Podchemy

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Recent episodes

Conversations with Tyler

Arthur Brooks on Reinvention, Religion, and the Science of Happiness

Click here to find Tyler's new generative book, The Marginal Revolution: Rise and Decline, and the Pending AI Revolution! Arthur Brooks reckons he's on the fourth leg of a spiral-shaped career: French horn player, economist, president of the American Enterprise Institute, and now Harvard professor and evangelist for the science of happiness. His new book, The Meaning of Your Life: Finding Purpose in an Age of Emptiness, argues that happiness isn't a feeling but a combination of enjoyment, satisfaction, and meaning — the macronutrients of happiness, he calls them — and that most of us are gorging on the wrong ones. Tyler, naturally, wants to know: what's the marginal value of a book on happiness, and what does spiral number five look like? Along the way, Tyler and Arthur cover how scarcity makes savoring possible and why knowing you'll die young sharpens the mind, what twin studies tell us about the genetics of well-being and why that's not actually depressing, the four habits of the genuinely happy, the placebo theory of happiness books, curiosity as an evolved positive emotion, the optimal degree of self-deception, why Arthur chose Catholicism rather than Orthodoxy, what the research says about accepting death, how he became an economist via correspondence school, AI's effect on think tanks, the future of classical music, whether Trumpism or Reaganism is the equilibrium state of American conservatism, whether his views on immigration have changed, what he and Oprah actually agree on, which president from his lifetime he most admires, Barcelona versus Madrid, what 60-year-olds are especially good at, why he's reading Josef Pieper, how he'll face death, and much more. Read a full transcript enhanced with helpful links, or watch the full video on the new dedicated Conversations with Tyler channel. Recorded March 19th, 2026. This episode was made possible through the support of the John Templeton Foundation. Other ways to connect Follow us on X and Instagram Follow Tyler on X Follow Arthur on X Sign up for our newsletter Join our Discord Email us: cowenconvos@mercatus.gmu.edu Learn more about Conversations with Tyler and other Mercatus Center podcasts here. Timestamps: 00:00:00 - Intro 00:02:10 - The Macronutrients of Happiness 00:07:54 - What Happiness Books are Worth 00:12:28 - The Habits of the Happiest People 00:14:27 - Why the Young Reject Happiness Advice 00:17:35 - Curiosity's Role in Happiness 00:20:22 - Self-Deception 00:22:04 - Facing Death 00:25:44 - Choosing a Religion 00:28:41 - Immigration 00:30:27 - The American Right Wing 00:33:55 - AI's Role in Happiness 00:37:12 - What Drives Generosity 00:38:37 - Oprah's Political Views 00:40:16 - Which Political Leaders Arthur Admires 00:41:59 - The Best French Horn Players 00:43:40 - Arthur's Spiral of Careers 00:48:20 - The Future of Think Tanks 00:49:50 - The Future of Classical Music 00:51:27 - Living in Spain 00:55:34 - Age and Peak Performance 00:56:12 - What Arthur Will Do Next 00:59:14 - Outro Image Credit: Jenny Sherman

