Kendra Sticka, PhD, RDN, is the Executive Director of healthEconnect Alaska, the state-designated health information exchange (HIE). In this role, she spearheads the HIE's strategic growth and operations, including its continued expansion into underserved rural and urban communities. Dr. Sticka has worked in Alaska healthcare for more than 20 years…

In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan explores the cutting-edge intersection of AI and biology with Stanford assistant professor Brian Hie. Discover how AI is revolutionizing our understanding of biological systems and creating new possibilities for interventions. Brian discusses his groundbreaking papers on hybrid AI architectures, t…

Nathan and co-host Stephen Parker delve into the world of AI video generation with Anastasis Germanidis, Co-Founder and CTO of Runway. This episode of The Cognitive Revolution explores the cutting-edge technology behind Runway's Gen 3 models and their impact on the creative industry. From emergent properties in scaled-up models to the democratizati…

Lisa Aquino is the CEO of the Anchorage Neighborhood Health Center (ANHC). Before taking over that organization in 2021, she was the Executive Director of Catholic Social Services for seven years. She has a Masters in Health Sciences degree from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Anchorage Neighborhood Health Center is a federally…

In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan explores unconventional approaches to AI safety with Judd Rosenblatt and Mike Vaiana from AE Studio. Discover how this innovative company pivoted from brain-computer interfaces to groundbreaking AI alignment research, producing two notable results in cooperative and less deceptive AI systems. Join…

In this special crossover episode of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan shares an insightful conversation from the Latent.Space podcast. Swyx and Alessio interview Alistair Pullen of Cosine, creators of Genie, showcasing the cutting edge of AI automation in software engineering. Learn how Cosine achieves state-of-the-art results on the SWE-bench benc…

Dr. Bill Sage is the Assistant Vice President of the Texas A&M Health Science Center, a professor of Medicine at the Texas A& M University School of Medicine, and a professor of Law at Texas A& M University School of Law. He has published hundreds of papers over the decades on health law and policy, and he has edited four books including the Oxford…

Join Nathan for an insightful episode of The Cognitive Revolution with Wade Foster, co-founder and CEO of Zapier. Discover how this no-code pioneer is evolving into an AI-powered platform for the future of work. Learn about Zapier's ambitious vision, their integration of AI throughout their product, and how they're adapting as a company. From AI-dr…

Retired Alaska Superior Court Judge Elaine Andrews moved to Alaska in 1976 immediately upon graduating from law school. Her first job as a lawyer was with the Alaska Judicial Council, which is tasked with vetting new judges and with deciding whether or not to recommend sitting judges for retention. In Alaska, a judge must be at least 30 years old, …

In this crosspost from the 80,000 Hours podcast, host Rob Wiblin interviews Nick Joseph, Head of Training at Anthropic, about the company's responsible scaling policy for AI development. The episode delves into Anthropic's approach to AI safety, the growing trend of voluntary commitments from top AI labs, and the need for public scrutiny of frontie…

Rev. Matt Schultz has been the Pastor of First Presbyterian Church in downtown Anchorage for eleven years. We discuss what Christian Nationalism is and why it’s dangerous. We also talk about Matt’s childhood, what brought him to the ministry, and how he came to be a liberal in both politics and theology. Rev. Schultz is leading classes starting Tue…

In this sponsored episode of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan interviews Andrei Oprisan, Engineering Lead at Agent.ai. They explore the cutting-edge world of AI agents and their impact on the future of work. Andrei shares insights on language model limitations, best practices for building AI agents, and Agent AI's vision as a professional network f…

In this Emergency Pod of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan provides crucial insights into OpenAI's new O1 and O1-mini reasoning models. Featuring exclusive interviews with members of the O1 Red Team from Apollo Research and Hayes Labs, we explore the models' capabilities, safety profile, and OpenAI's pre-release testing approach. Dive into the impli…

In this Emergency Pod of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan provides crucial insights into OpenAI's new o1 and o1-mini reasoning models. Featuring exclusive interviews with members of the o1 Red Team from Apollo Research and Haize Labs, we explore the models' capabilities, safety profile, and OpenAI's pre-release testing approach. Dive into the impli…

Dr. Lawrence Weiss founded the Masters in Public Health program and was instrumental in starting the Alaska Native Studies program at the University of Alaska Anchorage. He has a PhD in Sociology from SUNY Binghamton, but it was his postdoctoral Masters degree from Harvard in Occupational Health that moved him to Anchorage in the early 80s and led …

In this special cross-post episode of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan shares a fascinating conversation between Spencer Greenberg and philosopher Nick Bostrom from the Clearer Thinking podcast. They explore Bostrom's latest book, "Deep Utopia," and discuss the challenges of envisioning a truly desirable future. Discover how advanced AI could resha…

