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First Principles Daily
By Patrick
A daily narrative podcast that reasons about the world from first principles — the 'magic wand number' and the 'Idiot Index'. Episodes alternate between a concrete example of first-principles thinking... more
FAQs about First Principles Daily:
How many episodes does First Principles Daily have?
The podcast currently has 19 episodes available.
First Principles Daily episodes:
June 24, 2026Ep 19: A commercial kitchen build-out can run half a million dollars, yet the raw steel, compressors, and ductwork inside point to a far lower floor. 
June 23, 2026Ep 18: The first human genome cost billions and took thirteen years; today the same sequence costs a few hundred dollars in hours because someone treated DNA as millions of parallel reactions instead of one at a time. June 22, 2026Ep 17: Hearing aids that cost thousands per pair contain electronics worth only tens of dollars; the gap is not the silicon but the bundled model that has kept prices high. June 21, 2026Ep 16: An LED bulb that cost fifty dollars in 2010 now sells for a few dollars because its price was driven toward the cost of the semiconductor die and phosphor inside. June 20, 2026Ep 15: Prescription glasses retail for hundreds yet contain just dollars of polycarbonate and metal — why hasn't the cost fallen toward the material floor? June 19, 2026Ep 14: In the 1850s aluminum cost more than gold at the table of Napoleon III because no one could separate it cheaply from its oxide. June 18, 2026Ep 13: Capturing carbon dioxide from air today costs hundreds or thousands of dollars per ton, yet thermodynamics sets an energy floor far below that price. June 17, 2026Ep 12: Rockets once priced at roughly ten thousand dollars per kilogram to orbit now reach a few thousand through reuse — because the question changed from building expendables cheaper to whether the hardware must be thrown away after one flight. June 16, 2026Ep 11: Transmission lines that could cost a few times their copper and steel now run many times that because the real expense sits in permits, queues, and custom builds. June 15, 2026Ep 10: Traditional vaccines grow and inactivate whole pathogens one disease at a time, but mRNA hands the cell the genetic instructions and lets it make the antigen instead.
FAQs about First Principles Daily:
How many episodes does First Principles Daily have?
The podcast currently has 19 episodes available.