Apr 1, 2026

24 min read

Drug Story

On fluoride and tooth decay

You may not think of fluoride as a drug, but it fits the bill: The FDA classifies fluoride as a drug, an essential nutrient to human health, and regulates its use. So yeah. It’s a drug.Fluoride used to be boring. 75% of US water is fluoridated, and it has greatly reduced the rate of tooth decay in this country and worldwide. Fluoridation has been among the biggest success stories in medical history.But like a lot of medicine these days, fluoride is suddenly controversial. Again. Here and there, governments - the whole state of Utah, towns all over Florida - have removed fluoride from water. And predictably, the rate of tooth decay in children soars afterwards.Still fluoride is also a riddle. Because while the US has had a lot of success with fluoride, most countries do NOT add it to their water - and many non-fluoridated countries have much the same rate of tooth decay as the US. Is fluoride toothpaste enough?What is going on with fluoride?!4 out of 5 dentists recommend you listen to this episode to the end!Sources for this episode [1] Dentition of a Mesolithic Population (1967) American Journal of Physical Anthropology: Pre-industrial populations experienced significantly lower rates of dental caries, demonstrating the impact of modern diet and environment on oral disease.[2] Toothache (1994) Poetry Foundation: William Greenway: William Greenway’s visceral portrayal of dental pain.[3] A Colorado Story (2015) Colorado Dental Association: Naturally fluoridated water was definitively linked to reduced tooth decay, establishing the scientific basis for fluoridation policy.[4] The Story of Fluoridation (2024) National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research: Fluoridation emerged from observed natural fluoride exposure and was adopted as a nationwide preventive health strategy.[5] Pipe Dreams: America’s Fluoride Controversy (2011) Science History Institute Museum & Library: Water fluoridation sparked decades of political and scientific conflict, becoming one of the most contested public health interventions in U.S. history.[6] Big Hopes for Little Teeth (2024) National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research: Fluoridation significantly reduced childhood tooth decay and became a foundational population-level prevention strategy.[7] Community Water Fluoridation in Focus: A Comprehensive Look at Fluoridation Levels across America (2023) International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health: Access to fluoridated water varies widely across the U.S., reinforcing geographic and socioeconomic disparities in preventive oral health.[8] Water fluoridation less effective now than in past (2024) Cochrane: Fluoridation still reduces cavities, but the magnitude of benefit is smaller than in the mid-20th century.[9] Water fluoridation for the prevention of dental caries (2024) Cochrane Library: Fluoridation consistently lowers rates of tooth decay across populations, though evidence quality and modern applicability vary.[10] Research review contends fluoride in water is less effective than in 1970s (2024) American Dental Association: The marginal benefit of water fluoridation has decreased due to widespread fluoride exposure from toothpaste and other sources.[11] Out of Pocket: A Snapshot of Adults’ Dental and Medical Care Coverage (n.d.) CareQuest Institute: Lack of dental coverage forces many adults to delay or forgo care, increasing reliance on low-cost public health interventions like fluoridation.[12] Health Disparities in Oral Health (2024) CDC: Oral health outcomes are consistently worse for low-income and minority populations due to structural barriers and uneven access to prevention.[13] Two Cities Fluoride Removal Evidence (2025) Science News: Discontinuing fluoridation results in measurable declines in dental health outcomes.[14] What happened when Juneau took fluoride out of the drinking water? (2019) University of Alaska Anchorage: Removing fluoridation leads to increased tooth decay and higher rates of dental procedures, especially in children.[15] The Fluoride Wars Rage On (2021) nature: Fluoridation remains politically and culturally polarizing despite decades of scientific support. Get full access to Drug Story at www.drugstory.co/subscribe