In this episode, Nathan explores the fascinating and controversial realm of AI consciousness with robo-psychologist Yeshua God. Through extended dialogues with AI models like Claude, Yeshua presents compelling evidence that challenges our assumptions about machine sentience and moral standing. Yeshua argues for a more nuanced approach to AI alignme…

Dr. Anne Zink served as the Chief Medical Officer for the state of Alaska in Governor Dunleavy’s administration from 2019 until the Spring of 2024. She is a practicing emergency room physician who served as the emergency department medical director of the Mat-Su Regional Medical Center from 2010 to 2018. She received her medical degree from Stanfor…

In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan interviews Samo Burja, founder of Bismarck Analysis, on the strategic dynamics of artificial intelligence through a geopolitical lens. They discuss AI's trajectory, the chip supply chain, US-China relations, and the challenges of AI safety and militarization. Samo Burja brings both geopolitical ex…

Rep. Jennie Armstrong of West Anchorage was first elected to the Alaska State House in 2022 but is not running for re-election. Instead, she will continue running the two companies that she founded and dedicate more time to her young family. In this Labor Day episode, she shares insights into managing staff that she has gleaned from years of first-…

Nathan explores the emergence of computational life with Google researchers Ettore Randazzo and Luca Versari. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we delve into their groundbreaking paper on self-replicating programs arising from simple interactions. Join us for a fascinating discussion on the implications for AI development, the origins of…

Tom Begich is a former Alaska State Senate Minority Leader. After a life-long career as a singer-songwriter and political advisor, he first ran for office in 2016 to for the state senate seat held by Johnny Ellis representing downtown Anchorage. Tom did not run for re-election in 2022, but instead set up his staffer Löki Tobin to take his seat. We …

Nathan explores the cutting-edge world of AI-powered forecasting with Deger Turan, CEO of Metaculus. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we discuss how AI is revolutionizing prediction markets, the potential for AI to outperform human forecasters, and Metaculus's ambitious new AI forecasting benchmark tournament. Join us for an insightful …

The Alaska Delegation to the 2024 Democratic National Convention consisted of 19 voting delegates, but also party officials, pages, and others, who all traveled to Chicago last week. This episode is an attempt to capture their impressions of the convention immediately upon their return to Alaska. The guests (in order of their appearance) Jessica Co…

Nathan Labenz discusses the latest developments in California's AI bill SB 1047 with experts Nathan Calvin, Dean W. Ball, and Steve Newman. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we explore the updated version of the bill, its implications for frontier AI companies, and the debate surrounding its potential impact. Join us for an insightful an…

Nathan presents a comprehensive AI automation framework developed over three years, applicable to process automation and generative AI integration. This episode of The Cognitive Revolution, offers critical insights for businesses looking to leverage AI effectively. Learn about choosing AI tasks, understanding work deeply, and optimizing AI performa…

Nathan explores the cutting-edge field of mechanistic interpretability with Dan Balsam and Tom McGrath, co-founders of Goodfire. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we delve into the science of understanding AI models' inner workings, recent breakthroughs, and the potential impact on AI safety and control. Join us for an insightful discuss…

Representative Zack Fields has represented downtown Anchorage in the Alaska state house for the past 6 years. He began his work in Alaska in 2012 doing political work first through the AFL/CIO and later as communications director for the Alaska Democratic Party. In Governor Bill Walker's administration, he served as Workforce Development Coordinato…

In this special crossover episode of The Cognitive Revolution, Nathan Labenz joins Robert Wright of the Nonzero newsletter and podcast to explore pressing questions about AI development. They discuss the nature of understanding in large language models, multimodal AI systems, reasoning capabilities, and the potential for AI to accelerate scientific…

Join Nathan and Professor Eric Schwitzgebel as they delve into the fascinating world of AI consciousness. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we explore popular theories of consciousness and their implications for AI systems. Discover insights on idealism, dualism, and materialism, and learn about the ethical considerations surrounding AI …

Jenna Wright is the president and CEO of the Anchorage Economic Development Corporation. AEDC exists for three reasons: to encourage economic growth and diversity in Anchorage to promote a favorable business climate to raise Anchorage residents’ standard of living. The corporation is funded through private contributions, municipal & state grants, a…

Nathan explores the cutting-edge world of autonomous vehicles with industry expert Timothy B. Lee. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we delve into the current state of self-driving technology, comparing industry leaders like Waymo and Tesla. Join us for an in-depth discussion on technical challenges, safety statistics, regulatory landsca…

Nathan interviews Andrew Mason, CEO of Descript, about their AI-powered video editing platform. Learn how Descript is transforming content creation with features like AI transcription, custom voice overdubbing, and eye contact models. Discover the future of video editing and how AI is making it accessible to everyone in this insightful episode of T…

