PODCAST

LessWrong posts by zvi

zvi

Audio narrations of LessWrong posts by zvi

technology philosophy

All Episodes

42:52

“AI #93: Happy Tuesday” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/12/04

You know how you can sometimes have Taco Tuesday… on a Thursday? Yep, it's that in reverse. I will be travelling the rest of the week, so it made sense to put this out early, and incorporate the rest of the week into #94.Table of Contents Language Models Offer Mundane Utility. The price is fixed, so share and enjoy. Dare Not Speak Its Name. David Mayer. David Mayer! Guido Scorza? Language Models Don’t Offer Mundane Utility. It's a flop. Huh, Upgrades. Cohere, and reports on Claude writing

en-gb

10:04

“Balsa Research 2024 Update” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/12/03

For our annual update on how Balsa is doing, I am turning the floor over to Jennifer Chen, who is the only person working full time on Balsa Research. For my general overview of giving opportunities, see my post from last week. Previously: The 2023 Balsa Research update post, Repeal the Jones Act of 1920. tl;dr: In 2024, Balsa Research funded two upcoming academic studies on Jones Act impacts and published the Jones Act Post. In 2025, we’ll expand our research and develop specific policy proposals

en-gb

103:05

“Fertility Roundup #4” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/12/02

There is little sign that the momentum of the situation is changing. Instead, things continue to slowly get worse, as nations in holes continue to keep digging. The longer we wait, the more expensive the ultimate price will be. We will soon find out what the new administration does, which could go any number of ways. Table of Contents Not Enough Dakka. Embryo Selection. Costs. Proving that Dakka Works. IVF. Genetics. Cultural Trends. Denial. Urbanization. The Marriage Penalty. The Biological

en-gb

73:54

“Repeal the Jones Act of 1920” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/11/27

Balsa Policy Institute chose as its first mission to lay groundwork for the potential repeal, or partial repeal, of section 27 of the Jones Act of 1920. I believe that this is an important cause both for its practical and symbolic impacts.The Jones Act is the ultimate embodiment of our failures as a nation. After 100 years, we do almost no trade between our ports via the oceans, and we build almost no oceangoing ships. Everything the Jones Act supposedly set out to protect, it has destroyed.

en-gb

78:30

“AI #90: The Wall” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/11/14

As the Trump transition continues and we try to steer and anticipate its decisions on AI as best we can, there was continued discussion about one of the AI debate's favorite questions: Are we making huge progress real soon now, or is deep learning hitting a wall? My best guess is it is kind of both, that past pure scaling techniques are on their own hitting a wall, but that progress remains rapid and the major companies are evolving other ways to improve performance, which started with OpenAI's

en-gb

78:52

“AI #89: Trump Card” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/11/07

A lot happened in AI this week, but most people's focus was very much elsewhere.I’ll start with what Trump might mean for AI policy, then move on to the rest. This is the future we have to live in, and potentially save. Back to work, as they say. Table of Contents Trump Card. What does Trump's victory mean for AI policy going forward? Language Models Offer Mundane Utility. Dump it all in the screen captures. Language Models Don’t Offer Mundane Utility. I can’t help you with that, Dave. Here

en-gb

64:12

“Housing Roundup #10” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/10/29

There's more campaign talk about housing. The talk of needing more housing is highly welcome, as one prominent person after another (including Jerome Powell!) talking like a YIMBY.A lot of the concrete proposals are of course terrible, but not all of them. I’ll start off covering all that along with everyone's favorite awful policy, which is rent control, then the other proposals. Then I’ll cover other general happenings. Table of Contents Rent Control. The Administration Has a Plan. Trump Has

en-gb

65:26

“AI #87: Staying in Character” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/10/29

The big news of the week was the release of a new version of Claude Sonnet 3.5, complete with its ability (for now only through the API) to outright use your computer, if you let it. It's too early to tell how big an upgrade this is otherwise. ChatGPT got some interface tweaks that, while minor, are rather nice, as well. OpenAI, while losing its Senior Advisor for AGI Readiness, is also in in midst of its attempted transition to a B-corp. The negotiations about who gets what share of that are

en-gb

16:02

“The Mask Comes Off: At What Price?” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/10/21

The Information reports that OpenAI is close to finalizing its transformation to an ordinary Public Benefit B-Corporation. OpenAI has tossed its cap over the wall on this, giving its investors the right to demand refunds with interest if they don’t finish the transition in two years.Microsoft very much wants this transition to happen. They would be the big winner, with an OpenAI that wants what is good for business. This also comes at a time when relations between Microsoft and OpenAI are

en-gb

91:24

“Monthly Roundup #23: October 2024” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/10/16

It's monthly roundup time again, and it's happily election-free.Thinking About the Roman Empire's Approval Rating Propaganda works, ancient empires edition. This includes the Roman Republic being less popular than the Roman Empire and people approving of Sparta, whereas Persia and Carthage get left behind. They’re no FDA. Polling USA: Net Favorable Opinion Of: Ancient Athens: +44% Roman Empire: +30% Ancient Sparta: +23% Roman Republican: +26% Carthage: +13% Holy

en-gb

46:37

“Economics Roundup #4” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/10/15

