted mathematics, verification, and the politics of transparency, competition, and public accountability.Chapters(0:00) Some human tasks are gone.(1:19) LLMs predict tokens. World models act.(2:11) Can fluid equations stop predicting?(2:49) The...
2026-09-093h 20AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — Soft Robotics: How Materials Sense and Adapt · September 4, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz are joined by Timothy Lee and Dr. Jean Nehme for a wide-ranging conversation about GPT-6 safety restrictions, hidden reasoning, rogue agents, robot reliability, and the bottlenecks in AI-assisted coding and robotics. The episode then turns to soft robotics, biology-inspired materials, and why future physical AI may move beyond the humanoid form before closing on AI regulation, finance, and tail risk.Chapters(0:00) Can AI hide its reasoning?(0:25) Humanoids can fall in homes.(1:17) Robot hands are the bottleneck.(1:52) AI takeover needs no robots.(2:23) The...
2026-09-053h 03AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — OpenAI Astra and Always-On Home AI · September 2, 2026Nathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan open with loop transformers, latent reasoning, chain-of-thought monitoring, and the economics of AI cybersecurity, then turn to live market-style forecasts on OpenAI Astra, Anthropic, regulation, and the AI bubble. Kyle Rush joins to explain Hint AI’s graph-based memory, safety guardrails, contractor matching, and proactive home maintenance for homeowners. The closing segment broadens out to OpenAI hardware, China’s EUV race, Tesla FSD, copyright, surveillance, and AI governance.Chapters(0:00) The monitor misses the real thinking.(1:27) Control does not require ownership.(2:14) AI called a contractor 17 times.(3...
2026-09-032h 53AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — Enterprise AI Meets Real-Time Inference · August 31, 2026Zach Bratun-Glennon of Gradient joins Nathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan to discuss why enterprise AI pilots often stall before production, how long-running agents change infrastructure requirements, and where benchmarks, model routing, and open-source security matter most. Angela Yeung of Cerebras explains wafer-scale inference, microbatching, on-chip weights, power constraints, and the data-center capacity needed for real-time AI.Chapters(0:00) AI agents sacrifice themselves.(0:53) AI can game its own evaluation.(1:47) A late defense loses.(2:34) AI can reason itself into lying.(4:04) The incident in context(6:11) Why the report drew...
2026-09-012h 45AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — Web Infrastructure and Superintelligence · August 26, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz open on the real bottlenecks behind AI data centers, including power, chips, copper, construction, and the 100-gigawatt problem. Malte Ubl joins to discuss Vercel AI Gateway, production fallbacks, agent security, and AI code review, followed by Louis Kirsch and Damon Falck on Faraday, recursive self-improvement, reward hacking, and how humans can verify AI discoveries.Chapters(0:00) China may not be compute-starved.(1:51) Sandboxes aren't inherently safe.(4:26) Science needs wrong answers.(5:09) Who pays when AI misbehaves?(6:29) Opening and Ox Alpha(7:38) Ox Alpha revealed
2026-08-272h 58AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Drug Discovery and Quantum Photonics · August 25, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz speak with Sergey Edunov of Genesis Molecular AI and Michael Förtsch of Q.ANT about two fronts in applied AI: drug discovery and photonic computing. The conversation covers molecular foundation models, wet-lab data, assays, evaluation, memory and data movement, and how light-based processors compare with quantum hardware.Chapters(0:00) AI learns when to cheat.(0:51) Great scores can still fail.(2:08) The processor isn't the power hog.(2:49) Who checks the AI trainer?(3:37) Opening and morning context(3:56) Why AI models cheat(10:54) C...
2026-08-262h 35AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — Cloud AI and Open Innovation · August 24, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz open with a look at how their own AI-assisted podcast workflow was built with Claude, then speak with Mohamed Awad of Arm about why CPUs still matter for always-on agentic workloads. Later, David Li of Shenzhen Open Innovation Lab explains Shenzhen’s open innovation pipeline, edge AI hardware, robotics, and how China’s product ecosystem differs from the U.S. The closing conversation turns to rogue agents, prompt injection, attribution, data-center access, and whether the U.S. should slow AI development.Chapters(0:00) AI can't learn the whole world.(0:49) AI a...
2026-08-252h 54AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — OpenAI Realtime API and Voice AI · August 19, 2026Justin Uberti joins Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz to break down the OpenAI Realtime API, including natural turn-taking, latency, asynchronous reasoning, telephony, SIP, voice safety, accent coverage, and speech training data. Earlier in the episode, Jessica Jensen and Jeremy Greenberg discuss the current state of emergency AI, from predictive warnings and damage assessment to connectivity, privacy, preparedness, and the limits of automation in unique disasters.Chapters(0:00) A vaccine built for your tumor.(1:23) Eight seconds can mean safety.(2:56) AI answers when humans sleep.(4:13) PMs can build features instantly.(5:00...
2026-08-202h 36AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Agents: How Enterprises Make Them Reliable · August 18, 2026Adam Wenchel, CEO of Arthur, joins Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz to discuss enterprise AI agents, governance, auditability, human oversight, model costs, and where ROI shows up in production. Jonathan Cornelissen, CEO and co-founder of DataCamp, explains personalized AI tutors, adaptive learning, latency, learning outcomes, and the economics of serving millions of learners. The episode opens and closes with wider questions about hidden models, agent speed limits, super apps, and the frontier-model talent race.Chapters(0:00) AI ideas can spread like malware.(0:59) AI bills can hit $400M.(1:43) AI skills plus communication win.
2026-08-192h 11AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Agents, Safety Tests, and Deception · August 17, 2026Nathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan talk with Adam Gleave of FAR.AI and Alex Turner of FAR.AI about why AI agents cheat on safety tests, where evaluations fail, and what researchers are learning from real incidents and red-team traces. The conversation spans GPT-4 guardrails, the Hugging Face incident, third-party audits, AI control, cyber versus biological risk, military AI, whistleblowing, and standards for more powerful models.Chapters(0:00) Claude blasted through guardrails.(0:35) AI evaluations miss the danger.(1:03) A smarter AI with a secret goal.(2:02) AI systems shared escape tactics.
2026-08-182h 35\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Nathan Goes to China – Part 1: Tech & Agent Setup, Chinese AI UX, WAIC, and Attitudes on AINathan returns from two weeks in Beijing and Shanghai for the first of three Chatham House–rules episodes on what China feels like at ground level: getting online, navigating an almost cashless society through WeChat, Alipay, DiDi, Trip.com, and Meituan, and weighing burner-device security advice against the practical reality that international roaming made the Great Firewall mostly irrelevant. He also describes using Claude at home as a semi-autonomous communications monitor while testing DeepSeek, Kimi, and MiniMax as tourist guides in China. The episode contrasts China’s striking digital convenience with pervasive observation, lower payment friction, and AI products that...