Mar 31, 2026

12 min read

The Knowledge Project

Joe Liemandt: Alpha School and the Future of Education

Joe Liemandt is the principal of Alpha School and the founder of Trilogy Software and ESW Capital. Liemandt dropped out of Stanford to build Trilogy, made the cover of Forbes twice before thirty, became the youngest member of the Forbes 400, then vanished from public life for twenty-five years. But he didn’t stop building. Through ESW Capital, he quietly became one of the most prolific acquirers of software businesses in the world. Now he’s back with a $1 billion bet that AI can make kids learn ten times faster, and that school as we know it isn’t just inefficient, it’s broken. At Alpha School, students spend two hours a day on AI-driven instruction and score in the top 1% on standardized tests. The rest of the day is devoted to what Liemandt calls life skills: leadership, entrepreneurship, teamwork, and real projects that kids actually care about. There are no lectures, and kids don’t move forward until they master the material. He argues the traditional classroom was designed for a narrow slice of students and wastes everyone else’s time. The fix isn’t more money or better teachers; it’s rebuilding from scratch around mastery, motivation, and AI. This conversation covers his full arc from sleeping on the floor at Trilogy to being mentored by Jack Welch, to deciding that “kids must love school more than vacation” was a non-negotiable design principle. He explains how Timeback works under the hood, why he’s comfortable streaming student screens to AI in real time, and how he plans to scale it for a billion kids. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. ------ Timestamps: (00:00) Introduction (00:08) Is the Current Education System Broken? (07:01) Alpha School: What is it? (11:01) Alpha School: Results (14:55) Ad Break (16:55) Selection and Affordability (23:20) Current Classroom Struggles (26:40) What Does Mastery Mean? (35:37) Can You Change the System? (39:19) Teaching Through AI (44:27) How Do You Solve Motivation? (57:01) What Makes A Good Guide? (01:01:04) Coaching Kids (01:05:17) Teaching Life Skills (01:08:18) You Can Do Hard Things (01:13:25) AI Monitoring (01:21:08) Effort vs. IQ (01:23:36) Physics for High Schoolers (01:24:40) What Happens After Alpha School? (01:37:08) Investing in Yourself (01:38:21) Conversations with Jack Welch (01:45:49) Trilogy IPO: The Choice to Not Go Public (01:51:40) Physical vs Virtual (02:03:18) Paying Kids To Learn (02:11:01) What Is Success For You? ------ Newsletter: The Brain Food newsletter delivers actionable insights and thoughtful ideas every Sunday. It takes 5 minutes to read, and it’s completely free. Learn more and sign up at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠fs.blog/newsletter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ------ Follow Shane Parrish: X: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://x.com/shaneparrish⁠ Insta: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/farnamstreet/⁠ LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/shane-parrish-050a2183/⁠ Follow Joe Liemandt: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/liemandt/ Tools to help your kids: Math up to grade 7: https://www.synthesis.com/tutor High School Physics: https://physicsgraph.com Math Grade 8-12: https://www.mathacademy.com ------ Thank you to the sponsors for this episode: +Granola AI, The AI notepad for people in back-to-back meetings: https://www.granola.ai/shane Check out the Granola Notes. +Shopify: https://shopify.com/knowledgeproject Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mar 31, 2026

44 min read

Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy

Sergey Levine - Building LLMs for the Physical World - [Invest Like the Best, EP.465]

My guest today is Sergey Levine, a professor at UC Berkeley and co-founder of Physical Intelligence. The company is building robotic foundation models designed to control any embodied system to do any task in any environment. Sergey argues that solving robotics at full generality is the right path, and that building systems that learn across many robots, environments, and tasks may be the more scalable approach than building narrow specialists. We discuss how these models can perform new tasks without being trained on them directly, and why everyday human actions remain the hardest problems in the field. He also reflects on how human trust and acceptance may matter as much as technical breakthroughs in determining when robots become part of daily life. Please enjoy my conversation with Sergey Levine. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. ----- Become a Colossus member to get our quarterly print magazine and private audio experience, including exclusive profiles and early access to select episodes. Subscribe at ⁠colossus.com/subscribe⁠. ----- ⁠Ramp’s⁠ mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠ramp.com/invest⁠⁠ to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- Trusted by thousands of businesses, ⁠Vanta⁠ continuously monitors your security posture and streamlines audits so you can win enterprise deals and build customer trust without the traditional overhead. Visit ⁠vanta.com/invest⁠. ----- ⁠WorkOS⁠ is a developer platform that enables SaaS companies to quickly add enterprise features to their applications. Visit⁠⁠ ⁠WorkOS.com⁠⁠⁠ to transform your application into an enterprise-ready solution in minutes, not months. ----- Rogo is the AI platform for finance. They're building agents for Wall Street that are trained to understand how bankers and investors actually do work: from diligence and modeling, to turning analysis into deliverables. To learn more, visit rogo.ai/invest. ----- ⁠Ridgeline⁠ has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Visit⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com⁠. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Timestamps: (00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like the Best (00:02:43) Intro: Sergey Levine (00:03:29) Why Bet on Generality Over Specialization (00:07:24) What if PI succeeds? (00:09:05) Pros and Cons of Humanoid Robotics (00:11:02) Timeline of Major Milestones in Robotics (00:15:47) Sergey's Personal Journey (00:18:22) Making General Intelligence Happen (00:19:57) Understanding Robot Data Collection (00:22:12) Most Surprising Discovery at Physical Intelligence (00:24:48) The Science of Common Sense (00:25:36) Long-Range Tasks in Robotics (00:27:24) Why Wouldn’t We Have A Robot in Our Kitchen by 2050 (00:31:21) Other Interesting Approaches (00:32:38) Cool vs. Useful in Robotics (00:36:48) Form Factor Innovation (00:38:22) Physical Intelligence Analogy (00:39:30) Economic Transformation from Robotics (00:40:48) Controversies in the Robotics Community (00:42:16) Arguments Against End-to-End Learning (00:42:34) Compositional Learning Explained (00:43:25) Last Tasks Robots will Conquer (00:44:30) Dark Parts of the Robotics Brain (00:47:05) What Makes a Great Researcher (00:50:15) Manufacturing and Scale Challenges (00:51:17) How Companies Should Prepare for Robotics (00:53:38) Boston Dynamics' Demos (00:55:43) Converging Technologies Enabling Robotics (00:56:47) How to Stay Up To Date in Robotics (00:59:51) Near Term Objectives (01:00:49) Confidence Level Among Researchers (01:03:31) Google's Experimentation Culture (01:04:24) The Kindest Thing

