Team Futurism: Recent Episodes
Team Futurism
Peter and Devon discuss Vivek Ramaswamy's presidential campaign and explain why any comparisons to Andrew Yang are entirely misled.
During this discussion, Peter goes into the arguably scandalous way that Vivek made his money with a failed Alzheimer's drug. To be fair to Vivek, he offers a rebuttal to this claim here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UgCe_k8aR8&t=0s
Peter Clarke and tech-optimist Kimberly Forsythe discuss a wide range of futurist topics, including the dangers and possibilities of AI, moving beyond scarcity, transhumanism, UBI, the future of the internet, and Elon Musk.
Follow Kimberly on Twitter/X: @NewWrldOptimist
Peter and Devon discuss whether they'd get their eyes scanned for Sam Altman's new cryptocurrency Worldcoin. They also give a review of Oppenheimer and discuss their frustration with America's gerontocracy.
In this interview with futurist Rachel Haywire, we discuss her recent article "Predictions for the Near Future." We cover her predictions about the rise of pop-up shops, the death of the town square, the centralization of groupchats, and many other topics.
Check out Rachel's writing at The Cultural Futurist on Substack: https://culturalfuturist.substack.com/
Reference: "My Predictions for the Near Future" by Rachel Haywire: https://culturalfuturist.substack.com/p/my-predictions-for-the-near-future
We debate whether lab-grown meat is a net good for the world, or whether it's an overblown, energy-draining vanity project for the rich.
Thomas Sheedy is the founder and president of Atheists for Liberty, an organization that promotes free thinking and the normalization of atheism--without the "woke" ideology that has overtaken other atheist organizations.
Thomas and Peter discuss concerns with wokeism in atheist communities, the real dangers of Christian nationalists, the future of atheism, the new Satanic panic, and other topics.
Atheists for Liberty: https://www.atheistsforliberty.org/
Chris Marshall is a futurist and behavioral scientist based in Wales. His new book, "Decoding Change," is about understanding the megatrends that will define our future.
Chris and Peter discuss crypto, block chain technology, performance psychology, AI, and when to expect the next real paradigm shift in technology.
Link to Decoding Change: https://www.amazon.com/Decoding-Change-Understanding-optimistic-future/dp/173911700X
Chris's Website The Uncertainty Scientist: https://www.theuncertaintyscientist.com/
In response to Ron DeSantis and other politicians coming to San Francisco to declare it a "collapsed" city, we discuss what it's really like to walk around the city right now in 2023. The city has lots of problems (homelessness, empty office buildings, stores closing, etc), but highlighting just these issues doesn't give the full picture.
Tom Ross is the Transhumanist Party's 2024 presidential candidate. In this interview, we discuss the viability of the Transhumanist Party, sentient rights, existential risks, and having an AI campaign manager. We also discuss Tom's book "US6 Hexalogy" and his experience hanging out with figures such as Robert Anton Wilson, Marilyn Ferguson, and Timothy Leary.
We debate whether Apple's new AR/VR headset, the Vision Pro, is going to change the world or be an utter failure like Google Glass.
As the next election cycle draws closer, we take a look at the politicians who are for nuclear energy and those who are against it. We name names. Our take is pretty simple: Don't vote for a politician who doesn't support nuclear energy.
We discuss the Hollywood writers’ strike (why it will probably backfire), how deepfakes will impact the next election cycle, how to quit social media, and other topics.
Peter and Devon discuss how artificial intelligence will impact political campaigns through AI-generated ads, personalized text messages, and deepfake campaign avatars.We also discuss outsider political candidates, Fox News firing Tucker, the war in Ukraine, and other topics.The conversation is based in part on the Atlantic article "Just Wait Until Trump Is a Chatbot." https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2023/04/ai-generated-political-ads-election-candidate-voter-interaction-transparency/673893/
Zoltan Istvan is a prominent transhumanist best known for founding the US Transhumanist Party and for his popular articles promoting futurist ideas.In this conversation, Peter Clarke and Zoltan discuss a wide range of topics, from transhumanist wine to digisexuality. For more on Zoltan's thoughts on longevity, check out Peter's interview with Zoltan in Merion West: https://merionwest.com/2023/04/28/death-is-not-inevitable-sitting-down-with-zoltan-istvan/For more on digisexuality, see Zoltan's recent piece in Newsweek: https://www.newsweek.com/dont-bash-digisexuality-some-it-brings-hope-opinion-1793091
Elon Musk really doesn't want people to live longer. He's spoken about this in several interviews and doubled down on it in recent tweets.In our view, it's a bad take. We discuss why. This discussion is a followup to my article in Merion West: https://merionwest.com/2023/04/04/elon-musks-bad-take-on-longevity/
This week we give our enlightened opinions on top stories, from the proposed TikTok ban to updates with ChatGPT. Other topics discussed: Ozempic, US life expectancy decline, and the latest in the war in Ukraine.
