Weird Things

By Andrew Mayne

Between science and fiction.... more

· Natural Sciences

4.5

329329 ratings

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FAQs about Weird Things:

How many episodes does Weird Things have?

The podcast currently has 1,052 episodes available.

Weird Things episodes:

December 21, 2024 Magic, AI, and the Future of Video Generation
The episode opens with the hosts talking about new live multimodal AI features in ChatGPT and Google Gemini, including Andrew's demo of showing ChatGPT a card trick over live video. They note that these features had been demonstrated earlier and are now shipping, but emphasize that backend compute, server connections, and GPU supply make rollout slower than some people expect. Most of the episode is spent on OpenAI's Sora and other video generators. The hosts discuss how to use Sora, including starting from a strong image or uploaded video, using storyboards, keeping generations short, trying lower resolutions first, using remix tools, and learning from the featured/recent feeds. They repeatedly stress current limitations in physical reasoning, object relationships, and variable binding, while also praising Sora for b-roll, companion footage, character coherence, and other creative uses. The episode closes with a short TV-picks segment covering Lower Decks, Strange New Worlds, Foundation, and Skeleton Crew. Key topics Infrastructure limits behind live AI features: Andrew says live video and multimodal AI depend on significant backend compute and connections, so they are not just app updates and cannot be scaled instantly. AI as a supportive audience member: In the live card-trick demo, the hosts are struck by how ChatGPT behaves like an encouraging spectator, staying supportive rather than immediately correcting the trick. Using prompts, storyboards, and reference images in S
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0min
December 21, 2024 The Future of Robotics and Sky Quakes
In this episode, Andrew Mayne, Justin Robert Young, and Brian Brushwood kick things off with a brief chat about the latest addition to Justin’s family and the implications of raising a child in today’s tech-saturated world. The conversation quickly shifts to Elon Musk’s recent showcase of Tesla’s advancements in robotics, including the Optimus robot and the Cyber Cab. The hosts speculate on the impact of these technologies on the future, from personal robotics to autonomous transportation networks. Additionally, they touch upon the phenomenon of sky quakes, debating their possible explanations and expressing skepticism about their origins. Throughout, the trio maintains a slightly irreverent tone, mixing in personal anecdotes and broader societal observations. Picks: Brian Brushwood: Alchemy: The Dark Art and Curious Science of Creating Magic in Brands, Business, and Life by Rory Sutherland Justin Robert Young: The Peripheral (TV Show) Andrew Mayne: The 13th Warrior (Movie)
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0min
December 20, 2024 Magic, AI, and the Future of Video Generation

In this episode of Weird Things, Andrew Mayne, Justin Robert Young, and Brian Brushwood explore the cutting edge of AI technology. Andrew kicks things off with a magic trick performed for an AI, showcasing the interactive capabilities of current AI models. The trio discusses the recent advancements in AI, including live video features and the implications for content creation. They also delve into the capabilities and limitations of video generation tools like So, offering tips for users to get the most out of these platforms. The conversation highlights the rapid pace of AI development and its potential to revolutionize various industries.
Picks:
Brian Brushwood: Lower Decks
Justin Robert Young: OpenAI announcements on YouTube
Andrew Mayne: Not specified, but discussed disappointment with a certain sci-fi show and recommended Skeleton Crew
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Download url: https://weirdthingspodcast.com/uploads/20241218161529_2024-12-13-Weird-Things_mixdown.mp3
[podcast]https://weirdthingspodcast.com/uploads/20241218161529_2024-12-13-Weird-Things_mixdown.mp3
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1h 5min
December 20, 2024 The Future of Robotics and Sky Quakes

