Frames of Space

Abi Olvera on the Case for AI Optimism

A few weeks ago, the AI company Anthropic announced something genuinely strange. They had built a new model, codenamed Mythos, that was so capable at cybersecurity tasks they decided not to release it to the public. Instead, they're using it, quietly, with a small group of partners, to patch vulnerabilities in the world's most important software before anyone else gets a model this talented.
Abi Olvera is the Research Director at the Golden Gate Institute and the writer behind the Substack "Positive Sum." She specializes in understanding the constraints and abilities of emerging technology, particularly AI. As a result, she has a unique amount of insight on AI's capabilities, and knows what Mythos actually suggests about the pace of AI progress and innovation.
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with her about how her working-class background has affected her views on AI, whether AI is currently growing at an exponential rate, and the positive effects that AI might have on the next generation.
Show Notes
Assessing Claude Mythos Preview’s cybersecurity capabilities
"The optimism gap that's shaping AI policy" by Abi Olvera, Existential Hope
"Kelsey Piper on Whether AI Will Kill Us All" from Frames of Space
"To Forecast AI's Impact on Biosecurity, We Asked: Why are Attacks So Rare?" by Abi Olvera, Second Thoughts
"The Most Powerful and Dangerous AI Model Yet" from Plain English with Derek Thompson
"Could Artificial Intelligence undermine constructive disagreement?" by David Rozado, Free the Inquiry

Jordan Schneider on Podcasting and Political Corruption

Jordan Schneider is the host of ChinaTalk, a podcast and newsletter covering China, US foreign policy, and the technology shaping both. He's been podcasting since 2017, and has learned a thing or two about how to shape conversations with guests to make them as interesting as possible.
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with him about the nature of podcasting as a forcing function for learning, whether a more powerful UN is preferable or feasible, and what the Roger Bannister effect has to do with the extent of Trump's corruption.
Show Notes
"Ezra, Derek, and Dan Wang" from ChinaTalk
"Does America’s “China Consensus” Make Sense? A Debate" from Robert Wright's Nonzero
Why Congress by Philip Wallach
My first attempt at an AI-generated song

Kelsey Piper on Whether AI Will Kill Us All

Kelsey Piper is a staff writer at The Argument, a publication dedicated to having productive arguments among people who disagree about important political topics. I tried my best to carry the spirit of The Argument with me when speaking with Kelsey in this episode, and I had a blast the entire time.
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with her about her take on the AI extinction debate, the risk that AI will make it easier to build destructive bioweapons, and how her views on effective altruism have shaped her understanding of artificial intelligence.
Show Notes
“To Forecast AI’s Impact on Biosecurity, We Asked: Why are Attacks So Rare?” by Abi Olvera, Second Thoughts
"Forecasting Existential Risks: Evidence from a Long-Run Forecasting Tournament" (See Pg. 63 for bioweapon risk, and Pg. 270 for AI extinction risk)
Kelsey Piper's note on AI progress vs. diffusion
"How the U.S. Public and AI Experts View Artificial Intelligence" from The Pew Research Center
Séb Krier's tweet on AGI development

Sam Kahn on Substack and the Nature of Writing

Sam Kahn is a senior editor at Persuasion and the writer behind the Substack "Castalia."
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with him about how Substack changed his life, his current approach to politics, and the tension between the writing he enjoys and the writing that gets the most clicks.
Show Notes
"The Things Not Named — With Sam Kahn" from The Things Not Named

Tibor Rutar on Capitalism, Inequality, and Exploitation

To what extent has income inequality worsened over the past few years and decades? Have the rich been getting richer and the poor poorer? Has capitalism led to a rise in worker exploitation? Is neoliberalism responsible for the rise in democratic backsliding throughout the world?
Tibor Rutar is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Maribor and the writer behind the Substack "Political Economy, Stats, and Society." And his biography makes this conversation immediately more interesting: he used to be a serious Marxist. In the aftermath of the Great Recession, the appeal of big structural explanations gave him the sense that Marxism could diagnose what was wrong with capitalism and propose something better.
And then, over time, he started changing his mind.
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with him about why he shifted away from Marxism, the difference between neoliberal capitalism and social democratic capitalism, and the effect that globalism has had on working-class Americans.
Show Notes
"The China Syndrome: Local Labor Market Effects of Import Competition in the United States" from the American Economic Review
"27. Tibor Rutar - Capitalism for Realists" from Ideas Having Sex
"The quiet vindication of Fukuyama" by Tibor Rutar, Political Economy, Stats, and Society
 