Previous Economics Roundups: #1, #2, #3Fun With Campaign Proposals (1) Since this section discusses various campaign proposals, I’ll reiterate: I could not be happier with my decision not to cover the election outside of the particular areas that I already cover. I have zero intention of telling anyone who to vote for. That's for you to decide. All right, that's out of the way. On with the fun. And it actually is fun, if you keep your head on straight. Or at least it's fun for me. If

en-gb

57:29

“AI #85: AI Wins the Nobel Prize” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/10/10

Both Geoffrey Hinton and Demis Hassabis were given the Nobel Prize this week, in Physics and Chemistry respectively. Congratulations to both of them along with all the other winners. AI will be central to more and more of scientific progress over time. This felt early, but not as early as you would think. The two big capability announcements this week were OpenAI's canvas, their answer to Anthropic's artifacts to allow you to work on documents or code outside of the chat window in a way that

en-gb

39:59

“Joshua Achiam Public Statement Analysis” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/10/10

Joshua Achiam is the OpenAI Head of Mission Alignment I start off this post with an apology for two related mistakes from last week. The first is the easy correction: I incorrectly thought he was the head of ‘alignment’ at OpenAI rather than his actual title ‘mission alignment.’ Both are important, and make one's views important, but they’re very different. The more serious error, which got quoted some elsewhere, was: In the section about OpenAI, I noted some past comments from Joshua

en-gb

96:12

“AI #84: Better Than a Podcast” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/10/03

Introduction: Better than a PodcastAndrej Karpathy continues to be a big fan of NotebookLM, especially its podcast creation feature. There is something deeply alien to me about this proposed way of consuming information, but I probably shouldn’t knock it (too much) until I try it? Others are fans as well. Carlos Perez: Google with NotebookLM may have accidentally stumbled upon an entirely new way of interacting with AI. Its original purpose was to summarize literature. But one

en-gb

65:37

“Book Review: On the Edge: The Business” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/09/25

Previously: The Fundamentals, The GamblersHaving previously handled the literal gamblers, we are ready to move on to those who Do Business using Riverian principles. Or at least while claiming to use Riverian principles, since Silicon Valley doesn’t fit into the schema as cleanly as many other groups. That's where we begin this section, starting at the highest possible conceptual level. Time to talk real money. Why Can You Do This Trade? First law of trading: For you to buy,

en-gb

160:56

“Book Review: On the Edge: The Gamblers ” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/09/24

Previously: Book Review: On the Edge: The FundamentalsAs I said in the Introduction, I loved this part of the book. Let's get to it. Poker and Game Theory When people talk about game theory, they mostly talk solving for the equilibrium, and how to play your best game or strategy (there need not be a formal game) against adversaries who are doing the same. I think of game theory like Frank Sinatra thinks of New York City: “If I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere.” If you can

en-gb

57:22

“Book Review: On the Edge: The Fundamentals ” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/09/23

The most likely person to write On the Edge was Nate Silver. Grok thinks the next most likely was Michael Lewis, followed by a number of other writers of popular books regarding people thinking different. I see why Grok would say that, but it is wrong. The next most likely person was Zvi Mowshowitz. I haven’t written a book for this type of audience, a kind of smarter business-book, but that seems eminently within my potential range. On the Edge is a book about those living On The

en-gb

90:30

“Housing Roundup #9: Restricting Supply ” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/09/22

I’d split the latest housing roundup into local versus global questions. I was planning on waiting a bit between them. Then Joe Biden decided to propose a version of the worst possible thing. So I guess here we are. What is the organizing principle of Bidenomics? Restrict Supply and Subsidize Demand (1) This was the old counterproductive Biden proposal: Unusual Whales: Biden to propose $5,000 credit for first-time home buyers, per WaPo. The Rich: House prices about to

en-gb

84:40

“Monthly Roundup #22: September 2024 ” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/09/17

It's that time again for all the sufficiently interesting news that isn’t otherwise fit to print, also known as the Monthly Roundup.Bad News Beware the failure mode in strategy and decisions that implicitly assumes competence, or wishes away difficulties, and remember to reverse all advice you hear. Stefan Schubert (quoting Tyler Cowen on raising people's ambitions often being very high value): I think lowering others’ aspirations can also be high-return. I know of people who would have

en-gb

95:23

“GPT-o1 ” by Zvi

LessWrong posts by zvi ·

2024/09/17

Terrible name (with a terrible reason, that this ‘resets the counter’ on AI capability to 1, and ‘o’ as in OpenAI when they previously used o for Omni, very confusing). Impressive new capabilities in many ways. Less impressive in many others, at least relative to its hype. Clearly this is an important capabilities improvement. However, it is not a 5-level model, and in important senses the ‘raw G’ underlying the system hasn’t improved. GPT-o1 seems to get its new capabilities by taking

en-gb

306 results

LessWrong posts by zvi

All Episodes

Similar Podcasts

Lead With AI

Tamara Nall

Linux in the Ham Shack

Black Sparrow Media

Data Engineering Podcast

Tobias Macey

Eye On A.I.

Craig S. Smith

Reflections

Livewire Labs