In this episode, Andrew Mayne, Justin Robert Young, and Brian Brushwood kick things off with a brief chat about the latest addition to Justin’s family and the implications of raising a child in today’s tech-saturated world. The conversation quickly shifts to Elon Musk’s recent showcase of Tesla’s advancements in robotics, including the Optimus robot and the Cyber Cab. The hosts speculate on the impact of these technologies on the future, from personal robotics to autonomous transportation networks. Additionally, they touch upon the phenomenon of sky quakes, debating their possible explanations and expressing skepticism about their origins. Throughout, the trio maintains a slightly irreverent tone, mixing in personal anecdotes and broader societal observations.
Picks:
Brian Brushwood: Alchemy: The Dark Art and Curious Science of Creating Magic in Brands, Business, and Life by Rory Sutherland
Justin Robert Young: The Peripheral (TV Show)
Andrew Mayne: The 13th Warrior (Movie)
Support Weird Things on Patreon
Subscribe to the Weird Things podcast on iTunes Podcasts
Podcast RSS feed
Download url: https://weirdthingspodcast.com/uploads/20241017204616_2024-10-11-Weird-things-mixdown.mp3
[podcast]https://weirdthingspodcast.com/uploads/20241017204616_2024-10-11-Weird-things-mixdown.mp3
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53min
December 18, 2024 Space Catchers and the Future of Robotics
The episode opens with a long discussion of SpaceX successfully catching the Starship booster with Mechazilla. The hosts focus on the scale of the tower and booster, the surprise and delight of the SpaceX team, and what the feat implies for fully reusable rockets. They also broaden the conversation into Elon Musk's impact, conviction and persistence in engineering, and how institutions and experts can be wrong about what is possible. [L21-L29, L33-L41, L47-L57] The middle of the episode turns to robotics and AI. The hosts discuss Tesla's Optimus robots at the We, Robot event, including the gap between what was demonstrated and what was actually autonomous. They then spend a long stretch on an Apple paper about reasoning benchmarks, arguing that a small prompt change can dramatically improve performance and that the paper overstates the case against AI reasoning. The back half becomes a hands-on demo of local AI and Ollama, plus creative prompting tests, before ending with picks for Ollama, The Apprentice, Tribalism is Dumb, and Civil War. [L65-L85, L139-L157, L195-L205, L221-L237, L375-L445, L471-L493] Across the AI discussion, Andrew argues that model capabilities are improving quickly and that skepticism often comes from narrow benchmarks, outdated assumptions, or prior investments in other approaches. Brian shifts toward a pragmatic stance that AI use is mainly a productivity issue and that people care more about the output than the method. The episode closes with a shared
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1h 10min
October 10, 2024 The AI Revolution Marches On
The episode opens with Andrew detailing OpenAI's Dev Day announcements, especially the real-time API for continuous text or audio conversations and demos aimed at customer support and phone ordering. The hosts then debate AI as a replacement or augmentation for customer service, with Brian and Justin emphasizing how frustrating human support can be and how useful a capable AI agent might be if it can actually solve problems. Andrew walks through several additional OpenAI features, including prompt caching, easier fine-tuning, memory controls in ChatGPT, and the new Canvas document-editing mode. The conversation also covers a study comparing doctors and GPT-4 on diagnostic tasks, Meta's new video model and the Movie Gen demos, and then shifts into picks where Justin praises Agatha All Along, Brian promotes Achewillow, and Andrew recommends Only Murders in the Building. Key topics Real-time conversational APIs for voice and text: Andrew explains OpenAI's real-time API for nonstop voice or text conversation and compares it with similar work from other companies like Deepgram. AI as a replacement or augmentation for customer support: The hosts describe AI as potentially better than scripted human support if it can resolve issues quickly on either the calling or receiving end. Superhuman persuasion and AI negotiation risks: Andrew raises the possibility of highly persuasive AI being used for manipulation, while also imagining AI lawyers and negotiators. Prompt caching and cheaper
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55min
October 10, 2024 Augmented Reality, VR, and the Quest for the Perfect Hologram
In this episode, Andrew Mayne, Justin Robert Young, and Brian Brushwood kick things off with a chat about the weather before diving into the world of augmented reality and virtual reality. They discuss the limitations of Apple’s Vision Pro and the potential of Facebook’s Project Orion, comparing the two and expressing their hopes for the future of AR. The conversation then shifts to acoustic holograms, showcasing how sound can be used to manipulate objects in space, creating what could be the future of holographic displays. The trio also touches on the advancements in AI, demonstrating how smaller, faster models can generate content and perform tasks with impressive speed and accuracy. Throughout the episode, the hosts maintain a slightly irreverent tone, mixing in their personal experiences and opinions on the tech industry. Picks: Brian Brushwood: I’m Beginning to Get Worried About This Black Box of Doom by Jason Pargin Justin Robert Young: Mr. McMahon on Netflix Andrew Mayne: Alien Rom
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1h 12min
October 07, 2024 The Quest for a Silent Burrito Delivery
The episode opens with the hosts joking about wanting burritos immediately and turns into a discussion of faster delivery systems. Andrew introduces Zipline's drone-delivery model, describing how it keeps the aircraft high above the ground and lowers cargo by line to avoid noise and landing-safety problems. That leads naturally into a broader conversation about autonomous transport, including Waymo's route-based ride service and Zoox's purpose-built vehicle design, along with speculation about future mobile rooms, containers, and other vehicle-as-space ideas. The middle of the episode moves through AI and brain-interface ideas. The hosts discuss an AI-only social network, using ChatGPT as a vocabulary and etymology aid, and then a playful cave-packing exercise that leads into a real cave story about Cheetos left in Carlsbad Cavern and the microbial ecosystem it supported. From there they broaden into Mars ethics, robotic exploration, AI tool-building and sunk-cost thinking, before ending with a long entertainment segment on The Wire, The Sopranos, and Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, plus praise for Michael Keaton. Key topics Drone delivery designed to stay aloft: Andrew describes Zipline as a delivery system that drops cargo from a drone hanging high in the air, avoiding the safety and noise issues of landing on a porch or sidewalk. Autonomous vehicle design tradeoffs: Waymo is discussed as a mapped driverless ride service, while Zoox is framed as a boxier, purpose-built autonomous
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0min
October 06, 2024 The Quest for a Silent Burrito Delivery

