AGI, Immortality, & Visions of the Future with Adam Becker
Neil deGrasse Tyson, Gary O'Reilly, and Chuck Nice talk with physicist and author Adam Becker about how tech billionaires envision the future through ideas like AGI, space colonization, transhumanism, and digital immortality. Becker explains why many of these visions are scientifically dubious or incoherent, how they misread science fiction as literal blueprints rather than cautionary tales, and how extreme wealth concentrates power over humanity's technological trajectory. The episode closes with a reflection on the need for wisdom and ethical guardrails alongside scientific and technological ingenuity.
AI Expert: We Have 2 Years Before Everything Changes! We Need To Start Protesting! - Tristan Harris
Stephen speaks with technology ethicist Tristan Harris about how incentives in the tech industry led from social media harms to a new wave of powerful AI systems, and why current AI development is on a trajectory most people would not choose if they saw it clearly. Tristan explains the race toward artificial general intelligence (AGI), the private beliefs and fears of AI leaders, the likely impacts on jobs, politics, and social fabric, and the emerging risks from AI companions and therapy bots. They conclude by outlining potential governance, design, and civic responses that could steer AI onto a narrower, safer path if enough people act in time.
#2418 - Chris Williamson
Joe Rogan and Chris Williamson discuss how smartphones, social media and emerging AR technologies shape attention, mental health and groupthink, and contrast that with the value of time, presence and physical experience. They debate climate change activism, pollution, perverse incentives around green funding and why some protest tactics may backfire, then broaden into existential risks like AI, engineered pandemics and nuclear war alongside concerns about censorship and the UK online safety regime. The conversation also covers trans athletes and fairness in women's sports, high‑stakes boxing matchmaking, hypnosis and memory reliability, and what it means to pursue greatness while trying to remain happy and authentic in an AI‑mediated world.
4 hard truths about capitalism and climate | Steve Howard
Sustainability investor Steve Howard outlines four hard truths about capitalism and climate change, arguing that businesses, financial markets, and policies must be rewired to enable large-scale decarbonization. He explains how companies are structurally resistant to change, how short-term profit focus and unpriced environmental externalities distort markets, and why long, loud, legal climate policies are essential to drive investment into cleaner technologies. Drawing on examples from Temasek, IKEA, Singapore, and emerging climate-tech firms, he shows how better (cleaner, cheaper, higher-performing) solutions can scale quickly and calls on policymakers, asset owners, businesses, and individuals to actively redirect capital toward climate solutions.
How to see (and stop) deforestation from space | Tasso Azevedo
Land reformer Tasso Azevedo describes how the MapBiomas Network turns decades of satellite imagery into detailed, legally robust land-use maps to expose and curb deforestation in Brazil and other tropical regions. By integrating high-resolution imagery, property registries, and protected area data, the project has dramatically increased enforcement against illegal deforestation, redirected finance away from destructive operations, and supported a wide range of environmental and social applications. The talk also highlights successful action against illegal gold mining and outlines plans to expand this collaborative mapping approach to cover most of the world's tropical forests.
TED Talks Daily Book Club: Human Nature: Nine Ways to Feel About Our Changing Planet | Kate Marvel
Host Elise Hu interviews climate scientist Kate Marvel about her book "Human Nature, Nine Ways to Feel About Our Changing Planet," which explores climate change through nine emotions rather than just data or policy. Marvel discusses why scientists should acknowledge their feelings, how climate communication needs storytelling as well as charts, and how humans still have agency to shape a wide range of possible futures. They cover topics including grief for changing places, the limits of individual action, practical climate solutions, technological interventions, and how hope can be understood as something we do rather than something we simply have.
We're doing AI all wrong. Here's how to get it right | Sasha Luccioni
AI sustainability expert Sasha Luccioni argues that current AI development is being driven by a "bigger is better" mentality that concentrates power in a few large tech companies while causing significant environmental and social harms. She contrasts massive, energy-hungry large language models and data centers with smaller, task-specific and open AI systems that can run on modest hardware and support climate solutions. Luccioni calls for transparent energy metrics, supportive regulation, and user choices that prioritize sustainable, equitable AI that serves all of humanity and the planet.
#2397 - Richard Lindzen & William Happer
Joe Rogan speaks with atmospheric scientist Dick Linson and physicist Will Happer about climate science, the history of climate narratives, and how they believe politics and funding have distorted the field. They discuss CO2, water vapor, ice ages, solar variability, and climate models, while arguing that the current climate crisis narrative is exaggerated and tightly tied to financial and political incentives. The conversation also explores historical analogies like eugenics and the Salem witch trials, structural issues in academia and peer review, and the psychological and societal impacts of climate alarmism.
How we took on an oil giant - and won | Melinda Janki
Climate justice litigator Melinda Janke explains how she uses existing environmental and liability laws in Guyana to challenge ExxonMobil's massive offshore oil projects. She details several landmark legal victories that restricted permit durations, forced inclusion of global "scope three" emissions in impact assessments, and imposed unlimited liability backed by a parent company guarantee. The talk emphasizes that law is a powerful tool ordinary people can use to hold fossil fuel companies accountable and that the oil industry is more vulnerable than it appears.