Mar 31, 2026

27 min read

Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy episode artwork

EconTalk

AI, Employment, and Education (with Tyler Cowen)

Tyler Cowen is bullish on the integration of AI into higher education. He's also not worried about its effects on the future workplace. Listen as Cowen speaks with EconTalk's Russ Roberts about the reasons for his optimism, and argues that college classes should devote significant time to learning how to use AI. They discuss the future of writing (and thinking) in an academic context, and Cowen's solution to dealing with worries about cheating. Cowen also shares how he personally has adapted to AI, and whether he thinks there's value to a college education designed not to ensure mastery of a subject, but instead to help students become the kind of people they want to be.

Mar 30, 2026

23 min read

Conversations with Tyler

Arthur Brooks on Reinvention, Religion, and the Science of Happiness

Click here to find Tyler's new generative book, The Marginal Revolution: Rise and Decline, and the Pending AI Revolution! Arthur Brooks reckons he's on the fourth leg of a spiral-shaped career: French horn player, economist, president of the American Enterprise Institute, and now Harvard professor and evangelist for the science of happiness. His new book, The Meaning of Your Life: Finding Purpose in an Age of Emptiness, argues that happiness isn't a feeling but a combination of enjoyment, satisfaction, and meaning — the macronutrients of happiness, he calls them — and that most of us are gorging on the wrong ones. Tyler, naturally, wants to know: what's the marginal value of a book on happiness, and what does spiral number five look like? Along the way, Tyler and Arthur cover how scarcity makes savoring possible and why knowing you'll die young sharpens the mind, what twin studies tell us about the genetics of well-being and why that's not actually depressing, the four habits of the genuinely happy, the placebo theory of happiness books, curiosity as an evolved positive emotion, the optimal degree of self-deception, why Arthur chose Catholicism rather than Orthodoxy, what the research says about accepting death, how he became an economist via correspondence school, AI's effect on think tanks, the future of classical music, whether Trumpism or Reaganism is the equilibrium state of American conservatism, whether his views on immigration have changed, what he and Oprah actually agree on, which president from his lifetime he most admires, Barcelona versus Madrid, what 60-year-olds are especially good at, why he's reading Josef Pieper, how he'll face death, and much more. Read a full transcript enhanced with helpful links, or watch the full video on the new dedicated Conversations with Tyler channel. Recorded March 19th, 2026. This episode was made possible through the support of the John Templeton Foundation. Other ways to connect Follow us on X and Instagram Follow Tyler on X Follow Arthur on X Sign up for our newsletter Join our Discord Email us: cowenconvos@mercatus.gmu.edu Learn more about Conversations with Tyler and other Mercatus Center podcasts here. Timestamps: 00:00:00 - Intro 00:02:10 - The Macronutrients of Happiness 00:07:54 - What Happiness Books are Worth 00:12:28 - The Habits of the Happiest People 00:14:27 - Why the Young Reject Happiness Advice 00:17:35 - Curiosity's Role in Happiness 00:20:22 - Self-Deception 00:22:04 - Facing Death 00:25:44 - Choosing a Religion 00:28:41 - Immigration 00:30:27 - The American Right Wing 00:33:55 - AI's Role in Happiness 00:37:12 - What Drives Generosity 00:38:37 - Oprah's Political Views 00:40:16 - Which Political Leaders Arthur Admires 00:41:59 - The Best French Horn Players 00:43:40 - Arthur's Spiral of Careers 00:48:20 - The Future of Think Tanks 00:49:50 - The Future of Classical Music 00:51:27 - Living in Spain 00:55:34 - Age and Peak Performance 00:56:12 - What Arthur Will Do Next 00:59:14 - Outro Image Credit: Jenny Sherman