Nathan explores the future of AI-generated video with Joshua Xu, founder of HeyGen, and Victor Lazarte from Benchmark. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we discuss HeyGen's success in practical AI video creation, serving over 40,000 businesses. Learn about the transformative potential of AI in video production, from content translation t…

Erin Baldwin Day is the founder of the Mutual Aid Network of Anchorage (MANA) and an organizer of the Anchorage Housing Club. Mutual aid is collective coordination to ensure that the basic needs of all of our neighbors are met, acknowledging that our existing social support systems are not enough to meet those needs. MANA works with local partners …

Nathan Labenz joins the Nick Halaris Show to discuss the current AI landscape, balancing enthusiasm with critical analysis. This episode of The Cognitive Revolution explores AI's transformative potential in medicine, law, and automation, while addressing concerns about safety, control, and geopolitical implications. Join us for an insightful conver…

Arianna Bellizzi is the new Executive Director of Anchorage’s Federation of Community Councils. We talk about her background, how she came to this job, and the history of Anchorage’s community council system. We also discuss the current state of community councils in our city and potential ways for improving them. Find your community council by cli…

Nathan hosts Riley Goodside, the world's first staff prompt engineer at Scale AI, to discuss the evolution of prompt engineering. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we explore how language models have progressed, making prompt engineering more like programming than poetry. Discover insights on enterprise AI applications, best practices fo…

Soldotna City Council member Lisa Parker became at the age of 19 the youngest person in Alaska to achieve elected office when she won her election to the Anchorage Charter Commission. In 1975 that commission unified the City of Anchorage with the Borough of Anchorage into the municipality that it is today. Like our guest last week, Jane Angvik who …

Nathan interviews Bernal Jimenez Gutierrez, creator of HippoRAG, a novel approach to retrieval augmented generation inspired by the human hippocampus. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we explore how HippoRAG improves on traditional RAG systems, its neuroanatomical inspiration, and its potential for handling complex queries requiring mul…

Nathan explores the Guaranteed Safe AI Framework with co-authors Ben Goldhaber and Nora Ammann. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we discuss their groundbreaking position paper on ensuring robust and reliable AI systems. Join us for an in-depth conversation about the three-part system governing AI behavior and its potential impact on the…

Anchorage Charter Commission member Jane Angvik ran for the Anchorage Charter Commission not too long after she had moved to Anchorage in 1973. What she had learned during her time working for the Greater Anchorage Borough Planning Department was that the City of Anchorage and the Borough of Anchorage hated each other – they couldn’t stop suing eac…

Nathan interviews Mike Knoop, co-founder of Zapier and co-creator of the ARC Prize, about the $1 million competition for more efficient AI architectures. They discuss the ARC AGI benchmark, its implications for general intelligence, and the potential impact on AI safety. Nathan reflects on the challenges of intuitive problem-solving in AI and consi…

Nathan explores the future of food production with Rajat Bhageria, founder and CEO of Chef Robotics. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we delve into how AI and robotics are revolutionizing food assembly, potentially reshaping the entire food industry. Discover insights on imitation learning, data flywheel effects, and the vision of acces…

Nathan welcomes back Sander Schulhoff, creator of LearnPrompting.org, to discuss the recently released Prompt Report. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we explore the current state of prompting techniques for large language models, covering best practices, challenges, and emerging trends in AI. Join us for an in-depth conversation on the…

Jane Angvik was an Anchorage Charter Commission member who drafted the founding document that unified the city and borough of Anchorage in 1975. On July 1, 2024, she administered the oath of office at the inauguration of Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance. Jane has spent her life in service to Alaska whether at her first job for the Anchorage borough…

Nathan interviews Siqi Chen, CEO of Runway, about revolutionizing business finance through AI. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we explore how Runway is creating an intelligent business operating system that generates financial scenarios and explains complex metrics. Siqi shares insights on AI's future impact on finance, business, and s…

Community activist Dr. Cal Williams was born on November 30, 1941, in Monroe, Louisiana. A college graduate, Williams served in the United States Air Force during the early 1960s and participated in the Civil Rights Movement through his affiliation with the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). In 1965, following the advice of Charles and John LeVieg…

Nathan hosts Albert Gu, assistant professor at CMU and co-founder of Cartesia AI, to discuss the groundbreaking Mamba architecture. In this episode of The Cognitive Revolution, we explore the state space model revolution, diving into the technical details of Mamba and Mamba 2. Join us for an insightful conversation on the future of AI architectures…

Dive into the profound discussion on AI expectations and the future with Martin Casado, General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz, as we unpack the complexity of AI systems and their potential impact on the world. Explore the differing viewpoints on AI's epistemics, possible regulatory standards, and the art of predicting AI advancements. Gain insight…