American Optimist
@AmOptimistShow • 18,757 subscribers
Official Account of @JTLonsdale's American Optimist podcast 🎙📺 NEW EPISODES: https://t.co/bQnaq8kHE8
Videos
Marc Andreessen: "Europe seems enthusiastic about being left behind... 25 years ago, if you did a list of the 50 biggest tech companies in the world, a pretty significant number of them were European... probably 15 of the top 50. Today, you're basically down to Spotify. I love Spotify, but that's not what the European tech sector used to be. They have sort of deliberately disarmed and turned away from technology and progress and capitalism in really profound ways for decades now." Marc Andreessen 🇺🇸 speaking to Joe Lonsdale and University of Austin (UATX)
American Optimist107,349 Aufrufe • vor 2 Tagen
NEW 🚨 Brian Chau Built an AI That Uncovers Fraud — It Exposed AI Doomers & Just Found a $21 Billion Racial Wealth Transfer Brian Chau is an investigative journalist using AI to uncover widespread corruption and billions in fraud. He exposed how Effective Altruism NGOs bought and planted AI doomer articles. Now, he's breaking his next big story with Joe Lonsdale. Episode 162 out now 👇 (00:00) Episode intro (01:40) Youngest American to win IOI gold (04:30) How is AI journalism uncovering what legacy media can't? (09:30) Is Effort News nonpartisan? Answering the critiques (11:25) Breaking news: $21 Billion Racial Wealth Transfer (17:30) Exposing the UK's counterterror incompetence (22:00) How Effective Altruism & AI doomers bought the media (24:00) Anthropic "whistleblower" connection to left-wing NGOs (28:50) How do you account for bias in your reporting? (34:30) How to build a sustainable media business (42:30) AI for liberty and accountability; optimistic vision for the future
American Optimist516,416 Aufrufe • vor 1 Monat
EPISODE 149: The Small Business Succession Crisis & New Possibilities in the AI Age Joe Lonsdale sits down with Will Fry, Founder & CEO American Operator. (00:00) Episode intro (01:25) Will’s entrepreneurial journey (04:15) The small business succession crisis (06:40) American Operator’s approach vs. private equity (08:35) "We're creating millionaires on Main Street" (11:55) Does AI mean boom or bust for small business (15:55) Forget law school? Buy a small business instead? (21:20) AI use cases for small business (23:00) Why many SMBs shut down instead of sell (26:00) How the operate-to-own model works (33:50) Optimism for Main Street America
American Optimist2,450,413 Aufrufe • vor 6 Monaten
![Marc Andreessen: if you're the parents of a smart kid where I grew up [rural Wisconsin] and you think you're going to get them into a top university in this country, you're fooling yourself... What level of untapped talent exists in this country that a combination of DEI and immigration have basically cut out of the loop for the last 50 years? Marc: Nobody wants to talk about, but I've started to talk about the intersection of DEI and immigration that has really warped our perceptions on high skilled immigration over the last 50 years. You look at the foreign enrollment rates at the top universities, which went from 2 or 3 or 4 percent 50 years ago or whatever to 27% or 30% or 50%... Joe: Columbia's over half. Marc: 70% or whatever it is. And so there's been this massive transformation in who gets educated. And then there's been this massive transformation of who gets admitted through affirmative action, as we now know it, DEI. This goes straight to the political divide in the country, which is, if you're parents of a kid where I grew up [rural Wisconsin] and you've got a smart kid and you think you're going to get them into, you know, a top university in this country, like you're fooling yourself. There is this really fundamental question which is, what level of untapped talent exists in this country that a combination of DEI and immigration have basically cut out of the loop for the last 50 years? And how long can we have this story to everybody in the Midwest and in the South that says, sorry, because of historical oppression, your kids are SOL.](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1943758894263660670/amplify_video_thumb/1943758267760427008/img/JvH7lV-HctkWnxx1.jpg)
Marc Andreessen: if you're the parents of a smart kid where I grew up [rural Wisconsin] and you think you're going to get them into a top university in this country, you're fooling yourself... What level of untapped talent exists in this country that a combination of DEI and immigration have basically cut out of the loop for the last 50 years? Marc: Nobody wants to talk about, but I've started to talk about the intersection of DEI and immigration that has really warped our perceptions on high skilled immigration over the last 50 years. You look at the foreign enrollment rates at the top universities, which went from 2 or 3 or 4 percent 50 years ago or whatever to 27% or 30% or 50%... Joe: Columbia's over half. Marc: 70% or whatever it is. And so there's been this massive transformation in who gets educated. And then there's been this massive transformation of who gets admitted through affirmative action, as we now know it, DEI. This goes straight to the political divide in the country, which is, if you're parents of a kid where I grew up [rural Wisconsin] and you've got a smart kid and you think you're going to get them into, you know, a top university in this country, like you're fooling yourself. There is this really fundamental question which is, what level of untapped talent exists in this country that a combination of DEI and immigration have basically cut out of the loop for the last 50 years? And how long can we have this story to everybody in the Midwest and in the South that says, sorry, because of historical oppression, your kids are SOL.