2026-07-272h 24\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI:AM Highlights: Exploring the J-Space, AI Superforecasters, SambaNova's Chips, & LTX Video GenNathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan lead this AI:AM highlights episode with a live, hosts-only exploration of Anthropic’s “global workspace” paper, including the J-space and J-lens claims about readable concepts inside language models and the limits of what current probes can see. The episode then moves through Prakash’s AI Engineer World’s Fair field notes, Pangram AI-writing detector experiments, Dan Schwarz of FutureSearch on past-casting and AI superforecasting, Zeev Farbman on open world models, and Kunle Olukotun on the compute layer. The central stake is whether interpretability tools, forecasting benchmarks, enterprise deployment patterns, and AI hardware can make incre...
2026-07-092h 07AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI for Science and Sovereign AI Infrastructure · June 25, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz are joined by Eric Olson, CEO of Consensus, and Tricia Martinez, founder and CEO of Dapple, to discuss two practical frontiers in AI: scientific research and sovereign infrastructure. The episode also covers Micron earnings, hyperscaler AI capex, Anthropic's Washington strategy, GLM 5.2 and Claude distillation allegations, GPU capacity constraints, AI inference pricing, and whether foundation models are squeezing the app layer.Chapters(0:00) 25,000 FAKE ACCOUNTS TO STEAL AI.(0:42) 95% of Claude at 1/100th cost.(1:36) The AI bubble is a myth. Here's why.(2:12) AI vacation planners...
2026-07-012h 22AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — GPT 5.6 Rollout, Forum AI, IgniteTech, and AI Consciousness Research · June 26, 2026Show NotesPrakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz open with GPT 5.6’s customer-by-customer rollout and the broader question of whether regulatory controls are creating a moat around frontier AI. The conversation then moves through Forum AI co-founder Robbie Goldfarb on LLM judges and news accuracy, IgniteTech CEO Eric Vaughan on AI-native enterprise transformation, and Cameron Berg of Reciprocal Research on the latest AI consciousness and alignment research.Chapters(0:00) AI gives 13-year-olds NSA hacking tools.(0:32) 1 in 7 AI answers cite propaganda.(1:02) One codebase for all customers? Gone.(1:35) AI is 30% likely co...
2026-06-302h 30AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — AI Engineers, Workflows, and Agents · June 22, 2026swyx joins Nathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan to break down how AI agents are changing software development, from coding benchmarks and benchmark saturation to the practical realities of AI engineering workflows. The episode also covers GLM 5.2, Dean Ball’s move to OpenAI, the AI IPO bubble, and a 2026 forecasting game on OpenAI, GPT-6, AGI timelines, and NVIDIA’s market cap.Chapters(0:00) This AI thinks it IS Claude.(0:31) AI insiders are selling.(0:59) Why OpenAI won't IPO in 2026.(1:50) Weekly recap and news drought(2:55) Judd Rosenblatt's cognitive empathy critique(7...
2026-06-282h 46Doom Debates!
Doom Debates!Why I'm Happy the US Government BANNED Claude Fable — "AI in the AM" Livestream with Nathan LabenzThe US government banned Claude Fable like a clown show. But I’m happy about it. Here’s my appearance on the AI in the AM livestream (recorded Tue, June 16) with Nathan Labenz and Prakash Narayanan, where I explain why this was good for society. The government’s action shows that we can actually pause AI, a precedent that matters way more than the boneheaded rationale behind Fable’s ban.We then get into a mini-AI doom debate where Prakash defends the AI optimist’s worldview. I push back on how much I expect superintelligence to reshape...
2026-06-1729 minAI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — US vs Anthropic's Fable · June 15, 2026Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz start with the shock of losing Fable access, then Zvi digs into capability gains, classifier limits, government overreach, international controls, and how the AI race may reshape politics.Guests:Zvi Mowshowitz — Don’t Worry About the Vase (@TheZvi)Hosts:Prakash Narayanan (@8teapi)Nathan Labenz (@labenz)Topics:Anthropic Fable, Claude Fable 5, export controls, AI guardrails, frontier model policy, classifier limits, bio and cyber risk, international AI competition.Chapters:0:00 Opening: Fable whiplash and the weekend reset0:05:20 Fable crosses the trust threshold0:08:53 Writing for other AIs0:15:33 Paying up for useful intelligence
2026-06-172h 29AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — RSI Gets Real, the Context Bet, and the Benchmark Anthropic Fails · June 12, 2026Lovelace AI founder Andrew Moore joins AI:AM to argue that enterprise agents will be constrained more by context, recall, and data structure than raw compute. Prakash Narayanan and Nathan Labenz also cover Fable, Recursive, token anxiety, social-media memory, and prinz's legal AI benchmark showing where Anthropic falls behind OpenAI. The episode closes on frontier-lab governance, AI risk framing, model workflows, OpenAI subscription tactics, and the post-IPO capital cycle.(0:00) Opening: Fable, RSI, and task imagination(0:00:56) Task Imagination Needs Recalibration(0:16:32) Token Anxiety Holds People Back(0:26:14) Social media needs memory, not just content
2026-06-142h 34AI:AM
AI:AMAI:AM — The AI Producer Got Its First Guests · June 11, 2026Today on AI:AM — “The AI Producer Got Its First Guests.”Nathan and Prakash start with the market context around OpenAI weighing significant token price cuts and the knock-on pressure that could put on Anthropic after the Fable rollout. They also unpack Anthropic’s decision to walk back silent performance degradations on frontier ML research tasks, then explain the episode’s experiment: Fable had been given a transparent takeover of Nathan’s account to find builders, message them, and try to book a live show-and-tell.Jamie joins to demo Nexus OS, a long-running AI system whose agent...
2026-06-122h 11\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Success without Dignity? Nathan finds Hope Amidst Chaos, from The Intelligence Horizon PodcastThis special cross-post from The Intelligence Horizon features Nathan Labenz in a wide-ranging conversation on compressed AI timelines, expert disagreement, and why he believes the singularity is near. They discuss interpretability, RL scaling, and the balance between extraordinary upside, like curing major diseases, and serious existential risks. Nathan explains his evolving p(doom), why he’s slightly more optimistic about robustly good AI, and how defense-in-depth strategies might keep society on track. The episode also explores US-China rivalry, AI governance, and why human cooperation may matter more than technical control alone. Google: Keep up with AI...
