Mark Daniel — How to Find a Kaleidoscopic Alien (EP.254)
Infinite Loops
Mark Daniel is the co-founder and managing partner of the investment firm Digital, whose portfolio extends across accelerated computing, gaming, crypto, social networking, AI, extended reality, cybersecurity, creator tools, spatial computing, and immersive learning. Back in 2013, he was also one of the very first recipients of a Thiel Fellowship. This was a fun one. Mark joins the show to discuss why podcasts are dangerous (😬), why content creators should have a 10 post limit, how he identifies kaleidoscopic aliens to invest in, and MUCH more. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I...
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John Kennedy — The Hidden Crisis in American Education (EP.253)
Infinite Loops
John Kennedy, a director at the Corsi-Rosenthal Foundation, is tackling an overlooked crisis in American education: air quality. With the ingenious use of a simple $60 box fan, he's on a mission to revolutionize the health and learning environments of students nationwide. It's mind-boggling how much low-hanging fruit there is here. The difference that clean air makes to health and brain capacity is enormous, and it's a surprisingly cheap problem to fix. In fact, as you'll hear about halfway through our conversation, I was so convinced by John and the Corsi-Rosenthal team's solution that...
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Michael Strong — Let’s Get Socratical (EP.252)
Infinite Loops
Michael Strong has spent decades quietly revolutionizing education by designing innovative schools and programs built around agency, critical thinking, entrepreneurship and creativity. He is the founder and CEO of The Socratic Experience, a virtual school that equips students for lifelong happiness and success through Socratic dialogue. Alongside his work in the US, he has educational consulting experience in multiple developing nations. And… he’s a fellow Minnesotan! Michael joins the show to discuss whether Socratic education can scale, the benefits of the Mormon model, why high agency...
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Sahil Bloom — A Multitude of Wealth (EP.251)
Infinite Loops
Sahil Bloom, a prolific creator, founder and investor, has mastered the art of translating complex ideas about wealth and success into wisdom that resonates with millions. His newsletter, The Curiosity Chronicle, grew from just 100 readers to over 800,000 subscribers in three years - a testament to his ability to cut through the noise with clarity and insight. His upcoming book, "The 5 Types of Wealth," challenges our conventional understanding of what it means to be truly wealthy, arguing that financial success is just one piece of a much larger puzzle. Here's what makes Sahil fascinating -...
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Seth Stephens-Davidowitz — Who Makes the NBA? (EP.250)
Infinite Loops
Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, a data scientist and bestselling author, is known for his brilliant use of data to upend conventional wisdom - often with humorous, surprising, and occasionally shocking results. His latest book, Who Makes the NBA, uses data to interrogate some of basketball’s biggest questions, consistently yielding unexpected insights. Here’s the kicker - he wrote the entire book in just 30 days after discovering Code Interpreter. Unsurprisingly for a former quant, I had a blast chatting to Seth. Topics discussed include why so many NBA players are called Chris, whether...
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Julian Gough — The Egg and The Rock (EP.249)
Infinite Loops
Julian Gough sums up his career as follows: “I just sit in my room and write.” Well, I think being an acclaimed children’s author, novelist, stage playwright, poet and top-ten Irish musician is a little more impressive than he’s letting on… Oh, and I didn’t even mention that he wrote the ending to the computer game Minecraft! His current project, The Egg and The Rock, puts all of this to shame. This book, which Julian is writing in public on Substack, seeks to do no less than redescribe the universe, arguing that is not some random, dead, purposeless sack of chemicals, but instead...
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Ben Reinhardt — Speculative Technologies (EP.248)
Infinite Loops
Ben Reinhardt is the founder of Speculative Technologies “a nonprofit industrial research lab that’s working to unlock a wonderful, abundant future through technologies that don’t have a home in other institutions.” He has previously worked at NASA and Bay Area startups/VC firms, founded a startup building robotics for eldercare, and helped entrepreneurs start companies in Singapore. Oh, and he has a Ph.D. in space robotics from Cornell University and is one of the few people with a . in history! Ben, who brings his expertise in emerging technologies to the OSV advisory council, joins...
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Jay Reno — Making A Point (EP.247)
Infinite Loops
My guest on Infinite Loops this week knew he wanted to be an entrepreneur from the time he was buying and selling things on eBay. Jay Reno claims he didn’t know what the word ‘arbitrage’ meant back then, but if you tug on the colourful threads of his career, you’d reveal the kind of tenacity and resourcefulness that allows special founders like him to repeatedly find value in places that have long been deserted by everybody else. If you listen in on today’s episode, it will become apparent why O’Shaughnessy Ventures invested in Jay and his current venture. Jay is the CEO and...
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Michael Garfield — Play the (Mind) Jazz (EP.246)
Infinite Loops
My guest today is Michael Garfield, a paleontologist, futurist, writer, podcast host and strategic advisor whose “mind-jazz” performances — essays, music and fine art — bridge the worlds of art, science and philosophy. This year, Michael received a for his “Humans On the Loop” discussion series, which explores the nature of agency, power, responsibility and wisdom in the age of automation. This whirlwind discussion is impossible to sum up in a couple of sentences (just look at the number of books & articles mentioned!) Ultimately, it is a conversation about a subject...
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Max Meyer Launched a Print Magazine in 2024. Here’s Why. (EP.245)
Infinite Loops
My guest today is Max Meyer, the proprietor of Arena Magazine, a new quarterly publication exploring technology, capitalism and civilization. Arena’s aim? To “make it okay to dream in public again.” Max and I discuss why he launched a print magazine in 2024, WTF happened to legacy media, the wisdom of Ratatouille and MUCH more. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. For the full transcript, episode takeaways, and bucketloads of other goodies designed to make you go, “Hmm, that’s interesting!”, check out our . Important Links: Show Notes: What is...
info_outlineMy guest today is Scott Aaronson, a theoretical computer scientist, OG blogger, and quantum computing maestro.
Scott has so many achievements and credentials that listing them here would take longer than recording the episode. Here's a select few:
- Self-taught programmer at age 11, Cornell computer science student at 15, PhD recipient by 22!
- Schlumberger Centennial Chair of Computer Science at The University of Texas at Austin.
- Director of UT Austin's Quantum Information Center.
- Former visiting researcher on OpenAI's alignment team (2022-2024).
- Awarded the ACM prize in computing in 2020 and the Tomassoni-Chisesi Prize in Physics (under 40 category) in 2018.
… you get the point.
Scott and I dig into the misunderstood world of quantum computing — the hopes, the hindrances, and the hucksters — to unpack what a quantum-empowered future could really look like. We also discuss what makes humans special in the age of AI, the stubbornly persistent errors of the seat-to-keyboard interface, and MUCH more.
I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did. For the full transcript, some highlights from Scott’s blog, and bucketloads of other goodies designed to make you go, “Hmm, that’s interesting!” check out our Substack.
Important Links:
- Shtetl-Optimized (Scott’s blog)
- My Reading Burden
- On blankfaces
Show Notes:
- So much reading. So little time.
- The problem of human specialness in the age of AI
- It’s always the same quantum weirdness
- Why it’s easy to be a quantum huckster
- Quantum progress, quantum hopes, and quantum limits
- Encryption in a quantum empowered world
- Wielding the hammer of interference
- Scientific discovery in a quantum empowered world
- Bureaucracy and blank faces
- Scott as Emperor of the World
- MORE!
Books Mentioned:
- The Fifth Science; by ****Exurb1a
- The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; by Douglas Adams