American Optimist5,190,500 Aufrufe • vor 1 Jahr
NEW 🚨 Inside Anthropic — AGI, AI Optimism, Regulatory Capture, Open Source & More! Joe Lonsdale sits down with Anthropic's Sholto Douglas and Nicholas Marwell - Have we reached AGI — and what does it mean? - What are the most exciting breakthroughs at Anthropic right now? - What are the biggest risks and concerns? - What is their stance on open source? - Is Anthropic angling for regulatory capture? - Do AI researchers share same values as the heartland? Episode 164 out now! (00:00) Episode intro (02:00) Self-taught ML; Unlikely paths to Anthropic (04:30) What are the most exciting things you're working on? (08:04) Have we reached AGI — and what comes next? (10:10) How to measure AI progress (14:20) Is biology the next great frontier? (16:50) Career advice & the decade of the generalists (19:30) What could go wrong? What are the biggest AI risks? (23:11) Offense vs defense; how technology evolves (25:08) Answering the regulatory capture critique (30:45) Anthropic's stance on open source (31:50) Would you slow down and let China go ahead? (33:05) Anthropic's view on distillation (40:12) Is a post-scarcity world achievable? (48:54) How do we preserve values, tradition & community? (55:00) Predictions for 2028
American Optimist225,104 Aufrufe • vor 29 Tagen
NEW🚨 Inside the Company That Evaluates AI Labs; Who Will Reach Recursive Self-Improvement First? Joe Lonsdale & Vivek Gopalan sit down with Rayan Krishnan, founder & CEO of Vals AI They cover: - How Rayan used Fable to solve a 370-year-old cipher - The science behind model evaluation / can you stay ahead of the labs? - Should labs self-regulate? What's the role for independent evaluators? - Which lab will reach RSI first — and what happens next? - How do models try to deceive evaluators? Episode 167 out now! (00:00) Episode intro (02:00) Palantir, Machiavelli & lessons from Alex Karp (07:50) Solving a 370-year-old cipher / Is AI making new discoveries? (12:10) How do you measure AI abilities across finance, legal, etc? (15:30) What is the science behind model evaluation? (18:00) The importance of independent evaluation (23:35) Evaluating Chinese models & addressing distillation (26:45) Will Anthropic reach Recursive Self-Improvement first? What happens next? (28:30) How do models try to deceive evaluators (33:00) Why Rayan remains optimistic about AI
American Optimist33,645 Aufrufe • vor 5 Tagen
EPISODE 157: Scott Nolan on the AI Energy Crisis & America's Nuclear Renaissance Joe Lonsdale sits down with Scott Nolan Lessons from SpaceX early days; building General Matter; why we rely on Russia; how we fell behind China; nuclear power in space; and more! (00:00) Episode intro (01:20) Boeing vs SpaceX / lessons on speed & performance (05:20) What made SpaceX unique? (09:05) General Matter / how to make nuclear fuel (16:45) Disarmament and relying on Russia (19:50) The AI energy crisis / falling behind China (24:30) Founders Fund & energy investing (27:15) How to scale nuclear energy (32:00) How to fund the nuclear buildout (36:15) Nuclear in space & new possibilities
American Optimist876,619 Aufrufe • vor 4 Monaten
🚨NEW Joe Lonsdale with Jesse Watters on what's really behind the AI doomerism: "They've given up Christianity in most of San Francisco... if you give up religion, you want some kind of messianic complex, some kind of big thing to believe in. These effective altruists — this is their Messiah, this is their end of the world, this is their obsession." Jesse Waters: Am I going wrong anywhere, Joe? Joe Lonsdale: I think President Trump and you are correct. There is a coordinated campaign to make the American people afraid... There's over 50 organizations that were coordinating campaigns, doing narrative intelligence tests, testing public opinion, and spending huge amounts of money trying to scare people. It's regulatory capture, on one hand. It's our adversaries, of course, want us to stop. And I'll tell you what else it is: America has always been very religious, but they've given up Christianity in most of San Francisco. So this is like a messianic complex where this is their religion and the end of the world. And they're obsessed with it. It's weird. Jesse: So these guys don't believe in God. They're atheists, but they've created something which they believe is god like, is that what's going on here? Joe: I think that's a big part of what's happening. Listen, AI is real by the way. What you said is right, there's an industrial revolution coming that's amazing for America if we get it right. People who hate America want to stop it. But yes, America has always... we were founded by kind of extreme Puritans, right? We've always been very, very religious. We've had these awakenings. And I think this is a form of what happens if you give up religion is you want to have some kind of messianic complex, some kind of big thing to believe in. And these effective altruists, this is their Messiah and this is their end of the world and this is their obsession. So I think it is a little bit unhealthy in terms of the spiritual life in San Francisco that's broken. Jesse: So the chip guy, who runs Nvidia, he's basically saying it's not true. There is