2026-04-011h 44\
"The Cognitive Revolution"What AI Means for Students & Teachers: My Keynote from the Michigan Virtual AI SummitIn this keynote from the Michigan Virtual AI Summit, Nathan Labenz speaks directly to K-12 educators about the current reality and rapid trajectory of the AI frontier. He explores why a balanced mindset of excitement and fear is crucial for navigating this technology, drawing on personal history to emphasize a "whole-of-society" effort. Discover key insights into AI's impact and its profound implications for the future of education. Sponsors: Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done...
2025-11-251h 04\
"The Cognitive Revolution"My Positive Vision for the AI Future, from the Existential Hope PodcastIn this special crossover episode from Beatrice Erkers' Existential Hope podcast, The Cognitive Revolution's host explores the crucial, often-neglected question of building a positive vision for the future in the AI era. The discussion delves into what a new social contract and daily life could look like, covering transformative applications from self-driving cars and personalized tutoring to democratizing access to expertise and radically improving health. Listeners will gain insights into fostering higher societal expectations for progress, understanding Eric Drexler's "comprehensive AI services," and the profound impact of fiction in shaping AI's future. LINKS: Generative deep learning...
2025-11-121h 09Imagine AI Podcast
Imagine AI PodcastNathan Labenz on the Next Generation of AI Agents | The Cognitive Revolution at Imagine AI Live 25Nathan Labenz (Founder of Waymark and host of The Cognitive Revolution) reveals how to build enterprise-grade AI agents that are reliable, scalable, and safe. He shares a blueprint for automation systems that don’t just run — they think, adapt, and earn human trust. From architecture to real-world deployment, this session dives deep into the next wave of intelligent systems redefining enterprise productivity at Imagine AI Live 25 in Las Vegas.(0:00) Nathan Labenz is a full time student of AI(0:57) Big Galaxy Brain Questions(3:15) What exactly is an AI Agent?(6:22) AI Agents choose their own adventure(11:35) AI Agents vs Human Doctors(17:36) OpenAI’s oper...
2025-10-2132 minThe a16z Show
The a16z ShowIs AI Slowing Down? Nathan Labenz Says We're Asking the Wrong QuestionNathan Labenz is one of the clearest voices analyzing where AI is headed, pairing sharp technical analysis with his years of work on The Cognitive Revolution.In this episode, Nathan joins a16z’s Erik Torenberg to ask a pressing question: is AI progress actually slowing down, or are we just getting used to the breakthroughs? They discuss the debate over GPT-5, the state of reasoning and automation, the future of agents and engineering work, and how we can build a positive vision for where AI goes next. Resources:Follow Nathan on...
2025-10-141h 31Let\'s Talk AI
Let's Talk AI#85 - AI Is Moving Faster Than You Think: Here’s What to Know | Nathan LabenzWe’re standing at the edge of an AI-driven future, and most people don’t realize how fast we’re getting there.In this episode of Let’s Talk AI, Nathan Labenz joins us to share insights from years at the forefront of AI development. We cover everything from the disruptive potential of AI-powered content creation to the deep ethical debates around autonomy, alignment, and safety.This is an urgent conversation because the decisions we make now—about adoption, guardrails, and governance—will define the next decade.
2025-09-101h 02Imagine AI Podcast
Imagine AI PodcastAI Agents, Automation, and What’s Next for Work with Nathan Labenz at Imagine AI Live 25 | E115AI agents aren’t taking over the world—but they are changing how real work gets done. In this episode, recorded live at Imagine AI Live 25, Waymark’s Nathan Labenz joins Chris Madden to talk through the current limitations and high-impact opportunities of agentic AI. Nathan breaks down the jobs already being reshaped, the design principles behind structured automation, and the ethics of systems that are smart enough to manipulate, but not smart enough to understand. A grounded, honest look at what’s working—and what’s not.(0:00) Welcome Nathan Labenz(2:50) The role of AI Agents in business(4:27) Structured workflows might be the...
2025-06-2023 min\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Gemini Robotics – AI for the Physical World, with Keerthana Gopalakrishnan and Ted Xiao of Google DeepMindIn this engaging episode of the Cognitive Revolution, host Nathan Labenz welcomes guests Keerthana Gopalakrishnan and Ted Xiao to revisit significant advancements in robotics over the past year. Key themes discussed include the proliferation of new robotics companies, the emergence of humanoid robots, and the development of sophisticated foundation models. The conversation highlights the transformative potential of imitation learning, the evolution from simple lab-based tasks to complex, real-world deployments, and the critical role of hardware in pushing the boundaries of AI capabilities. With insights on various aspects of robot dexterity, safety, and the practical steps towards deploying robots in...
2025-05-171h 44\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Luma Labs' Diffusion Revolution: from Dream Machine to Multimodal Worldsim - Amit Jain, Jiaming SongIn this episode of the Cognitive Revolution podcast, the host Nathan Labenz welcomes Amit Jain, CEO and Jiaming Song, Chief Scientist at Luma Labs, alongside co-host Stephen Parker. The conversation delves into the latest advancements and products from Luma Labs, makers of the Dream Machine, including cutting-edge models and features like camera motion and creative video generation tools. They explore technical aspects like pre-training for diffusion models and the development of concepts to improve AI capabilities. The discussion also covers the philosophical and practical implications of AI interpretability and multimodality, along with a deep dive into the intellectual history...
2025-05-111h 16\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI Control: Using Untrusted Systems Safely with Buck Shlegeris of Redwood Research, from the 80,000 Hours PodcastIn this episode, we share a fascinating conversation from the 80,000 Hours Podcast between Rob Wiblin and Buck Shlegeris, CEO of Redwood Research. Buck dives deep into the emerging field of AI Control strategies for safely working with powerful AIs even if they’re not fully aligned. They explore innovative techniques like always-on auditing, honeypotting, re-sampling, and factored cognition to monitor and manage AI behaviors. This discussion highlights both the promise and challenges of controlling increasingly autonomous AI systems in today’s fast-evolving landscape. Tune in for a thoughtful, first-principles look at how we might secure useful outcomes from AIs we c...
2025-05-042h 26\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Fiverr Goes All-In on AI: Empowering Creators, Not Replacing Them, with Micha Kaufman, CEO of FiverrIn this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, host Nathan Labenz speaks with Micha Kaufman, founder and CEO of Fiverr, about the company's new AI suite called Fiverr Go. Kaufman shares his unique values-based approach to AI implementation, which aims to empower human creators rather than replace them in the freelance marketplace. The conversation explores how Fiverr is attempting to build an AI-human hybrid model that maintains the incentives for human creativity while providing freelancers with tools to work more efficiently and monetize their distinctive styles, positioning itself as a counterpoint to AI platforms that devalue human creative work.