Lyman Stone on How to Raise Fertility Rates

Lyman Stone is a Substack writer and a Senior Fellow and Director of the Pronatalism Initiative at the Institute for Family Studies. He is a pronatalist, which means that he wants society to have higher birth rates and more children.
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with him about the nature of his online persona, the gap between desired and actual fertility rates, and the correlation between marriage and fertility.
Show Notes
"Babies Matter So It's Pronatalism Or Bust" by Lyman Stone

Damon Linker on the ICE Agents in Minneapolis

Announcement: this podcast will be returning to its traditional biweekly upload schedule for the foreseeable future. But I really enjoyed the run of weekly episodes that I've been able to pull off for the past few months, and I hope to do it again some time :)
Damon Linker is a senior lecturer of political science at the University of Pennsylvania and the writer behind the Substack "Notes from the Middleground," which covers the nature of MAGA politics and where it came from. As someone who was far more restrained in his critiques of Trump during Trump's first term, I've found it notable to see how much more concerned he's become about Trump since his second inauguration.
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with him about how the resistance against Trump has been more restrained this time around, why ICE agents are disproportionately located in blue cities, and whether the Trump administration will be able to interfere in the upcoming midterm elections.
Show Notes
"The Other Rally at the Garden" by Damon Linker, Notes from the Middleground
"The Politics of Anger in Minneapolis" by Damon Linker, Notes from the Middleground

Victor Kumar on Why Viewpoint Diversity Matters

Victor Kumar is an associate professor of philosophy at Boston University and the writer behind the Substack "Open Questions." He is known for his writing on political polarization, and the cultural reasons behind the state of civil culture in America.
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with him about why he believes in the importance of a large Overton window, the positions he held about lockdowns during the pandemic, and whether or not universities should engage in affirmative action on behalf of conservatives.
Show Notes
"We Need to Talk" by Victor Kumar, Open Questions
"The Fragmentation of America" by Victor Kumar, Open Questions

Elena Bridgers on Why Modern Motherhood Feels So Hard

Elena Bridgers is the writer behind the Substack "Motherhood Until Yesterday." She is known for her writing on evolutionary biology: specifically, the nature of hunter-gatherer societies, and how that explains why motherhood is so difficult in the present.
In the episode, I got a chance to speak with her about the tradeoffs that come with gender equity, how parenting has changed her conception of contemporary feminism, and the ways in which hunter-gatherer societies were neither patriarchal nor matriarchal.
Show Notes
"Regan Arntz-Gray on the Different Interpretations of Feminism" from Frames of Space
"But WHY Do We Want Gender Equality?" by Elena Bridgers, Motherhood Until Yesterday
"Of course motherhood drives the gender wage gap" by Ruxandra Teslo, Ruxandra's Substack
"Three years ago, I bought an obscure academic book that changed my life" by Elena Bridgers, Motherhood Until Yesterday
Father Time: A Natural History of Men and Babies by Sarah Blafer Hrdy

Lars Doucet on How to Reduce the Cost of Rent

Lars Doucet is the President of the Center for Land Economics and the writer behind the Substack "Progress and Poverty." Lars is a Georgist, which means he believes that land is fundamentally different from other forms of property. From his point of view, we shouldn't be taxing what people build, earn, or produce—we should be taxing the value of the location itself.
In this episode, I got a chance to speak with him about the concept of a land value tax (LVT): why it reduces rent costs, how it can increase government revenue without decreasing productivity, and the extent to which an LVT is compatible with the YIMBY movement.
Show Notes
civicmapper.org
"The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom" by Jonathan Haidt
"The Land Trap: A New History of the World's Oldest Asset" by Mike Bird