Apr 1, 2026

24 min read

Drug Story

On fluoride and tooth decay

You may not think of fluoride as a drug, but it fits the bill: The FDA classifies fluoride as a drug, an essential nutrient to human health, and regulates its use. So yeah. It’s a drug.Fluoride used to be boring. 75% of US water is fluoridated, and it has greatly reduced the rate of tooth decay in this country and worldwide. Fluoridation has been among the biggest success stories in medical history.But like a lot of medicine these days, fluoride is suddenly controversial. Again. Here and there, governments - the whole state of Utah, towns all over Florida - have removed fluoride from water. And predictably, the rate of tooth decay in children soars afterwards.Still fluoride is also a riddle. Because while the US has had a lot of success with fluoride, most countries do NOT add it to their water - and many non-fluoridated countries have much the same rate of tooth decay as the US. Is fluoride toothpaste enough?What is going on with fluoride?!4 out of 5 dentists recommend you listen to this episode to the end!Sources for this episode [1] Dentition of a Mesolithic Population (1967) American Journal of Physical Anthropology: Pre-industrial populations experienced significantly lower rates of dental caries, demonstrating the impact of modern diet and environment on oral disease.[2] Toothache (1994) Poetry Foundation: William Greenway: William Greenway’s visceral portrayal of dental pain.[3] A Colorado Story (2015) Colorado Dental Association: Naturally fluoridated water was definitively linked to reduced tooth decay, establishing the scientific basis for fluoridation policy.[4] The Story of Fluoridation (2024) National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research: Fluoridation emerged from observed natural fluoride exposure and was adopted as a nationwide preventive health strategy.[5] Pipe Dreams: America’s Fluoride Controversy (2011) Science History Institute Museum & Library: Water fluoridation sparked decades of political and scientific conflict, becoming one of the most contested public health interventions in U.S. history.[6] Big Hopes for Little Teeth (2024) National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research: Fluoridation significantly reduced childhood tooth decay and became a foundational population-level prevention strategy.[7] Community Water Fluoridation in Focus: A Comprehensive Look at Fluoridation Levels across America (2023) International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health: Access to fluoridated water varies widely across the U.S., reinforcing geographic and socioeconomic disparities in preventive oral health.[8] Water fluoridation less effective now than in past (2024) Cochrane: Fluoridation still reduces cavities, but the magnitude of benefit is smaller than in the mid-20th century.[9] Water fluoridation for the prevention of dental caries (2024) Cochrane Library: Fluoridation consistently lowers rates of tooth decay across populations, though evidence quality and modern applicability vary.[10] Research review contends fluoride in water is less effective than in 1970s (2024) American Dental Association: The marginal benefit of water fluoridation has decreased due to widespread fluoride exposure from toothpaste and other sources.[11] Out of Pocket: A Snapshot of Adults’ Dental and Medical Care Coverage (n.d.) CareQuest Institute: Lack of dental coverage forces many adults to delay or forgo care, increasing reliance on low-cost public health interventions like fluoridation.[12] Health Disparities in Oral Health (2024) CDC: Oral health outcomes are consistently worse for low-income and minority populations due to structural barriers and uneven access to prevention.[13] Two Cities Fluoride Removal Evidence (2025) Science News: Discontinuing fluoridation results in measurable declines in dental health outcomes.[14] What happened when Juneau took fluoride out of the drinking water? (2019) University of Alaska Anchorage: Removing fluoridation leads to increased tooth decay and higher rates of dental procedures, especially in children.[15] The Fluoride Wars Rage On (2021) nature: Fluoridation remains politically and culturally polarizing despite decades of scientific support. Get full access to Drug Story at www.drugstory.co/subscribe