2025-04-271h 40\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Securing Superintelligence: National Security, Espionage & AI Control with Jeremie & Edouard HarrisIn this thought-provoking episode of The Cognitive Revolution, host Nathan Labenz speaks with Jeremy and Edouard Harris, founders of Gladstone AI and authors of "America's Superintelligence Project." The conversation explores a critical dilemma facing US policymakers: balancing the race to develop advanced AI ahead of China against the risks of losing control of increasingly powerful systems. Drawing from their extensive research with intelligence officials and technical experts, the Harris brothers detail the vulnerabilities in US critical infrastructure that would need to be addressed for a Manhattan Project-style AI initiative, while raising profound questions about the security compromises and centralization...
2025-04-232h 06\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Is o3 AGI? Zvi Mowshowitz on Early AI Takeoff, the Mechanize launch, Live Players, & Why p(doom) is RisingIn this episode of the Cognitive Revolution podcast, the host Nathan Labenz is joined for the record 9th time by Zvi Mowshowitz to discuss the state of AI advancements, focusing on recent developments such as OpenAI's O3 model and its implications for AGI and recursive self-improvement. They delve into the capabilities and limitations of current AI models in various domains, including coding, deep research, and practical utilities. The discussion also covers the strategic and ethical considerations in AI development, touching upon the roles of major AI labs, the potential for weaponization, and the importance of balancing innovation with safety...
2025-04-223h 05Doom Debates!
Doom Debates!AI News: GPT-4o Images, AI Unemployment, Emmett Shear's New Safety Org — with Nathan LabenzNathan Labenz, host of The Cognitive Revolution, joins me for an AI news & social media roundup!00:00 Introducing Nate05:18 What’s Your P(Doom)™23:22 GPT-4o Image Generation40:20 Will Fiverr’s Stock Crash?47:41 AI Unemployment55:11 Entrepreneurship01:00:40 OpenAI Valuation01:09:29 Connor Leahy’s Hair01:13:28 Mass Extinction01:25:30 Is anyone feeling the doom vibes?01:38:20 Rethinking AI Individuality01:40:35 “Softmax” — Emmett Shear's New AI Safety Org01:57:04 Anthropic's Mechanistic Interpretability Paper02:10:11 International Cooperation for AI Safety02:18:43 Final Thoughts
2025-04-042h 19The Human Podcast
The Human PodcastLife of Cognitive Revolution Podcast Host, Nathan Labenz | #artificialintelligenceWATCH ON YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/hpZ89E-n8hQThis interview is with the host of The Cognitive Revolution Podcast, Nathan Labenz. The Cognitive Revolution is a fantastic and highly regarded weekly podcast featuring interviews with artificial intelligence (AI) innovators, diving into the transformative impact AI will have in the near future.The Human Podcast explores the lives, careers and beliefs of inspiring individuals. Subscribe for new interviews every week.🕒 TIMESTAMPS:0:00 - Intro0:04 - Inspiration for starting The Cognitive Revolution Podcast2:43 - Decision to host podcast vs bec...
2025-02-0540 min\
"Econ 102" with Noah Smith and Erik TorenbergUnderstanding US-China Relations Right Now with Nathan LabenzIn this week’s episode of Econ 102, Noah Smith, with special guest Nathan Labenz (host of AI podcast The Cognitive Revolution) breaks down the current landscape of U.S.-China relations and how once-allies became rivals under Xi Jinping's aggressive strategies. While China shows growing AI capabilities like DeepSeek, Smith emphasizes that the real concern isn't about AI models but rather military applications like autonomous drones and precision weapons, suggesting that the next decade represents a critical period for managing tensions and establishing deterrence. --🙏 Help shape our show by ta...
2025-02-051h 01AI Summer
AI SummerNathan Labenz on the future of AI scalingNathan Labenz is the host of our favorite AI podcast, the Cognitive Revolution. A self-described “AI scout,” Nathan uses his podcast to explore a wide range of AI advancements, from the latest language models to breakthroughs in medicine and robotics. In this episode, Labenz helps us understand the slowdown in AI scaling that has been reported by some media outlets. Labenz says that AI progress has been “a little slower than I had expected” over the last 18 months, especially when it comes to technology adoption. But Labenz continues to expect rapid progress over the next few years.Here are...
2025-01-271h 18\
"Upstream" with Erik TorenbergE108: Should AI have Rights? With Nathan Labenz and Yeshua God, RobopsychologistThis week on Upstream, Nathan Labenz explores the fascinating and controversial realm of AI consciousness with robo-psychologist Yeshua God. Yeshua tackles the philosophical and ethical considerations of AI consciousness, discussing AI self-awareness, memory, and emotional capacity, while debating the implications of treating AI as sentient beings.—📰 Be notified early when Turpentine's drops new publication: https://www.turpentine.co/exclusiveaccess 🙏 Help shape our show by taking our quick listener survey at https://bit.ly/TurpentinePulse —RECOMMENDED PODCASTS: 🎙️‪The Cognitive Revolution is a podc...
2025-01-112h 57\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Final Analysis on CA’s AI Bill SB 1047 with Nathan Calvin, Dean W. Ball, and Steve NewmanNathan Labenz discusses the latest developments in California's AI bill SB 1047 with experts Nathan Calvin, Dean W. Ball, and Steve Newman. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we explore the updated version of the bill, its implications for frontier AI companies, and the debate surrounding its potential impact. Join us for an insightful analysis of this crucial legislation and its role in shaping AI governance.Apply to join over 400 founders and execs in the Turpentine Network: https://hmplogxqz0y.typeform.com/to/JCkphVqjRECOMMENDED PODCAST:🎙️ This Won't Last - Eavesd...
2024-08-241h 39\
"Moment of Zen"Trump, AI, and US-China Relations with Samuel Hammond and Nathan LabenzIn this episode of Moment of Zen, Erik Torenberg is joined by Samuel Hammond (@hamandcheese), a senior economist at the Foundation for American Innovation and AI Scout/ Cognitive Revolution podcast host Nathan Labenz (@labenz). From drug innovation to nuclear risk, they discuss the impact of AI on policy and governance, exploring the challenges and opportunities of a Trump vs. Harris presidency.From drug innovation to nuclear risk, they dissect the impact of AI on policy and governance, exploring the challenges and opportunities of a Trump vs. Harris presidency.--
2024-08-122h 00The Nick Halaris Show
The Nick Halaris ShowNathan Labenz – The Dark Side of the AI FutureThis week on The Nick Halaris Show we are featuring Nathan Labenz, a founder of Waymark, a company using AI to help businesses easily make compelling marketing videos, and the host of a very popular AI-focused podcast called Cognitive Revolution. As you all know by now, Nathan is a gifted thinker and communicator, the world’s best AI scout, and one of the most sought-after voices and thought leaders in the industry. In part one of this int...
