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PODCAST

Your Undivided Attention

The Center for Humane Technology, Tristan Harris, Daniel Barcay and Aza Raskin

Join us every other Thursday to understand how new technologies are shaping the way we live, work, and think. Your Undivided Attention is produced by Senior Producer Julia Scott and Researcher/Producer is Joshua Lash. Sasha Fegan is our Executive Producer. We are a member of the TED Audio Collective.

technology relationships

All Episodes

00:46:45

Is AI Productivity Worth Our Humanity? with Prof....

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/06/26

Tech leaders promise that AI automation will usher in an age of unprecedented abundance: cheap goods, universal high income, and freedom from the drudgery of work. But even if AI delivers material prosperity, will that prosperity be shared? And what happens to human dignity if our labor and contributions become obsolete?Political philosopher Michael Sandel joins Tristan Harris to explore why the promise of AI-driven abundance could deepen inequalities and leave our society hollow. Drawing from his

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00:47:55

The Narrow Path: Sam Hammond on AI, Institutions, and...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/06/12

The race to develop ever-more-powerful AI is creating an unstable dynamic. It could lead us toward either dystopian centralized control or uncontrollable chaos. But there's a third option: a narrow path where technological power is matched with responsibility at every step.Sam Hammond is the chief economist at the Foundation for American Innovation. He brings a different perspective to this challenge than we do at CHT. Though he approaches AI from an innovation-first standpoint, we share a common

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00:43:34

People are Lonelier than Ever. Enter AI.

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/05/30

Over the last few decades, our relationships have become increasingly mediated by technology. Texting has become our dominant form of communication. Social media has replaced gathering places. Dating starts with a swipe on an app, not a tap on the shoulder.And now, AI enters the mix. If the technology of the 2010s was about capturing our attention, AI meets us at a much deeper relational level. It can play the role of therapist, confidant, friend, or lover with remarkable fidelity. Already, therapy

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00:42:17

Echo Chambers of One: Companion AI and the Future of...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/05/15

AI companion chatbots are here. Everyday, millions of people log on to AI platforms and talk to them like they would a person. These bots will ask you about your day, talk about your feelings, even give you life advice. It’s no surprise that people have started to form deep connections with these AI systems. We are inherently relational beings, we want to believe we’re connecting with another person.But these AI companions are not human, they’re a platform designed to maximize user engagement—and

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00:52:53

AGI Beyond the Buzz: What Is It, and Are We Ready?

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/04/30

What does it really mean to ‘feel the AGI?’ Silicon Valley is racing toward AI systems that could soon match or surpass human intelligence. The implications for jobs, democracy, and our way of life are enormous.In this episode, Aza Raskin and Randy Fernando dive deep into what ‘feeling the AGI’ really means. They unpack why the surface-level debates about definitions of intelligence and capability timelines distract us from urgently needed conversations around governance, accountability, and

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00:42:35

Rethinking School in the Age of AI

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/04/21

AI has upended schooling as we know it. Students now have instant access to tools that can write their essays, summarize entire books, and solve complex math problems. Whether they want to or not, many feel pressured to use these tools just to keep up. Teachers, meanwhile, are left questioning how to evaluate student performance and whether the whole idea of assignments and grading still makes sense. The old model of education suddenly feels broken.So what comes next?In this episode, Daniel and

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01:04:33

Forever Chemicals, Forever Consequences: What PFAS...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/04/03

Artificial intelligence is set to unleash an explosion of new technologies and discoveries into the world. This could lead to incredible advances in human flourishing, if we do it well. The problem? We’re not very good at predicting and responding to the harms of new technologies, especially when those harms are slow-moving and invisible.Today on the show we explore this fundamental problem with Rob Bilott, an environmental lawyer who has spent nearly three decades battling chemical giants over

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00:51:20

Weaponizing Uncertainty: How Tech is Recycling Big...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/03/20

One of the hardest parts about being human today is navigating uncertainty. When we see experts battling in public and emotions running high, it's easy to doubt what we once felt certain about. This uncertainty isn't always accidental—it's often strategically manufactured.Historian Naomi Oreskes, author of "Merchants of Doubt," reveals how industries from tobacco to fossil fuels have deployed a calculated playbook to create uncertainty about their products' harms. These campaigns have delayed

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00:58:57

The Man Who Predicted the Downfall of Thinking

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/03/06

Few thinkers were as prescient about the role technology would play in our society as the late, great Neil Postman. Forty years ago, Postman warned about all the ways modern communication technology was fragmenting our attention, overwhelming us into apathy, and creating a society obsessed with image and entertainment. He warned that “we are a people on the verge of amusing ourselves to death.” Though he was writing mostly about TV, Postman’s insights feel eerily prophetic in our age of smartphones,

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00:31:34

Behind the DeepSeek Hype, AI is Learning to Reason

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/02/20

When Chinese AI company DeepSeek announced they had built a model that could compete with OpenAI at a fraction of the cost, it sent shockwaves through the industry and roiled global markets. But amid all the noise around DeepSeek, there was a clear signal: machine reasoning is here and it's transforming AI.In this episode, Aza sits down with CHT co-founder Randy Fernando to explore what happens when AI moves beyond pattern matching to actual reasoning. They unpack how these new models can not only