A recent Vox article claimed that out stuff is getting worse because "consumerism ushered in an era of badly made products." Is this true?
We discuss the controversy surrounding Roald Dahl's classic books being edited by sensitivity readers. Should we get ready for more of this type of censorship of classic literature? How can we push back against it?
Micah Redding is the founder of Christian Transhumanist Association. In this interview, we discuss the religious undertones of transhumanism, the conflict between science and religion, and why Micah believes that transhumanism is the way forward for Christianity. As an atheist, I also challenge Micah on a few religious claims and I present my view that Satanic Transhumanism makes more sense than Christian Transhumansim.Christian Transhumanist Website: https://www.christiantranshumanism.org/Micah's Website:https://www.micahredding.com/Peter's essay on Satanic Transhumanism:https://petermclarke.medium.com/satanic-transhumanism-the-future-of-reason-79b673ce57d0
It's common to hear people remark upon the death of rock & roll. But is it dead? What does the future of music look like?
Full Davos Video: https://www.weforum.org/videos/davos-am23-ready-for-brain-transparency-english/
In this interview with Lea Booth, we discuss the advantages of nuclear energy and why it's gaining popularity. We also attempt to steel man arguments against nuclear. Lea Booth is an energy reporter and columnist for Quillette. He previously worked with Michael Shellenberger.
There's a lot of buzz about futuristic cities right now. Some of them are just the pipe dreams of billionaires, others are actually being built right now by governments around the world. We discuss why we're broadly skeptical, but still holding out some optimism for cities of the future.
I'm joined by Dain Fitzgerald and Robert Stark to discuss the whether California is failing, as often is claimed. We touch on the population decline, the migration of the creative class, the affordability crisis, the homeless crisis, etc. We also touch on the inevitable territory of SF vs. LA. Dain Fitzgerald is on Twitter @DainFitzgerald. Also check out his YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@champagnebulge1Robert Stark is on Twitter @2020Blackstone. He also writes on Substack: https://robertstark.substack.com/
In this interview with Gennady Stolyarov II, chairman of the US Transhumanist Party, we discuss the current state of the transhumanist movement and its potential for growth, reasons for tech pessimism, Peter Thiel's view of technological stagnation, and more.
In this interview with John from Godless Engineer, we discuss: Jesus mythicism (was Jesus a real person?), the relevance of mythical stories, Jordan Peterson, the danger of Christian Nationalism, and the future of religion.
Godless Engineer's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/godlessengineer
Article by Peter Clarke referenced: Jesus Mythicism Is About to Go Mainstream: https://merionwest.com/2022/01/14/jesus-mythicism-is-about-to-go-mainstream/
We dive right into the gun debate: Is it a gun problem or a people problem? How does mental health factor in? How do we feel about the 2nd Amendment? Is the gun problem in America even fixable?
People who live in small towns are part of modern culture too! But how do they fit in?
Devon is just back from spending the summer in a tiny town in Montana. He gives us a window into the mindset of the the modern American small-town dweller. More broadly, we get into issues such as the growing urban/rural divide in America.
Peter chats with "real" artist Mark Dwyer about the future of artists given the advances in AI art, such as Dall-e 2.
This is an interview with Naum Milyavskiy about his new documentary, "Hear, Falcon." In the documentary, Naum makes fascinating parallels between the ways humans relate to animals (specifically falcons) and artificial intelligence.
Topics in the discussion include: how to solve human loneliness, the future of human and non-human relationships, and the question of whether we humans are basically machines ourselves.
Russia's war with Ukraine is not a modern war, we argue. It's antiquated and dumb. What is the future of war?
We're not big fans of Andrew Tate, to put it lightly. Not a hard hill to on. But what about the tech censorship question? Should he have been deplatformed?
Andrew Yang's recent messaging about the Forward Party has disappointed a lot of people. We talk about this and the future of the Forward Party and political centrism generally.