Mar 31, 2026

12 min read

The Knowledge Project

Joe Liemandt: Alpha School and the Future of Education

Joe Liemandt is the principal of Alpha School and the founder of Trilogy Software and ESW Capital. Liemandt dropped out of Stanford to build Trilogy, made the cover of Forbes twice before thirty, became the youngest member of the Forbes 400, then vanished from public life for twenty-five years. But he didn’t stop building. Through ESW Capital, he quietly became one of the most prolific acquirers of software businesses in the world. Now he’s back with a $1 billion bet that AI can make kids learn ten times faster, and that school as we know it isn’t just inefficient, it’s broken. At Alpha School, students spend two hours a day on AI-driven instruction and score in the top 1% on standardized tests. The rest of the day is devoted to what Liemandt calls life skills: leadership, entrepreneurship, teamwork, and real projects that kids actually care about. There are no lectures, and kids don’t move forward until they master the material. He argues the traditional classroom was designed for a narrow slice of students and wastes everyone else’s time. The fix isn’t more money or better teachers; it’s rebuilding from scratch around mastery, motivation, and AI. This conversation covers his full arc from sleeping on the floor at Trilogy to being mentored by Jack Welch, to deciding that “kids must love school more than vacation” was a non-negotiable design principle. He explains how Timeback works under the hood, why he’s comfortable streaming student screens to AI in real time, and how he plans to scale it for a billion kids. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. ------ Timestamps: (00:00) Introduction (00:08) Is the Current Education System Broken? (07:01) Alpha School: What is it? (11:01) Alpha School: Results (14:55) Ad Break (16:55) Selection and Affordability (23:20) Current Classroom Struggles (26:40) What Does Mastery Mean? (35:37) Can You Change the System? (39:19) Teaching Through AI (44:27) How Do You Solve Motivation? (57:01) What Makes A Good Guide? (01:01:04) Coaching Kids (01:05:17) Teaching Life Skills (01:08:18) You Can Do Hard Things (01:13:25) AI Monitoring (01:21:08) Effort vs. IQ (01:23:36) Physics for High Schoolers (01:24:40) What Happens After Alpha School? (01:37:08) Investing in Yourself (01:38:21) Conversations with Jack Welch (01:45:49) Trilogy IPO: The Choice to Not Go Public (01:51:40) Physical vs Virtual (02:03:18) Paying Kids To Learn (02:11:01) What Is Success For You? ------ Newsletter: The Brain Food newsletter delivers actionable insights and thoughtful ideas every Sunday. It takes 5 minutes to read, and it’s completely free. Learn more and sign up at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠fs.blog/newsletter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ------ Follow Shane Parrish: X: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://x.com/shaneparrish⁠ Insta: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/farnamstreet/⁠ LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/shane-parrish-050a2183/⁠ Follow Joe Liemandt: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/liemandt/ Tools to help your kids: Math up to grade 7: https://www.synthesis.com/tutor High School Physics: https://physicsgraph.com Math Grade 8-12: https://www.mathacademy.com ------ Thank you to the sponsors for this episode: +Granola AI, The AI notepad for people in back-to-back meetings: https://www.granola.ai/shane Check out the Granola Notes. +Shopify: https://shopify.com/knowledgeproject Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mar 31, 2026