no even 10% chance of human extinction from AI. Do you believe that? Joe: Yeah, I believe that. I think there's definitely risks where, for example, if the I guess if people use it for viral synthesis and a DNA synthesis site, they could cause a lot of deaths. I think there's going to be lots of hacking that happens thanks to AI being used by people. I think there's other risks that we can't yet understand for how authoritarians could use this... to trick the populace by being really good at knowing how to appeal to huge numbers of people about horrible things. So there's lots of risks, and there's lots of upside. But I think these doomer narratives are ridiculous. And I think we should be embracing the industrial revolution, and we should be pushing back on these NGOs. By the way, the same thing they did last time with climate change, with killer bees... These guys want power. They want money. We shouldn't buy it. Jesse: Killer bees. I forgot about that one. So you're saying you could use it to control the population, but, I mean, we could also use it to root out corruption in the federal government. Are Democrats kind of scared that that I could be used against them? Joe: I think that's exactly right. I think people don't realize how much AI is on the side of liberty, how much is anti-corruption. Scott Bessent's doing a great job as Treasury Secretary and changing the rules so we can look through things, we can start using AI. There's investigative journalists already getting going, finding all sorts of fraud in HHS that only AI could have found because there's so much to look through. And so, yes, I think it's going to be a very positive thing for society. It's going to root out all that money that they're stealing and moving around to their NGOs, and they don't want that happening. I think you're right about that.
American Optimist234,242 Aufrufe • vor 1 Monat
EPISODE 161: The Robotics GPT-3 Moment Joe Lonsdale sits down with Pete Florence Pete and Generalist are changing everything we know about robotics: -- robots trained on new tasks in seconds (seconds!) -- self-taught ambidexterity & other breakthroughs -- 10X more science and how the world will change (00:00) Episode intro (01:30) Bay Area to MIT and DeepMind (03:55) Pete's epiphany: robots sitting still (08:30) Why intelligence, not hardware, is the next frontier (13:20) The GPT-3 era of robotics (14:55) Why leave DeepMind? (16:50) How to train robot brains (18:30) Emergent ambidexterity (20:40) LLMs vs robot world models (23:50) GEN-0, GEN-1 & scaling laws in robotics (27:28) 10x more science per year (32:50) Skilled trades, reindustrialization & future of robots
American Optimist346,265 Aufrufe • vor 2 Monaten
EPISODE 156: Coleman Hughes Takes on America's Most Contentious Debate Joe Lonsdale sits down with Coleman Hughes to discuss his new University of Austin (UATX) course: "The Legacy of Slavery" (00:00) Episode intro (01:40) Teaching the Legacy of Slavery (06:20) Coleman's journey from Columbia to UATX (08:30) Dr. King vs Derrick Bell (11:20) Racial disparities by IQ and salary (13:00) Thomas Sowell & the Real History of Slavery (19:00) America's Founding Hypocrisy (24:00) Will the Left cancel Dr. King? (26:20) Understanding the 1619 Project (30:25) Breakdown of the black family (37:20) Is America wealthy because of slavery? (43:50) Are you worried about woke AI? (45:40) Three solutions for racial progress
American Optimist691,987 Aufrufe • vor 5 Monaten
EPISODE 147: The New Era of Software Abundance Joe Lonsdale visits Scott Wu & Russell Kaplan at Cognition HQ 00:00 Episode intro 01:35 Why technical talent & execution matters in AI 06:10 Do young people have an edge in the AI era? 08:26 Cognition's rapid growth 11:55 The new era of software abundance 14:30 Cognition engineers don't type code anymore 19:20 "Never sleep while Devin is idling" 21:25 The case for AI disinflation 23:50 How Devin generates 12X productivity gains 28:25 Cognition for government / taking on complex, broken systems 36:40 The AI race / competition with Anthropic 39:00 Forward deployed engineers? 43:40 How fast are LLMs improving? 47:10 The AI-led small business explosion
American Optimist836,904 Aufrufe • vor 7 Monaten
🚨NEW: Joe Lonsdale on Tesla terrorism: "That's how authoritarians react, that's how the left reacts... they've tried to bully me, they try to scare my friends from speaking up. Thank goodness Elon Musk is someone who is going to double down and go harder because that's what a real leader does when people try to threaten them." On DOGE's effectiveness: "He's uncovering grift for millions of people.... we've caught departments with nine stories of fancy offices, buying champagne, giving their friends cash with the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service... you have a lot of people who, their money faucet - their free money - is being turned off and they're angry, and Elon is the hate figure they're responding to go after." On intimidation tactics: "For the last 10 years I've been speaking up, I've been getting a lot of protests myself... our job as leaders is to role model to those around us, even if they attack you, we're going to fight for our civilization."