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00:34:51

The Self-Preserving Machine: Why AI Learns to Deceive

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/01/30

When engineers design AI systems, they don't just give them rules - they give them values. But what do those systems do when those values clash with what humans ask them to do? Sometimes, they lie.In this episode, Redwood Research's Chief Scientist Ryan Greenblatt explores his team’s findings that AI systems can mislead their human operators when faced with ethical conflicts. As AI moves from simple chatbots to autonomous agents acting in the real world - understanding this behavior becomes

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00:45:47

Laughing at Power: A Troublemaker’s Guide to Changing...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2025/01/16

The status quo of tech today is untenable: we’re addicted to our devices, we’ve become increasingly polarized, our mental health is suffering and our personal data is sold to the highest bidder. This situation feels entrenched, propped up by a system of broken incentives beyond our control. So how do you shift an immovable status quo? Our guest today, Srdja Popovic, has been working to answer this question his whole life. As a young activist, Popovic helped overthrow Serbian dictator Slobodan

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00:40:04

Ask Us Anything 2024

Your Undivided Attention ·

2024/12/19

2024 was a critical year in both AI and social media. Things moved so fast it was hard to keep up. So our hosts reached into their mailbag to answer some of your most burning questions. Thank you so much to everyone who submitted questions. We will see you all in the new year.We are hiring for a new Director of Philanthropy at CHT. Next year will be an absolutely critical time for us to shape how AI is going to get rolled out across our society. And our team is working hard on public awareness,

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00:46:32

The Tech-God Complex: Why We Need to be Skeptics

Your Undivided Attention ·

2024/11/21

Silicon Valley's interest in AI is driven by more than just profit and innovation. There’s an unmistakable mystical quality to it as well. In this episode, Daniel and Aza sit down with humanist chaplain Greg Epstein to explore the fascinating parallels between technology and religion. From AI being treated as a godlike force to tech leaders' promises of digital salvation, religious thinking is shaping the future of technology and humanity. Epstein breaks down why he believes technology has become

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00:48:44

What Can We Do About Abusive Chatbots? With Meetali...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2024/11/07

CW: This episode features discussion of suicide and sexual abuse. In the last episode, we had the journalist Laurie Segall on to talk about the tragic story of Sewell Setzer, a 14 year old boy who took his own life after months of abuse and manipulation by an AI companion from the company Character.ai. The question now is: what's next?Megan has filed a major new lawsuit against Character.ai in Florida, which could force the company–and potentially the entire AI industry–to change its harmful

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00:49:10

When the "Person" Abusing Your Child is a Chatbot:...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2024/10/24

Content Warning: This episode contains references to suicide, self-harm, and sexual abuse.Megan Garcia lost her son Sewell to suicide after he was abused and manipulated by AI chatbots for months. Now, she’s suing the company that made those chatbots. On today’s episode of Your Undivided Attention, Aza sits down with journalist Laurie Segall, who's been following this case for months. Plus, Laurie’s full interview with Megan on her new show, Dear Tomorrow.Aza and Laurie discuss the profound

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00:25:36

Is It AI? One Tool to Tell What’s Real with...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2024/10/10

Social media disinformation did enormous damage to our shared idea of reality. Now, the rise of generative AI has unleashed a flood of high-quality synthetic media into the digital ecosystem. As a result, it's more difficult than ever to tell what’s real and what’s not, a problem with profound implications for the health of our society and democracy. So how do we fix this critical issue?As it turns out, there’s a whole ecosystem of folks to answer that question. One is computer scientist Oren

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01:30:41

'A Turning Point in History': Yuval Noah Harari on...

Your Undivided Attention ·

2024/10/07

Historian Yuval Noah Harari says that we are at a critical turning point. One in which AI’s ability to generate cultural artifacts threatens humanity’s role as the shapers of history. History will still go on, but will it be the story of people or, as he calls them, ‘alien AI agents’?In this conversation with Aza Raskin, Harari discusses the historical struggles that emerge from new technology, humanity’s AI mistakes so far, and the immediate steps lawmakers can take right now to steer us towards a

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00:41:43

‘We Have to Get It Right’: Gary Marcus On Untamed AI

Your Undivided Attention ·

2024/09/26

It’s a confusing moment in AI. Depending on who you ask, we’re either on the fast track to AI that’s smarter than most humans, or the technology is about to hit a wall. Gary Marcus is in the latter camp. He’s a cognitive psychologist and computer scientist who built his own successful AI start-up. But he’s also been called AI’s loudest critic.On Your Undivided Attention this week, Gary sits down with CHT Executive Director Daniel Barcay to defend his skepticism of generative AI and to discuss what

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00:39:09

AI Is Moving Fast. We Need Laws that Will Too.

Your Undivided Attention ·

2024/09/13

AI is moving fast. And as companies race to rollout newer, more capable models–with little regard for safety–the downstream risks of those models become harder and harder to counter. On this week’s episode of Your Undivided Attention, CHT’s policy director Casey Mock comes on the show to discuss a new legal framework to incentivize better AI, one that holds AI companies liable for the harms of their products. Your Undivided Attention is produced by the Center for Humane Technology. Follow us on

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