Reasonably Optimistic

The sci-fi writer who predicted the future

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Science fiction writer Neal Stephenson predicted the metaverse, wearable tech and artificial intelligence long before those technologies arrived. What does he think of it all now? Host Megan McArdle talks to Stephenson about the future of AI, education and social media — and how his fiction became a window into the culture of Silicon Valley.


Timecodes

0:00 Welcome to Reasonably Optimistic

0:33 Who is Neal Stephenson?

1:19 Living in the future

3:25 Neal's origin story 

5:18 The disruptive effects of new technology 

8:18 The premise of The Diamond Age  

14:23 AI’s confident wrongness

17:43 What AI is good at

18:56 Is AI good for kids?

20:03 Fixing education in an AI world 

23:14 Will AI make nerds less valuable?

26:44 AI is eliminating entry level jobs

29:45 How tech founders got political

34:37 Is Neal Stephenson’s work political?

36:50 Technology is easier to predict than culture

40:11 What is Neal Stephenson reasonably optimistic about?


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