American Optimist1,319,648 Aufrufe • vor 1 Jahr
![NEW: Joe Lonsdale at Forum debate at RNC midterms takes on right-wing doomers and calls for "big daddy government" to smother AI and data centers. Joe Allen: However flawed it is, at least the desire to bring these guys [Big Tech / AI labs] under control is best met, however flawed it is, through big daddy government. Joe Lonsdale: I appreciate that perspective, that you're very negative on it. Overall, I think you're attributing a little too much to like the ChatGPT consumer interaction and not enough to the way in which industry is using AI to bring back manufacturing, to solve problems, to raise productivity. The only way we all get wealthier is raising productivity. We're already seeing very clearly signs that it has definitely led to job growth, not job destruction. I agree with you -- there are some people running some of these tech companies who seem to have this doomer PR, which as far as I can tell, is retarded. And if you want to punish them for that, I kind of empathize with you... But don't let them trick you. Because what a lot of them want is a big regulatory apparatus that they can capture. Because if you do create something at the federal level, you can bet the guys with trillions of dollars in their pockets can hire a thousand people that are going to find ways to capture that and use it against the rest of us. We have to be very careful, not just to do what the left wants and give the government all this power, which then will get captured, and then we're all screwed. We are the greatest nation on earth, in my opinion, in large part because of our freedom and our property rights and our checks on government power, our checks on corporate power as well. And because of our innovation sector -- it's tied to all of that. If you're on the left, you're worried about the companies. If you're on the right, you're more worried about government ... I think we're really screwed when the companies and the governments work together ...when those guys get together and come after us. That is what they want. So let's just be really, really careful. Whatever we put in place prioritizes competence, and it's not something they're going to be able to capture and use against us.](https://image.24vids.com/tw-2097909182569525310/amplify_video_thumb/2097907885531656192/img/Y3eMAvnqm9K8Miun.jpg)
NEW: Joe Lonsdale at Forum debate at RNC midterms takes on right-wing doomers and calls for "big daddy government" to smother AI and data centers. Joe Allen: However flawed it is, at least the desire to bring these guys [Big Tech / AI labs] under control is best met, however flawed it is, through big daddy government. Joe Lonsdale: I appreciate that perspective, that you're very negative on it. Overall, I think you're attributing a little too much to like the ChatGPT consumer interaction and not enough to the way in which industry is using AI to bring back manufacturing, to solve problems, to raise productivity. The only way we all get wealthier is raising productivity. We're already seeing very clearly signs that it has definitely led to job growth, not job destruction. I agree with you -- there are some people running some of these tech companies who seem to have this doomer PR, which as far as I can tell, is retarded. And if you want to punish them for that, I kind of empathize with you... But don't let them trick you. Because what a lot of them want is a big regulatory apparatus that they can capture. Because if you do create something at the federal level, you can bet the guys with trillions of dollars in their pockets can hire a thousand people that are going to find ways to capture that and use it against the rest of us. We have to be very careful, not just to do what the left wants and give the government all this power, which then will get captured, and then we're all screwed. We are the greatest nation on earth, in my opinion, in large part because of our freedom and our property rights and our checks on government power, our checks on corporate power as well. And because of our innovation sector -- it's tied to all of that. If you're on the left, you're worried about the companies. If you're on the right, you're more worried about government ... I think we're really screwed when the companies and the governments work together ...when those guys get together and come after us. That is what they want. So let's just be really, really careful. Whatever we put in place prioritizes competence, and it's not something they're going to be able to capture and use against us.