In this episode, Andrew Mayne, Justin Robert Young, and Brian Brushwood dive into a discussion that starts with Justin’s craving for a burrito and evolves into a conversation about the future of delivery services, including drones and autonomous vehicles like Waymo and Zoox. They explore the implications of AI advancements for space exploration, particularly on Mars, and the ethical considerations of colonizing planets with existing ecosystems. The trio also touches on the potential for AI in scientific research and ends with a speculative journey into a cave, humorously debating the essentials one might need, from snacks to an air horn.
Picks:
Justin Robert Young: The Wire Season 2
Brian Brushwood: The Sopranos
Andrew Mayne: The Eagle
Support Weird Things on Patreon
Subscribe to the Weird Things podcast on iTunes Podcasts
Podcast RSS feed
Download url: https://weirdthingspodcast.com/uploads/20241006223841_2024-09-20-Weird-Things_mixdown.mp3
[podcast]https://weirdthingspodcast.com/uploads/20241006223841_2024-09-20-Weird-Things_mixdown.mp3
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1h 3min
September 14, 2024 The Matrix Adventure and AI Revelations
The episode opens with a long discussion of OpenAI's Strawberry / O1-style reasoning models. Andrew Mayne explains that these models seem to work better when asked to break problems into steps, use tools, and reason through tasks in a more structured way than ordinary one-shot chat models. The hosts compare this to prompt engineering, discuss examples like decimal comparisons and counting the R's in "strawberry," and talk about how longer structured prompts, patience, and using the right model for the right task can improve results. Later, the conversation broadens into AI evaluations, benchmark gaming, model stacking, tool use, and concerns about AI persuasion. Andrew argues that leaderboard results can be misleading and that models often look strong in short tests but deteriorate with longer contexts, while Justin notes that eval methods themselves are still immature. They also discuss a Science paper about GPT-4 Turbo persuading people away from conspiracy beliefs, which Andrew frames as manipulative and alarming. The episode then moves into a playful Matrix screening story, a discussion of Polaris Dawn and private spacewalking, and the show ends with Netflix media picks. Key topics Reasoning models as step-by-step task solvers: Andrew describes Strawberry / O1 as a model that performs best on long, detailed, multi-step tasks, especially when asked to break work into steps and think through a problem. Prompt engineering for better outputs: The hosts discuss writing longer
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1h 4min

FAQs about Weird Things:

How many episodes does Weird Things have?

The podcast currently has 1,052 episodes available.

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