Singularity Discussions

This week our guest is NBC technology correspondent, Jacob Ward, who recently released his book, The Loop: How Technology Is Creating a World Without Choices and How to Fight Back.

In this episode we focus broadly on the ways in which technology and AI are learning from the worst instincts of human beings, and then using those bad behaviors to shape our future choices. As a result, Jacob suggests this creates feedback loops of increasingly limited and increasingly short-sighted behavior. This conversation includes exploring topics such as big data, bad incentives for programmers, profit motives, historical bias reflected in data, system 1 vs system 2 thinking, and much more. 

Find out more about Jacob at jacobward.com or follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/byjacobward

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is Rob Reich, a professor of political science at Stanford University and co-author of the recently published book System Error: Where Big Tech Went Wrong and How We Can Reboot.

In this episode, we focus heavily on how the tech industry’s obsession with efficiency and optimization has often meant sacrificing our values and even democracy itself. This includes conversations about data privacy, the tension between recklessly fast innovation and mindful but slow progress, concerns over China, the job market, and much much more. Additionally, we discuss some optimistic and very actionable steps that individuals, universities, and businesses can take to help society reboot our failed relationship with Big Tech. 

Find the book on Amazon, follow Rob at twitter.com/robreich, and stay tuned for Rob's upcoming class on these subjects at systemerrorbook.com

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is cognitive neuroscientist and author, Bobby Azarian, who recently released his book “The Romance of Reality–  How the Universe Organizes Itself to Create Life, Consciousness, and Cosmic Complexity.”

In this episode, we do our best to get the full picture of this process, from how physics shapes life, how that life has an evolutionary tendency towards increased information processing, and how the resulting computational universe presents us with existential problems that require human cooperation to solve. Amongst other things, this includes a conversation about the possibility of a global brain connected by technology, the possibility of machine consciousness, and what technologies and cultural behaviors might bring us towards a future worth living, with a final emphasis on Bobby’s enthusiasm for blockchain.

You can follow Bobby at twitter.com/bobbyazarian, buy his book on Amazon, and stay up to date with his latest work on Youtube (www.youtube.com/c/ROADTOOMEGA) and Substack (roadtoomega.substack.com)

This week our guest academic philosopher, Susan Schneider, who is the founding director for the Center for the Future Mind at Florida Atlantic University, as well as the author of the 2019 book, Artificial You: AI and the Future of Your Mind.

In this episode we focus heavily on Susan’s thoughts, hopes, and concerns surrounding the current conversations regarding artificial intelligence. This includes, but is certainly not limited to, the philosophical and ethical questions that AI presents in general, the feasibility of mind uploading and machine consciousness, the ways we may end up outsourcing our decision making to machines, how we might merge with machines, and how these potential tech futures might impact identity and sense of self.

You can learn more about Susan at schneiderwebsite.com, and find out how to get involved with her work at fau.edu/future-mind

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is philosopher and psychoanalytic theorist, Isabel Millar, who recently released her book, The Psychoanalysis of Artificial Intelligence, in which she explores the much neglected role of enjoyment and psychoanalysis in AI. Throughout the book, she uses the sexbot as a focal point of discussion, which allows her to emphasize the role of gender, sex, and a body as it relates to deeper questions about AI & humanity.

In this conversation we explore the notions of Isabel’s book, first by establishing an understanding of psychoanalysis, then by going through themes such as the importance of a body, the role of the female AI in film and the cultural and philosophical importance of film, the dominance of men in the creation of AI, and ultimately what AI can teach us about ourselves.

Find out more about Isabel at isabelmillar.com and purchase her book through Springer or Amazon 

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is German professor and philosopher, Stefan Sorgner, who has extensively studied and written about the topic of transhumanism–which is commonly defined as a movement that promotes the use of technology to enhance the capabilities of humans. Stefan’s work on the subject includes his 2020 book “On Transhumanism,” his recently released “We Have Always Been Cyborgs,” and peer-reviewed publications such as “Nietzsche, the Overhuman, and Transhumanism.”

In this conversation, Stefan and I discuss the key ideas central to transhumanism, including how the movement differs from traditional approaches to societal improvement, bad ideas within the movement that need to be corrected, the cultural differences in perception of transhumanism that exists between America, Europe, and the East, the deep importance of data ownership and privacy, and much more.

Find out more about Stefan and his work at: sorgner.de

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is businessman and entrepreneur, Jim Rutt, who you may know as the former chairman of the Sante Fe Institute or from his own podcast, The Jim Rutt show. Jim is also arguably the founding spearhead for a movement known as “Game B,” which we’ll discuss much more deeply in the episode but which could quickly be described here as an alternative to the destabilizing, exploitative, and zero-sum approach to society we currently have. Beyond detailing the specifics of Game B, this episode also explores Jim’s thoughts on technology, including online communities, social media moderation, digital IDs, and the ways in which Game B principles can be utilized to improve technology.

Jim’s article on Game B: https://medium.com/@memetic007/a-journey-to-gameb-4fb13772bcf3

Join the game B movement: https://www.game-b.org/

Listen to Jim’s podcast: https://www.jimruttshow.com/

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is hacker, Andrew “Bunnie” Huang, who is well known for clashing with Microsoft in the early 2000s when he taught others how to hack and modify the Xbox. Nearly twenty years later, and Bunnie is suing the US government for ways in which the Digital Millennium Copyright Act threatens free speech, all while also creating hackable hardware with other influential tech figures such as whistleblower Edward Snowden. 

In this episode we explore Bunnie’s thoughts on current trends and behaviors in technology, including tech security, copyright and IP laws, the differences between China and the western world’s approach to innovation, and the current issues around the chip shortage facing the global economy. If you want to learn more about Bunnie and his work, join us in the Singularity Community (su.org/community) where we’ll be announcing a virtual watch party to premiere a documentary on Bunnie entitled “The Hacktivist.”

Or follow Bunnie's work at bunniestudios.com.

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is Todd Rose, who was previously a professor at Harvard University where he led the Laboratory for the Science of Individuality and was the faculty director of the Mind, Brain, and Education program. Since then, Todd  co-founded the think-tank Populace to help improve society and the lives of individuals, and wrote a book we’ll be talking about a lot in this episode: “Collective Illusions: Conformity, Complicity, and the Science of Why We Make Bad Decisions.” We explore what these collective illusions are, how they relate to technology, and the opportunities and consequences of navigating these illusions.

Todd recommend reading this piece by Václav Havel entitled The Power of the Powerless, and you can find more about Todd and his work at toddrose.com.

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week my guest is Yanis Varoufakis, a Greek economist and politician who was the acting Minister of Finance in Greece during their debt crises in 2015. Since then, he founded the political party Mera25, and now sits in the Greek parliament as a member of the party. Aside from his work in government, Yanis has extensive experience with the role of technology in the economic sphere, which includes researching virtual economies at one of the world’s largest gaming companies, Valve, and he has even put forth plans for blockchain-based payments systems for Greece. He also recently wrote a science fiction novel entitled, Another Now, which challenges readers to "Imagine a world with no banks. No stock market. No tech giants. No billionaires."

While we discuss some larger implications of tech on economic structures, much of our conversation focuses on his concerns for what he calls “Techno Feudalism,” which he describes as the potential death of democratic capitalism at the hands of the tech elite. 

Follow more of Yanis' work at yanisvaroufakis.eu or twitter.com/yanisvaroufakis

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali