Smart people talking about politics, policy, culture and other stuff
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Liberal Bill Scher and conservative Matt Lewis meet in the rancor-free DMZ to hash out the week's political events.
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Heather Hurlburt and Daniel Drezner offer unorthodox takes from inside security orthodoxy.
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Aryeh Cohen-Wade speaks with guests about culture in all its forms—pop, high, and low—and American society in general.
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Predicting the Past (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)
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Bob and Paul’s time-warping podcast experiment ... Does thinking in bets better your thinking? ... Past prediction 1: Will the presidential race tighten up? ... J.D. Vance memes of yester-month ... Past prediction 2: Who will Kamala pick for VP? ... When reality gets weird ... Heading to Overtime ...…
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Gaza, Realism, and US Foreign Policy (Robert Wright & Emma Ashford)
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Emma’s forthcoming book on US grand strategy ... Gaza, Ukraine, and Mearsheimer’s realism ... The DC establishment’s dark view of world affairs ... How the Gaza war hurts American interests—and America itself ... Is the time ripe for realism and restraint? ... National problems that require international cooperation ... Heading to Overtime ...…
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Client States Gone Wild (Robert Wright & Andrew Day)
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...By bloggingheads.tv
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Kamala Could Win BIG (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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Are too many former Democratic presidents speaking at the convention? ... Does Kamala Harris need to win the national popular vote by a lot to win the Electoral College? ... Does Tim Walz need a better response to attacks on his military service? ... Does Donald Trump need a campaign shake up? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Kamala Could Win BIG (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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Are too many former Democratic presidents speaking at the convention? ... Does Kamala Harris need to win the national popular vote by a lot to win the Electoral College? ... Does Tim Walz need a better response to attacks on his military service? ... Does Donald Trump need a campaign shake up? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Understanding AI "Understanding" (Robert Wright & Nathan Labenz)
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Nathan's podcast, The Cognitive Revolution ... The enduring enigmas of AI ... Conceptualizing how LLMs conceptualize ... Do AIs actually understand things? ... Why AI doesn’t need to be superhuman to be revolutionary ... Human vs AI representations of the world ... Thinking through high-dimensional AI brain space ... Nathan on AI risk: Doomer? Acce…
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Covid: The evidence for natural origin (Robert Wright & Peter Miller)
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Peter’s background and (Root)claim to fame ... How Peter caught the Covid origins bug ... The Wuhan wet market: source or amplifier? ... Holes in the lab leak theory ... The patient zero problem ... A statistical deep dive into the wet market ... What the genetic evidence can (and can’t) tell us ... Can we “trust the science” on Covid? ... Has trib…
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Harris Picks Tim Walz for Veep (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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Matt argues Harris should have picked Shapiro ... Bill argues Walz has swing appeal ... Is the "couch" joke below the belt? ... How is Trump going after Walz? ... Will there be debates? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Harris Picks Tim Walz for Veep (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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Matt argues Harris should have picked Shapiro ... Bill argues Walz has swing appeal ... Is the "couch" joke below the belt? ... How is Trump going after Walz? ... Will there be debates? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Middle East on the Brink (Robert Wright & Joshua Landis)
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Who was Haniyeh—and why’d Israel kill him? ... Why Netanyahu may want a US-Iran war ... Are pro-Israel groups at peak power? ... Israel’s escalating conflict with Hezbollah ... The logic of Iranian retaliation ... Israel’s lack of a viable endgame in Gaza ... Heading to Overtime ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Who Will Kamala Harris Pick for VP? Shapiro or Kelly?? (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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How did Kamala Harris consolidate the Democratic Party so quickly? ... Is Harris authentic or a phony? ... Who will (and should) be Harris' VP? ... What is Trump thinking by attacking Harris' racial identity? ... What did Trump mean by saying "you won't have to vote anymore"? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Who Will Kamala Harris Pick for VP? Shapiro or Kelly?? (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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How did Kamala Harris consolidate the Democratic Party so quickly? ... Is Harris authentic or a phony? ... Who will (and should) be Harris' VP? ... What is Trump thinking by attacking Harris' racial identity? ... What did Trump mean by saying "you won't have to vote anymore"? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Life in an AI Utopia (Robert Wright & Nick Bostrom)
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Nick’s influential book Superintelligence and his new book Deep Utopia ... Has Nick flipped on AI doom? ... Life in the “solved world” of an AI utopia ... Can technology address the deepest problems of human nature? ... Meaning, artificial purpose, and the value of golf ... The promise and perils of virtual reality ... Heading to Overtime ...…
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The Case for (and against) Cold War II (Robert Wright & Dmitri Alperovitch)
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Dmitri’s new book, World on the Brink ... Is America’s behavior more destabilizing than China’s? ... China-Taiwan compared to Russia-Ukraine ... Is the US making a Chinese invasion of Taiwan more likely? ... Should the US try to maintain global hegemony? ... The “autocracy versus democracy” framing ...…
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Coconut Conservatism (Robert Wright & Andrew Day)
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...By bloggingheads.tv
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Will Kamala Make America Great Again? (Robert Wright, Derek Davison, and Daniel Bessner)
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The Nonzero-American Prestige all-star team ... Why didn’t the Trump shooting matter more? ... What anti-Trump historians get wrong ... Why Kamala shouldn't demonize Trump ... Heading to Overtime—and a discount deal ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Kamala’s Party (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)
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Who’s most to blame for the Biden mess? ... Why Trump might duck a debate with Kamala ... Is Biden locked in the basement? ... Kamala’s biggest liabilities ... Loyalty, the Mob, and Biden’s psychology ... Conspiracy theories of the Trump shooting ... The kind of VP Kamala should pick ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Trump’s Acceptance, Biden’s Defiance (Robert Wright & Mickey Kaus)
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Mickey makes his (iconic) return to Nonzero! ... Did Trump blow his RNC acceptance speech? ... The escalating Democratic civil war over Biden ... Trump vs Biden (vs Josh Shapiro) on national unity ... Drafting the ideal Dem electoral strategy ... J.D. Vance: paradox or phony? ... Is Trump the lesser evil on foreign policy? ... Has Mickey felt the “…
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Trump Picks J.D. Vance (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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How can anyone presume "divine intervention" saved Trump? ... What is the import of the JD Vance pick? ... In how much trouble are Democrats? ... What can Woodrow Wilson teach us about Joe Biden? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Looking for the Assassin’s Creed (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)
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The psychology of the shooter ... The psychology of Trump ... Trump as national healer ... When is anti-Trump rhetoric too extreme? ... The alpha male problem ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Biden Presses On (Robert Wright & Andrew Day)
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The Biden Mess (Robert Wright & Eric Levitz)
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Biden plays chicken against Democratic elites ... Could the delegates deny Biden the nomination? ... Odd moments in the George Stephanopoulos interview ... Biden faces down a populist-elite revolt ... How a small group of insiders could force Biden out ... Heading to Overtime ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Kamala or BUST? (Bill Scher & Matt K. Lewis)
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Is Biden OK? ... Should it be Kamala? ... Who are the Kamala alternatives? ... Who could be Kamala's VP? ... Who will be Trump's VP? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Kamala or BUST? (Bill Scher & Matt K. Lewis)
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Is Biden OK? ... Should it be Kamala? ... Who are the Kamala alternatives? ... Who could be Kamala's VP? ... Who will be Trump's VP? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Biden's Fragility, Trump's Immunity (Robert Wright & Andrew Day)
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...By bloggingheads.tv
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The President’s Brain (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)
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Dementia vs senility ... Biden’s brain: a post-debate diagnosis ... Who’s to blame for the Biden problem? ... Biden’s most baffling debate moment ... Will Biden step down? Bob and Paul place their bets ... Has Nick Bostrom flipped on AI doomerism? ... The earthly side of a meditation retreat ... Heading to Overtime ...…
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Brave New AI World (Robert Wright & Jeffrey Ladish)
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Why Jeffrey helped turn Meta’s Llama into Bad Llama ... Bioweapons, hacking, and other AI dangers ... How America unwittingly boosts China’s AI sector ... The dark side of AI “alignment” ... Is superintelligence the super-weapon of the future? ... The perils of AI acceleration ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Presidential Debate Preview (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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What do Biden and Trump need to accomplish at the debate? ... Will Trump's VP pick get a trial run in the spin room? ... Why is Rep. Bowman in trouble in NY-16? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Reckoning with China (Robert Wright & Edward Wong)
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Edward’s new book, At the Edge of Empire: A Family’s Reckoning with China ... What Americans get wrong about China ... Humiliation and China’s national psychology ... Why Edward’s father joined the People’s Liberation Army ... How Edward’s father fell out of favor with the PLA ... How draconian is Xi Jinping’s crackdown on Uyghurs? ... Famine, purg…
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The Endless Gaza and Ukraine Wars (Robert Wright & Andrew Day)
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...By bloggingheads.tv
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Trump Hates Milwaukee (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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Matt's big announcement ... What's the import of "cheapfakes"? ... Has Trump set debate expectations too low? ... Does it matter that Trump insulted Milwaukee? ... Will attacking Trump as a criminal work? ... Why is Trump outsourcing GOTV to Charlie Kirk? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Trump Hates Milwaukee (Matt K. Lewis & Bill Scher)
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Matt's big announcement ... What's the import of "cheapfakes"? ... Has Trump set debate expectations too low? ... Does it matter that Trump insulted Milwaukee? ... Will attacking Trump as a criminal work? ... Why is Trump outsourcing GOTV to Charlie Kirk? ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Elon, Sex, AI, and Free Will (among other things) (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)
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Bob re-enters reality ... Elon’s X-rated horse-trading ... What do LLMs really say about the “blank slate” view of the mind? ... Bob challenges Paul to meditate—will Paul retreat? ... Have Bob’s views changed since writing Nonzero? ... Paul’s and Bob’s (semi-compatible) views on free ... Heading to Overtime ...…
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Confessions of a Black Conservative (Robert Wright & Glenn Loury)
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Glenn’s very unvarnished memoir, Late Admissions: Confessions of a Black Conservative ... Glenn’s unusual urban upbringing ... Is Glenn’s sermon for black men hypocritical? ... Glenn’s double life at Harvard ... How it all came crashing down ... Is Glenn’s book *too* honest? ... Heading to Overtime ...…
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AI, Techno-optimism, and Cosmic Purpose (Robert Wright & Kevin Kelly)
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Kevin’s place in cyberspace history ... Are we grappling with the pace of tech progress rationally? ... Why Kevin identifies as a techno-optimist ... Is it too early to regulate AI? ... The noosphere, the technium, and species of mind ... Do AI doomers think too highly of thinking? ... Evolution and the question of cosmic purpose ... Should we see …
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The Alien Mind of AI (Robert Wright & Steven Pinker)
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AI's human-like, but inhuman, language skills ... Bob argues that LLMs don’t vindicate the ‘blank slate’ view of the mind ... Do humans and AIs acquire language in totally different ways? ... Will AIs ever quit hallucinating? ... The importance (or not) of “embodied cognition” ... What is it like to be an AI? ... Why Steve is skeptical of AI doom s…
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A Trump 2.0 Foreign Policy (Robert Wright & Kelley Vlahos)
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Kelley’s new podcast, Trip the Beltway Fantastic ... Pat Buchanan and conservative opposition to the Iraq war ... Would Trump 2.0 promote foreign policy restraint? ... Possible Trump appointees pushing for conflict with China ... The time Tucker Carlson helped prevent war with Iran ... Would Trump greenlight ethnic cleansing in Gaza? ... Would Trum…
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Trump's Conviction, Russia-Ukraine Escalation (Robert Wright & Andrew Day)
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...By bloggingheads.tv
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Trump Gets Trolled by Robert DeNiro (Bill Scher & Matt K. Lewis)
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Trump Gets Trolled by Robert DeNiro (Bill Scher & Matt K. Lewis)
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...By bloggingheads.tv
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Gaza, Biden, and Trump (Robert Wright, Derek Davison, and Daniel Bessner)
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The Nonzero-American Prestige apocalypse aversion project ... Are Bob, Derek, and Danny surprised the Gaza war is still going on? ... Biden’s simple political calculus on Gaza ... Would Trump greenlight the ethnic cleansing of Gaza? ... Israel’s plan (or lack thereof) for post-war Gaza ... Heading to Overtime ...…
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Nikki Haley Sells Out. Again. (Bill Scher & Matt K. Lewis)
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Nikki Haley's not-surprising support of Trump ... Why can't Biden get credit for the economy? ... Sam Alito flies his freak flags ...By bloggingheads.tv
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Nikki Haley Sells Out. Again. (Bill Scher & Matt K. Lewis)
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Nikki Haley's not-surprising support of Trump ... Why can't Biden get credit for the economy? ... Sam Alito flies his freak flags ...By bloggingheads.tv
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