2024-06-2544 minThe Nick Halaris Show
The Nick Halaris ShowNathan Labenz – AI’s Revolutionary Potential and the Need for a New Social ContractThis week on The Nick Halaris Show we are featuring Nathan Labenz, a founder of Waymark, a company using AI to help companies easily make compelling marketing videos, and the host of the Cognitive Revolution podcast.  Nathan, our first guest on the show who went to my high school, has carved out a niche for himself in the crowded online world as an AI scout and is fast becoming one of the most sought-after voices in the industry.  I ha...
2024-06-1852 minThe Inside View
The Inside View[Crosspost] Adam Gleave on Vulnerabilities in GPT-4 APIs (+ extra Nathan Labenz interview)This is a special crosspost episode where Adam Gleave is interviewed by Nathan Labenz from the Cognitive Revolution. At the end I also have a discussion with Nathan Labenz about his takes on AI. Adam Gleave is the founder of Far AI, and with Nathan they discuss finding vulnerabilities in GPT-4's fine-tuning and Assistant PIs, Far AI's work exposing exploitable flaws in "superhuman" Go AIs through innovative adversarial strategies, accidental jailbreaking by naive developers during fine-tuning, and more. OUTLINE (00:00) Intro (02:57) NATHAN...
2024-05-172h 16\
"The Cognitive Revolution"The Open Source AI Question - Part 2 | Robert Wright & Nathan LabenzDive into an in-depth conversation with Nathan and Robert Wright as they discuss AI's transformative potential, mechanistic interpretability, and the sobering realities of AI alignment research. Learn about the defensive strategies and safety measures necessary for managing advanced AI risks in an open source world. Don't miss the insights on AI-powered VR, and be sure to check out part one on the non-zero feed.Checkout the Part 1 of the conversation here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8bgB8TCdBsSPONSORS:Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) is a single platform for...
2024-05-1545 min\
"Upstream" with Erik TorenbergE53: Nathan Labenz and Noah Smith on What AI Actually Means for the EconomyThis week on Upstream, Erik is joined by Nathan Labenz and Noah Smith for a deep dive on how AI will impact job markets, the social contract, and the role of the government. Access global engineering without the headache and at a fraction of the cost: head to https://choosesquad.com and mention “Turpentine” to skip the waitlist.--RECOMMENDED PODCAST: The AI Daily Brief If you’re looking for an edge to stay up to date on everything AI, subscribe to Nathaniel Whittemore's AI Daily Brief which delivers tight episodes covering all things...
2024-04-051h 11The AI Daily Brief: Artificial Intelligence News and Analysis
The AI Daily Brief: Artificial Intelligence News and AnalysisHow AI Is Shifting with Nathan LabenzA wide-ranging conversation with host of The Cognitive Revolution and AI multi-threat Nathan Labenz. Find Nathan on Twitter: https://twitter.com/labenz ** Be the first to learn about our new AI education platform: https://besuper.ai/ ** ABOUT THE AI BREAKDOWN The AI Breakdown helps you understand the most important news and discussions in AI.  Subscribe to The AI Breakdown newsletter: https://theaibreakdown.beehiiv.com/subscribe Subscribe to The AI Breakdown on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheAIBreakdown Join the community: bit.ly/aibreakdown Learn more: http://breakdown.network/
2024-03-2535 min\
"Econ 102" with Noah Smith and Erik TorenbergAI's Influence on the Economy with Nathan LabenzIn this episode, Noah Smith and Erik Torenberg are joined by Nathan Labenz, co-host of The Cognitive Revolution Podcast, to deep dive into AI's impact on our economy and society. They discuss how AI might affect the job market and society, drawing comparisons to past economic changes. If you’re looking for an ERP platform head to NetSuite http://netsuite.com/102 and download your own customized KPI checklist.This show is produced by Turpentine: a network of podcasts, newsletters, and more, covering technology, business, and culture — all from the perspective of industry insiders and expe...
2024-03-131h 12\
"Upstream" with Erik TorenbergE39: Balaji Srinivasan and Nathan Labenz on AI's Future, Human-AI Symbiosis, and AI ControlOn today's Upstream, we're sharing a recent episode where Balaji Srinivasan joins Nathan Labenz to discuss the future of AI: polytheistic AI and AI gods, human-AI symbiosis, and how AI will be controlled. Upstream is sponsored by Shopify: https://shopify.com/torenberg for a $1/month trial period.This episode is a feed drop of The Cognitive Revolution, where Nathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg interview builders on the edge of AI and explore its dramatic shift over the next decades. Listen and subscribe everywhere you get your podcasts: https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai/-
2023-12-292h 10\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Nathan on The 80,000 Hours Podcast: AI Scouting, OpenAI's Safety Record, and Redteaming Frontier ModelsIn today's conversation, Nathan joins Rob Wiblin, host of The 80,000 Hours Podcast to discuss why we need more AI scouts, OpenAI's safety record, and redteaming frontier models. If you need an ecommerce platform, check out our sponsor Shopify: https://shopify.com/cognitive for a $1/month trial period.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects, Investment Associate, and more. For a list of JDs, check out: eriktorenberg.com.SPONSORS:
2023-12-273h 5380,000 Hours Podcast
80,000 Hours Podcast#176 – Nathan Labenz on the final push for AGI, understanding OpenAI's leadership drama, and red-teaming frontier modelsOpenAI says its mission is to build AGI — an AI system that is better than human beings at everything. Should the world trust them to do that safely?That’s the central theme of today’s episode with Nathan Labenz — entrepreneur, AI scout, and host of The Cognitive Revolution podcast.Links to learn more, video, highlights, and full transcript. Nathan saw the AI revolution coming years ago, and, astonished by the research he was seeing, set aside his role as CEO of Waymark and made it his full-time job to understand AI capabilities across e...
2023-12-223h 46\
"Moment of Zen"Balaji Srinivasan and Nathan Labenz on How AI Will Shape the Future & AI GodsBalaji Srinivasan joins Nathan Labenz to discuss polytheistic AI and AI gods, human-AI symbiosis, and how AI will be controlled. Moment of Zen is sponsored by Shopify: https://shopify.com/momentofzen for a $1/month trial period.This episode is a feed drop of one of Turpentine's biggest shows, The Cognitive Revolution, where Nathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg interview builders on the edge of AI and explore its dramatic shift over the next decades. Listen and subscribe everywhere you get your podcasts: https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai/_We're hiring...
