NonTrivial

In this episode I argue that intuition is more rigorous than precisely defined arguments, such as those constructed using mathematics. I talk about the cost of precision in real-world situations, offer an approach to formalize intuition, and suggest that when it comes to establishing the connection between our ideas and reality we should always let intuition lead.

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In this episode I discuss deadlines, and the critical difference between the artificial ones we create to manage our lives, and the real ones dictated by nature.

I discuss how our manufactured deadlines run counter to the natural rhythm humans use to create, and how we need to somehow reconcile our modern use of manufactured deadlines with the realization that good solutions only exist at nature's deadlines. 

I spend time describing nature's deadlines as high points in complexity, and put forward what I think is the best way to ensure we build what nature expects while still meeting the deadlines we create.

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In this episode I take a look at the notion of quality. How to define it and how to assess it in real world situations, and I’ll discuss what I think is a useful heuristic for sizing up both things and people that make their way into our lives.

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There are 2 main approaches to AI (symbolic vs connectionism), and they are very different in how they think about producing intelligence in the machine. 

One approach believes in programming what we know about the world into the machine, and the other ignores any pre-existing knowledge by relying on large datasets and correlation.

There is a long-standing debate between which approach is best, despite only one of these approaches having much success. 

The reason this debase still exists is because it gets to the heart of a deeper discussion on the role knowledge plays in intelligence. 

In this episode I use the AI debate to uncover what I believe is a deeper problem in how people think about learning, and relate this to implications for our everyday lives.

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The modern narrative frames structure and systems as oppressive. As though we should never be held back by systems that interfere with our ability to express our unique selves.

But being ourselves at all times with no system to govern our behavior is its own trap. The unfiltered and unstructured life is an unproductive and unfulfilled one. 

I argue that there is a difference between the real you and the true you, with the latter being realized through a system of ideals, and made possible thorugh things like ritual. 

In this episode I talk about the importance of structure, and how it paradoxically leads to more freedom.

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We all depend on our environment to survive. We need food, water, friends, family, coworkers. We participate in the economy, pay for entertainment, post on social media. But all these things bear the seeds of our destruction. We need things to grow, but past a point these same things can destroy us. The real challenge in life is finding the right dosage for the things we depend on. Analytical approaches tend to fail when it comes to finding the right dosage. I offer an alternative based on complexity and signals.

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Hey everyone, Sean here from NonTrivial. Just a quick announcement for the upcoming season 4. In season 3, I used a book to anchor our conversations. I did this so that I could show how many of the core patterns we encountered in seasons 1 and 2 appear universally in many different contexts.

In season 4 I will be returning to the original format of discussing the patterns themselves, without specifically using a book to showcase the example. In truth, not a lot changes, as the focus remains on the deep patterns I believe to be at the intersection of science, complexity, and philosophy. While I still may refer to the odd book as an example, the core focus is on the pattern itself and the real-world use it has in our lives.

I'm looking forward to kicking off a new season of NonTrivial, and as always, thanks so much for listening.

Hope everyone had an awesome holiday, and of course I wish you all a very Happy New Year.

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In this episode I take a look at the nature of time, try to figure out what it is, what today’s physics can and cannot tell us, whether or not it’s an illusion, and how memory and consciousness might play a fundamental role in the realization of time. 

I discuss Einstein's Relativity, review some thought experiments related to time, and describe what I think is wrong with the current physics approaches to explaining what time is. In the end I offer some ideas regarding the problem of time.

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AI is a promising and inevitable technology. But today’s AI is too brittle to trust fully, and without trust we cannot push the needle on AI progress. So, must we wait around until AI is good enough before we can truly trust it? I argue that we have to trust AI before it can make the next great leap in intelligence. This has to do with the fact that genuine intelligence works via flawed people working in groups. I argue that the next paradigm in AI research will need to have humans and AIs cooperating and competing with each other, biases and flaws included.

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We define a thing’s value by its characteristics; what it does and doesn’t do. But a thing cannot adequately be defined outside its environment. There are countless dependencies that make a thing, a thing. We need to shift our focus “up” to a more holistic level if we are to move levers that produce positive outcomes. This is because nature chooses what survives by operating on parameters that form in aggregate.

In this episode I use examples from Max Boot’s book War Made New: Technology, Warfare and the Course of History¹ to show how an understanding of what occurs in combination can be used to solve hard challenges as nature does.

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Members: Join for full access to additional talks, practical exercises, member Q&As, and more at dekyon.io.