44 min read

Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy

Sergey Levine - Building LLMs for the Physical World - [Invest Like the Best, EP.465]

My guest today is Sergey Levine, a professor at UC Berkeley and co-founder of Physical Intelligence. The company is building robotic foundation models designed to control any embodied system to do any task in any environment. Sergey argues that solving robotics at full generality is the right path, and that building systems that learn across many robots, environments, and tasks may be the more scalable approach than building narrow specialists. We discuss how these models can perform new tasks without being trained on them directly, and why everyday human actions remain the hardest problems in the field. He also reflects on how human trust and acceptance may matter as much as technical breakthroughs in determining when robots become part of daily life. Please enjoy my conversation with Sergey Levine. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. ----- Become a Colossus member to get our quarterly print magazine and private audio experience, including exclusive profiles and early access to select episodes. Subscribe at ⁠colossus.com/subscribe⁠. ----- ⁠Ramp’s⁠ mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠ramp.com/invest⁠⁠ to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- Trusted by thousands of businesses, ⁠Vanta⁠ continuously monitors your security posture and streamlines audits so you can win enterprise deals and build customer trust without the traditional overhead. Visit ⁠vanta.com/invest⁠. ----- ⁠WorkOS⁠ is a developer platform that enables SaaS companies to quickly add enterprise features to their applications. Visit⁠⁠ ⁠WorkOS.com⁠⁠⁠ to transform your application into an enterprise-ready solution in minutes, not months. ----- Rogo is the AI platform for finance. They're building agents for Wall Street that are trained to understand how bankers and investors actually do work: from diligence and modeling, to turning analysis into deliverables. To learn more, visit rogo.ai/invest. ----- ⁠Ridgeline⁠ has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Visit⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com⁠. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Timestamps: (00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like the Best (00:02:43) Intro: Sergey Levine (00:03:29) Why Bet on Generality Over Specialization (00:07:24) What if PI succeeds? (00:09:05) Pros and Cons of Humanoid Robotics (00:11:02) Timeline of Major Milestones in Robotics (00:15:47) Sergey's Personal Journey (00:18:22) Making General Intelligence Happen (00:19:57) Understanding Robot Data Collection (00:22:12) Most Surprising Discovery at Physical Intelligence (00:24:48) The Science of Common Sense (00:25:36) Long-Range Tasks in Robotics (00:27:24) Why Wouldn’t We Have A Robot in Our Kitchen by 2050 (00:31:21) Other Interesting Approaches (00:32:38) Cool vs. Useful in Robotics (00:36:48) Form Factor Innovation (00:38:22) Physical Intelligence Analogy (00:39:30) Economic Transformation from Robotics (00:40:48) Controversies in the Robotics Community (00:42:16) Arguments Against End-to-End Learning (00:42:34) Compositional Learning Explained (00:43:25) Last Tasks Robots will Conquer (00:44:30) Dark Parts of the Robotics Brain (00:47:05) What Makes a Great Researcher (00:50:15) Manufacturing and Scale Challenges (00:51:17) How Companies Should Prepare for Robotics (00:53:38) Boston Dynamics' Demos (00:55:43) Converging Technologies Enabling Robotics (00:56:47) How to Stay Up To Date in Robotics (00:59:51) Near Term Objectives (01:00:49) Confidence Level Among Researchers (01:03:31) Google's Experimentation Culture (01:04:24) The Kindest Thing

Mar 31, 2026

27 min read

EconTalk

AI, Employment, and Education (with Tyler Cowen)

Tyler Cowen is bullish on the integration of AI into higher education. He's also not worried about its effects on the future workplace. Listen as Cowen speaks with EconTalk's Russ Roberts about the reasons for his optimism, and argues that college classes should devote significant time to learning how to use AI. They discuss the future of writing (and thinking) in an academic context, and Cowen's solution to dealing with worries about cheating. Cowen also shares how he personally has adapted to AI, and whether he thinks there's value to a college education designed not to ensure mastery of a subject, but instead to help students become the kind of people they want to be.

Mar 30, 2026

23 min read