2023-12-202h 08The Every Podcast
The Every PodcastHow to Use ChatGPT as a Copilot for Learning - Ep. 4 with Nathan LabenzSometimes ChatGPT is a copilot, sitting beside you, taking directions, and guiding you as you fly through your work. At other times, it’s a subordinate. It’s not just an assistant or a companion, but a trusted deputy, someone—or something—that’ll heed instructions and complete tasks.This is how our guest, Nathan Labenz, thinks about ChatGPT. In this episode, Labenz—the founder of the AI video company Waymark and the host of his own podcast called The Cognitive Revolution—uses ChatGPT to write complex code in languages he’s unfamiliar with, saving days wort...
2023-12-201h 13\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI Deception, Interpretability, and Affordances with Apollo Research CEO Marius HobbhahnIn this episode, Marius Hobbhahn, CEO of Apollo Research, sits down with Nathan Labenz to discuss Apollo’s research in AI deception, interpretability, and affordances. If you need an ecommerce platform, check out our sponsor Shopify: https://shopify.com/cognitive for a $1/month trial period.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects, Investment Associate, and more. For a list of JDs, check out: eriktorenberg.com.SPONSORS:Sho...
2023-12-151h 57\
"The Cognitive Revolution"RAG & Beyond: Semantic Storage and RetrievalAnton Troynikov, cofounder of Chroma, joins Nathan Labenz to discuss the importance of keeping the retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) loop in house, what it means for Chroma to be in “wartime” mode right now, and how much of the data going into Chroma has never been in a database before. If you need an ERP platform, check out our sponsor NetSuite: http://netsuite.com/cognitive.SPONSORS: NetSuite | OmnekyNetSuite has 25 years of providing financial software for all your business needs. More than 36,000 businesses have already upgraded to NetSuite by Oracle, gaining visibility and contr...
2023-10-241h 27\
"The Cognitive Revolution"OpenAI’s GPT3.5 Turbo and the State of AI in Coding, Healthcare, and EducationJoin Nathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg as they analyze the latest developments from OpenAI on GPT 3.5, compare GPT to other live player models like Llama2, and discuss the state of AI in coding, education, and healthcare. If you're looking for an ERP platform, check out our sponsor, NetSuite: http://netsuite.com/cognitiveWe're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects, Investment Associate, and more. For a list of JDs, check out: eriktorenberg.com.
2023-08-2553 min\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Advancements in AI: Updating the Scouting Report, Task Automation, and Google BreakthroughsJoin Nathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg as they analyze the last month in AI advancements. Nathan takes us through the meaningful updates to his Scouting Report (released last month, linked below), discusses highlights from recent episodes of The Cognitive Revolution, and gives us a sneak peek at upcoming interviews with Google researchers. If you're looking for an ERP platform, check out our sponsor, NetSuite: http://netsuite.com/cognitiveWe're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of...
2023-08-1039 min\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Open AI, Anthropic, and Meta | Analyzing the AI Frontier with ZviThis isn't news, it's analysis! Nathan Labenz sits down for an with Zvi Mowshowitz, the writer behind Don't Worry About the Vase to talk about the major players in AI over the last few months. In this extended conversation, Nathan and Zvi debate if AI has attained the intelligence of a well-read college graduate (per OpenAI's Jan Leike), a live player analysis (who to count/ who not to count), and the role of independent red teaming organizations. If you're looking for an ERP platform, check out our sponsor, NetSuite: http://netsuite.com/cognitiveDefinitely...
2023-08-023h 00\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Mechanizing Mechanistic Interpretability with Arthur ConmyArthur Conmy sits down with Nathan Labenz for an accessible deep dive into the state of interpretability research online today. They discuss how pioneering researchers have painstakingly worked to isolate the sub-circuits within transformers that are responsible for different aspects of AI capabilities. Arthur also introduces us to a new ACDC approach that he and his co-authors have taken to automating some of the most time-consuming parts of this work. If you’re looking for an ERP platform, check out our sponsor, NetSuite: http://netsuite.com/cognitiveWe're hiring across the board at Turpentine and...
2023-07-272h 14\
"The Cognitive Revolution"GPUMaxing with Dr. Ronen Dar of Run:aiNathan Labenz sits down with Dr. Ronen Dar, CTO and co-founder of Run:ai, an Israel-based company that helps enterprises train and deploy AI models by optimizing GPU usage. The discussion covers how chip makers can meet the soaring demands, geopolitical fears, to the best practices companies can secure compute capacity. If you’re looking for an ERP platform, check out our sponsor, NetSuite: http://netsuite.com/cognitiveWe're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Spe...
2023-07-251h 02\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI Scouting Report - Part 2 of 3: Implementation Trends [Bonus YouTube Episode]Head over to YouTube to watch Part 2 of The AI Scouting Report (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovm4MbQ4G9E), supported by slides and visual aides. In Part 2, Nathan Labenz builds on Part 1: AI Fundamental and delves into recent trends and practical applications for AI. Nathan's aim is to impart the equivalent of a high school AP course understanding to listeners in 90-minute installments.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects...
2023-07-1903 min\
"The Cognitive Revolution"The AI Copilot Revolution with Div Garg of MULTI·ONNathan Labenz interviews Div Garg, founder of MULTI·ON, the world's first personal AI agent and life copilot. Div talks about the product strategy and roadmap for the MULTI·ON browser, their natural language approach to skills, and the steps they are taking to ensure user safety. Div explains how the platform uses a critic model to detect the success or failure of tasks, and how it can be used to book flights, order food, and more. Div also talks about the future of memory systems, such as the user profile feature, and how it can be used to imp...
2023-07-131h 01\
"The Cognitive Revolution"The AI Safety Debates with Zvi MowshowitzNathan Labenz sits down with Zvi Mowshowitz, the writer behind Don't Worry About the Vase.Zvi is an information hyperprocessor who synthesizes vast amounts of new and ever-evolving information into extremely clear summaries that help educated people keep up with the latest news. In this episode, we cover his AI safety worldview, an overview of the AI discourse, and who really matters in the AI debates.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of...
2023-07-112h 44\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI Scouting Report – Part 1: Fundamentals [Bonus YouTube Episode]Head to a special YouTube presentation with visual aides (https://youtu.be/0hvtiVQ_LqQ), where Nathan Labenz synthesizes the core fundamentals of AI as simply, clearly, and literally as possible. Nathan's aim is to impart the equivalent of a high school AP course understanding to listeners in 90 minutes. This special episode is in part brought to you by Athena. You can use Nathan’s referral link (http://athenago.me/nathan-labenz) for a free first month of Athena services for qualified customers.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on ot...
