This week our guest is David Carroll, a professor of media design at the New School in New York City who gained worldwide renown when he decided to engage in a legal battle with the Cambridge Analytica. For those who may not know, Cambridge Analytica was involved in a massive data scandal using Facebook data to manipulate voters into voting for Donald Trump and Brexit. In this conversation, we explore David’s battle against Cambridge Analytica from start to finish, attempting to go beyond the details captured in the documentary that was made about his fight, The Great Hack. We additionally discuss the current and future dynamics of data privacy and protection, including the often overlooked risks and the potential legislation that could drastically change humanity’s relationship with data.

Follow David at twitter.com/profcarroll

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is business and technology reporter, Peter Ward. Earlier this year, Peter released his book The Price of Immortality: The Race to Live Forever, where he investigates the many movements and organizations that are seeking to extend human life, from the Church of Perpetual Life in Florida, to some of the biggest tech giants in Silicon Valley. 

In this episode, we explore Peter’s findings, which takes us on a tour from cryonics to mind uploading, from supplements to gene editing, and much more. Along the way, we discuss the details of how one might actually achieve immortality, the details of senescent cells and telomeres, whether it's better to live healthy than to live long, the scams and failures that seem to dominate the space, as well as the efforts that seem most promising.

Find Peter's work on PenguinRandomHouse.com or follow him at twitter.com/PeterWardJourno

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is author and podcaster, Azeem Azhar, who has a robust background as an investor, founder, and regulator in the tech space, including several years working with the World Economic Forum on the Global Future Council on Digital Economy and Society. 

Azeem spends much of his time these days creating content for ExponentialView.co, where he provides weekly assessments of the dynamics at play in humanity’s exponential transformation. The key ideas he’s uncovered on this journey can be found in his latest book, The Exponential Age: How Accelerating Technology is Transforming Business, Politics and Society.

In this episode, we review his book and the wisdom he’s gained over the years, with an emphasis on the impacts of the growing divide taking place between technology’s advancements and society’s ability to keep up with it. 

Find Azeem's work at ExponentialView.co or follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/azeem

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is Michael Shermer, who founded Skeptic Magazine and is the executive director of the Skeptic’s Society. Michael’s written many books over the years, including Heavens on Earth, which explores technologists efforts towards immortality; Giving the Devil His Due, which is a collection of essays on scientific humanism; and later this month he’ll be publishing Conspiracy: Why the Rational Believe the Irrational.

Given Michael’s wide array of interest, we take a wide tour of many different ideas in this episode, including: free speech online, governmental regulation, how the internet has impacted conspiracy theories, reasons to be skeptical about technology, and much more.

Find Michael's podcast and latest publications on his website michaelshermer.com, or follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/michaelshermer

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

Hi everyone, 

Just wanted to make a quick episode to let you know we're taking a short break for these next few weeks, but we'll be back with a steady stream of more episodes on October 2nd. I also wanted to take a moment to say thank you to all of those who take time to listen every week. With your support we've been able to consistently rank as one of the most listened to tech podcasts in the world, attracting a remarkable lineup of guests who I've felt truly honored to talk to and whose conversations I hope you've enjoyed as much as I have. 

If you haven't done so yet, I recommend checking out our Youtube channel where you can find other great content from Singularity as well as videos for some select episodes of the podcast. We also have a wonderful website for the podcast (https://www.su.org/podcasts/the-feedback-loop), where you can find time-coded transcripts packaged together nicely with videos and links to the podcasts. 

Be sure to subscribe if you haven't yet, as we'll have some big announcements coming this winter regarding ways you get more involved with the podcast, including potentially being featured on the show. 

Thanks again, and I'll see you in a couple of weeks. 

This week our guest is Kevin Roose, a tech columnist for The New York Times and author of several books including his latest Futureproof: 9 Rules for Humans in the Age of Automation.

In this episode, Kevin and I discuss how the world’s tendency towards automation is leading to the end of many professions as well as a world of individuals whose behavior is shaped by algorithms. We explore how humans have promoted technology from an assistant that helps us meet our goals into now being a boss that controls our filter on reality by controlling what information we see. This includes things like recommendation engines, what we see in our news feeds, what ideas we’re exposed to most frequently, and a whole lot more. Kevin proposes that to be more employable and free from these behavioral constraints, we should focus on being social, surprising, and scarce.

Find more of Kevin's work at kevinroose.com, or follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/kevinroose

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is Mark Mills, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute who recently authored The Cloud Revolution: How the Convergence of New Technologies Will Unleash the Next Economic Boom and A Roaring 2020s.

In this episode, Mark and I discuss how the latest advancements in materials, machines, and information are unlocking a profound new paradigm represented by the cloud, the impact of which Mark argues has been severely underestimated. As part of this conversation, we also explore the ways such tech will impact automation, governmental regulation, and our on-going tension between climate and energy production. As Mark describes it himself, he’s a realist and an optimist, and both of those things are conveyed in this information rich episode. 

Find more of Mark's work at tech-pundit.com or follow him at twitter.com/markpmills

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is author and technologist, David Weinberger, who has spent years lecturing at Harvard as well as acting as a fellow and senior researcher at the renowned Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society. And just prior to covid, David released his latest book, Everyday Chaos: Technology, Complexity, and How We’re Thriving in a New World of Possibility.

In this episode, David and I explore some of the key ideas he focused on in Everyday Chaos. This includes looking at the ways in which we have historically used reductionist thinking to make generalizations for society, products, and technology, and how the latest technologies like the internet and Machine learning are revealing how much more we can thrive when we embrace chaos and customization. This means letting individuals and data tell us what people want by exploring all the possibilities rather than attempting to predict and shape outcomes beforehand. 

Find out more about David at his website weinberger.org and buy his book at everydaychaosbook.com

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

This week our guest is lecturer, investor, and author, Nir Eyal, whose previous two books include Hooked: How To Build Habit Forming Products and Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life.

Nir has a lot of experience teaching and discussing these subjects, so we were able to explore many different aspects of attention in a very short time. This include the triggers that drive us to get hooked to products, the morality of “hooking” people’s attention, the distinction between addiction and distraction, why Nir thinks social media hijacking attention is a dangerous myth, how managing our attention is about managing our pain, and many ways in which we can bolster our defenses against distraction and control our attention. 

Find out more about Nir's work at nirandfar.com, and download the Indistractable workbook at indistractable.com

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Host: Steven Parton - LinkedIn / Twitter

Music by: Amine el Filali

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