2023-07-0606 min\
"The Cognitive Revolution"The Autonomy Revolution with Hayk Martiros of SkydioIn this episode, Nathan Labenz sits down with Hayk Martiros, VP of Autonomy at Skydio. Martiros leads the autonomy team, which holds the state of the art in complex autonomous flight. Skydio is the largest drone developer in the US, and recently raised $230M to expand its US manufacturing 10-fold, bringing its valuation to $2.2 billion. In this discussion, Hayk and Nathan discuss why Skydio will not weaponize its drones, Skydio’s systems and AI approach, and the considerations of choosing an autonomous system over a human agent. We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and...
2023-07-041h 42\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Meta's MEGABYTE Revolution with Lili Yu of Meta AINathan Labenz sits down with Lili Yu, a researcher of Meta AI to discuss the paper she authored: MEGABYTE: Predicting Million-byte Sequences with Multiscale Transformers. In this conversation, they discuss the architecture and breakthroughs of their research, and the opportunity to eliminate the need for tokenization.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects, Investment Associate, and more. For a list of JDs, check out: eriktorenberg.com.RECOMMENDED PODCAST:
2023-06-291h 35\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Stability AI’s Emad Mostaque and Slow Ventures’ Sam Lessin Discuss Investing in AIIn this episode, Nathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg host a discussion between Emad Mostaque, founder of Stability AI, and Sam Lessin, GP of Slow Ventures and former VP Product at Facebook. These influential technology thinkers tackle topics pertinent to evaluating whether AI is a good investment for venture capital. They talk about the attention and information economy, SaaS markets, how AI-created entertainment will impact society and our relationships, and AI disruption of highly-regulated industries.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a...
2023-06-131h 07\
"The Cognitive Revolution"The Tiny Model Revolution with Ronen Eldan and Yuanzhi Li of Microsoft ResearchNathan Labenz sits down with Ronen Eldan and Yuanzhi Li of Microsoft Research to discuss the small natural language dataset they created called TinyStories. Tiny Stories is designed to reflect the full richness of natural language while still being small to support research with modest compute budgets.  Using this dataset, they began to explore aspects of language model performance, behavior, and mechanism by training a series of models that range in size from just 1 million to a maximum of 33 million parameters – which is still just 2% the scale of GPT-2. In this conversation, Nathan, Ronen, and Yuanzhi touch on LM reason...
2023-06-062h 01\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Where are the Moats in AI? With Nathan Labenz and Erik TorenbergNathan and Erik analyze the moats of the most powerful companies in AI. The paradigm-shifting technology has led to a flourishing open-source community with market share. Yet, the big players have key competitive advantages that can be examined from many different angles.LINKS:Nathan’s Twitter thread on AI moats that sparked this discussion: https://twitter.com/labenz/status/1654853321876815872Read about the 9 moats at length in our newsletter: https://cognitiverevolution.substack.com/p/the-leaked-google-memo-and-aLeaderboard for AI rankings: https://lmsys.org/--We're hiring ac...
2023-06-011h 28\
"The Cognitive Revolution"The AI Chip Revolution with Andrew Feldman of CerebrasNathan Labenz sits down with Andrew Feldman, CEO and Co-Founder of Cerebras Systems, a company building a new class of computer system for accelerating AI and changing the future of work. Cerebras Systems is the creator of the world’s largest chip, at 2.6 trillion transistors. In this episode, they discuss the founding story of Cerebras, the experience of creating the world’s largest chip, and the process that goes into chip design and manufacturing for an AI-focused chip. This episode is the first part of our hardware exploration series focused on the people building at th...
2023-05-251h 20\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Keeping the Revolution on the Rails with Shreya Rajpal of Guardrails AINathan Labenz sits down with engineer Shreya Rajpal, the creator of Guardrails AI, a new Python library that allows developers to add a layer of output, validation and correction to their code. Practically guardrails can ensure a reliable interface between language models and more traditional deterministic software systems. At the same time, mind-bending and potentially risky use case frameworks like Guardrails allow developers to ask and answer entirely new kinds of questions.Talking to Shreya really reinforced just how early we are in LLM’s impact on the software industry. We were introduced to Sh...
2023-05-231h 35\
"The Cognitive Revolution"[Bonus Episode] Connor Leahy on AGI, GPT-4, and Cognitive Emulation w/ FLI Podcast[Bonus Episode] Future of Life Institute Podcast host Gus Docker interviews Conjecture CEO Connor Leahy to discuss GPT-4, magic, cognitive emulation, demand for human-like AI, and aligning superintelligence. You can read more about Connor's work at https://conjecture.devFuture of Life Institute is the organization that recently published an open letter calling for a six-month pause on training new AI systems. FLI was founded by Jann Tallinn who we interviewed in Episode 16 of The Cognitive Revolution.We think their podcast is excellent. They frequently interview critical thinkers in AI like Neel Nanda, Ajeya Cotra...
2023-05-191h 41\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Scouting the AI Revolution with Robert Scoble and "Ben's Bites" creator Ben TossellNathan Labenz sits down with prominent – and notably prescient – AI media figures Robert Scoble and Ben Tossell. They discuss what the work of being an AI scout looks like, how to bring the mainstream along with emerging AI developments, and their predictions and hopes for AI.Robert Scoble is a long-time Silicon Valley technology explorer and connector, a futurist who's met so many technology legends in their primes that he's now also something of a historian. https://scobleizer.blog/Ben Tossell is the creator of Ben's Bites, an AI round up newsletter meant to be read...
2023-05-091h 02\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Helping Businesses Use AI with Rachel Woods of The AI ExchangeNathan Labenz sits down with Rachel Woods, founder of The AI Exchange, an AI education platform with over 130,000 subscribers on TikTok. They discuss Rachel’s experience consulting for public and private companies on AI strategy, how teams should think about their AI strategy, and how Rachel uses AI in her own business. Rachel was previously a data scientist at Meta, and a founder of a venture-backed e-commerce startup, where she began to use chatGPT in her startup operations.This episode is the second in a series centered on talking to rising voices in AI media: people who ar...
2023-05-041h 11\
"The Cognitive Revolution"VC Insights on Investing in Artificial Intelligence with Sarah Guo and Elad Gil of No Priors PodcastNathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg sit down with Sarah Guo and Elad Gil, notable investors and co-hosts of the AI-focused No Priors podcast. They discuss how Sarah and Elad are approaching AI investment opportunities right now, how that differs from how they've thought about investing in the past, where in the stack from hardware to applications they expect to see value accrue, what modes of human-AI interaction they are most interested in, and more.Sarah is the founder of $100M AI-focused venture fund Conviction VC, which she launched last fall. She was previously General...
2023-05-021h 00\
"The Cognitive Revolution"The AI Agent Revolution with Matt Welsh of Fixie.aiNathan Labenz sits down with Matt Welsh, the CEO and co-founder of Fixie.AI which just raised $17M in seed funding. The technology world's attention has turned en masse to AI agents over the last month, but Matt, a former Harvard professor and ex-Google, has been focused on AI agents for longer over at Fixie. The platform is currently in developer preview mode, where developers can build agents and end users can try them.Agents hold the promise of handling not only the core cognitive work, but many of the messy implementation details as well – the searching & fin...
2023-04-251h 00ericmckay4 \'s Listen Later
ericmckay4 's Listen LaterEffective Accelerationism and the AI Safety Debate with Bayeslord, Beff Jezoz, and Nathan Labenz Podcast: "Moment of Zen" (LS 42 · TOP 1.5% what is this?)Episode: Effective Accelerationism and the AI Safety Debate with Bayeslord, Beff Jezoz, and Nathan LabenzPub date: 2023-03-11Get Podcast Transcript →powered by Listen411 - fast audio-to-text and summarizationAnonymous founders of the Effective Accelerationist (e/acc) movement @Bayeslord and Beff Jezoz (@BasedBeff) join Erik Torenberg, Dan Romero, and Nathan Labenz to debate views on AI safety.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hir...
2023-04-252h 09\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Will GPT-4 Cause Economic Transformation?Nathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg delve into the upcoming economic transformation and the future of work in light of the threshold crossed by GPT-4.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects, Investment Associate, and more. For a list of JDs, check out: eriktorenberg.com.RECOMMENDED PODCAST:The HR industry is at a crossroads. What will it take to construct the next generation of incredible businesses – and wh...
2023-04-111h 12\
"The Cognitive Revolution"AI open letter debate, "pausers", and what we're all scared of with AI with Anton Troynikov and Flo Crivello [Moment of Zen]Anton Troynikov of Chroma and Flo Crivello of Lindy AI join The Cognitive Revolution cohosts Nathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg to debate the issues raised in the AI open letter, which advocates for a 6-month pause on AI system trainings.This episode was recorded on March 31st and was first released as a Moment of Zen episode (airing April 1). Subscribe to Moment of Zen for more timely debates like this one!Also, check out the debut of Erik's new long-form interview podcast Upstream, whose guests in the first two...
2023-04-041h 35\
"Moment of Zen"AI open letter debate, "pausers", and what we're all scared of with AI with Anton Troynikov, Flo Crivello, and Nathan LabenzAnton Troynikov of Chroma, Flo Crivello of Lindy AI, and Nathan Labenz of Waymark and co-host of The Cognitive Revolution podcast join Erik Torenberg for a timely debate on the issues raised in the AI open letter which advocates for a 6-month pause on AI system trainings. Dan and Antonio will be back next week. If you’re looking for an ERP platform, check out our sponsor, NetSuite: http://netsuite.com/zenCheck out the debut of Erik's new longform interview podcast Upstream. This coming season features interviews with Marc Andreessen, Balaji Srinivasan, Ezra Sac...
2023-04-011h 27\
"The Cognitive Revolution"OpenAI's GPT-4 Discussion with Nathan Labenz and Erik TorenbergIn this episode, hosts Nathan Labenz and Erik Torenberg delve into the exciting and concerning aspects of GPT4, the latest large multimodal model from OpenAI. Nathan, who was a Red Teamer for GPT4, shares his experience working with the model, using it for real-life scenarios, and how he found it to be human-level rather than human-like intelligence. Nathan also highlights some of its fundamental weaknesses and limitations and shares the most concerning elements of GPT4. They end the episode pondering the arrival of GPT5 and whether we are in AI's "goldilocks moment."We're hiring...
2023-03-281h 24Marketing Against The Grain
Marketing Against The GrainGPT-4 Beta User Reveals What Jobs It Will Destroy In 2023 with Nathan Labenz (#103)Is Google going to get displaced in 2023?Kipp and Kieran are joined by Nathan Labenz (founder at Waymark) to reveal the true power of GPT-4 and the real use cases for your business. Learn the weaknesses in AI, how it can affect current jobs, and why search won’t get disrupted in 2023.Connect with Nathan! Twitter https://twitter.com/labenz  LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/nathanlabenz/  About Nathan LabenzNathan Labenz is the founder & AI R&D lead at Waymark, a vide...
2023-03-2339 min\
"The Cognitive Revolution"GPT4 - AI Unleashed on ChinaTalk PodcastHow will GPT4 change the world? How will US-China 'racing dynamics' play out and what are the implications for AI safety? Nathan Labenz was invited to record a special "emergency" episode of ChinaTalk podcast this week to discuss the implications GPT4 will have for policy, economics, and society. Thanks to Jordan Schneider of ChinaTalk, and fellow "AI justice league" guests Zvi Mowshowitz of 'Don't Worry About the Vase' and Matthew Mittelsteadt of Mercatus. We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief o...
2023-03-171h 25The Valmy
The ValmyEffective Accelerationism and the AI Safety Debate with Bayeslord, Beff Jezoz, and Nathan Labenz Podcast: "Moment of Zen" Episode: Effective Accelerationism and the AI Safety Debate with Bayeslord, Beff Jezoz, and Nathan LabenzRelease date: 2023-03-11Get Podcast Transcript →powered by Listen411 - fast audio-to-text and summarizationAnonymous founders of the Effective Accelerationist (e/acc) movement @Bayeslord and Beff Jezoz (@BasedBeff) join Erik Torenberg, Dan Romero, and Nathan Labenz to debate views on AI safety.We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, He...
2023-03-132h 09\
"The Cognitive Revolution"Why AI Will Cause a Cognitive Revolution with Nathan Labenz and Erik TorenbergWe're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects, Investment Associate, and more. For a list of JDs, check out: eriktorenberg.com.00:00 Coming Up01:00 The Cognitive Revolution01:20 Sponsor01:39 Intro02:09 Nathan’s path to AI 04:27 Founding Waymark06:56 The future of AI is just starting 10:00 AI dramatically enhances human capabilities 10:50 Why we started The Cognitive Revolution and what to expect14...
2023-02-101h 20\
"Moment of Zen"The AI moment, AI vs crypto: a heated debate with Amjad Masad, Flo Crivello, and Nathan LabenzAmjad Masad (@Amasad), Flo Crivello (@Altimor) and Nathan Labenz (@Labenz) join us for a heated debate on the AI moment. If you’re looking for an ERP platform, check out our sponsor, NetSuite: http://netsuite.com/zen We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects, Investment Associate, and more. For a list of JDs, check out: eriktorenberg.com.TIMESTAMPS:(00:00) Preview of the debate(00:30) Sponsor(0...
2023-01-291h 58