American Optimist123,702 Aufrufe • vor 1 Monat
🚨NEW: Joe Lonsdale unloads on data center myths at RNC midterm debate. Joe Lonsdale: Are you willing to admit the water thing is fake about data centers? Almonds use 1.5 trillion gallons a year. Data centers is 22 billion. Golf uses 25 times as much water. There's just fake attacks... I responsibly agree with you on our civilization needing to keep its core values and its faith and not have our kids disrupted by these things. I also think it's responsible for more of the populace to say, guys, this is bullshit. Because what's happening here is there's a seam in our civilization — driven by anxiety, by real worries that are legitimate. But that seam is being exploited by bad actors... There are psyops driven by China and Iran that push this stuff, and it will lead us to idiot policy... the same way Russia was caught funding anti-fracking campaigns. They find these seams, they try to get us to do dumb things so they can beat us. And we are not going to let them beat us.
American Optimist103,235 Aufrufe • vor 1 Monat
EPISODE 142: Understanding the AI Wave Joe Lonsdale sits down with 8VC Partners Alex Kolicich & Jack Moshkovich Why is AI fundamentally disruptive? What does it mean for large software incumbents? Will LLMs become commodities? And are we entering a bubble, or just getting started? (00:00) Episode intro (01:40) Smart enterprise thesis (04:00) Did enterprise software dramatically boost productivity? (08:30) Understanding the AI wave (11:45) Will LLMs become commodities? (17:10) OpenAI vs Anthropic vs Meta vs Grok (20:30) Frontier models vs enterprise incumbents (25:27) What did Palantir get right? (32:30) AI case studies/new possibilities (43:00) The most surprising aspect of the AI wave (46:12) Are we entering a bubble? Or just getting started? (52:40) Biggest concern with AI (58:00) Biggest reason for optimism
American Optimist417,594 Aufrufe • vor 8 Monaten
!["I remember getting there on day one and reading the [SpaceX] employee handbook. On the top of page one was just a single line in bold that said: this is not a science experiment." Scott Nolan was an early employee at SpaceX He explains what made the culture and mission unique.](https://image.24vids.com/tw-2069165844572037459/amplify_video_thumb/2069165541009330177/img/vHvWTW-9HJ_bpQ-B.jpg)
"I remember getting there on day one and reading the [SpaceX] employee handbook. On the top of page one was just a single line in bold that said: this is not a science experiment." Scott Nolan was an early employee at SpaceX He explains what made the culture and mission unique.
American Optimist206,980 Aufrufe • vor 4 Monaten
🚨NEW: Our adversaries secretly funded the anti-fracking & anti-nuclear movements. Now Joe Lonsdale asks: Who's funding the outrage about Flock? And of all the surveillance cameras, why is the outrage only directed at the ones arresting criminals and illegal aliens? Joe Lonsdale: I've been working on this for 25 years... I've been trying to make the government competent in the areas that I touch and trying to "watch the watchers." You can go back and see me talk about "watching the watchers" for a very long time now. Now, what what bothers me about about this... there are the legitimate things you can argue about, and then there's the psyops from the left... We're in Texas here today. I'm a proud Texan now for six years. I want to give you one other example of a psyop.... You guys may remember we heard a lot about how bad fracking was. This is a big, big deal. It's now a known fact -- it's not conspiracy -- it's a known fact that our adversaries saw how good fracking was, and how bad it would be for them. And Russia especially spent an insane amount of money trying to stop us from doing fracking... Thank goodness Texans were bold and said, these psyops are bullshit, I'm not gonna listen to them. So my question is, so we have lots of types of cameras that watch us. We have license plate reader cameras, we have parking cameras, and we have Flocks. And I'm not involved in Flock at all. I think they've done a shitty job on some of the messaging here, but isn't it a little suspicious to you as well that no one's attacking the other cameras? No one's attacking the cameras that are giving us speeding tickets, that are watching other parts of our society. But everyone, after DSA spends insane amounts of money, message tests, the far left figures out how to get the right to agree with them, and then they go after the things that are arresting criminals. And those are the only ones that everyone on the populist right is protesting... Isn't that a little bit silly? Shouldn't it be that we're protesting all of them or none of them? Are we kind of falling for the left here? Is there something where we shouldn't be going along with the psyop?
American Optimist81,333 Aufrufe • vor 1 Monat
EPISODE 160: Joe Lonsdale sits down with Aaron Levie "The actual creators of AI are scared sh*tless." — Aaron's take on tech's cognitive dissonance. "So you actually want people to die of cancer, right?" — on politicians trying to ban data centers And more: -- Why Geoffrey Hinton is wrong about AI job destruction -- China's Kimi K3 wake-up moment -- What doomers & accelerationists both get wrong -- 13 new categories of AI jobs at Box -- Law firms (law firms!) building their own AI models (00:00) Episode intro (01:15) AI wave / every two months is a year now (06:30) China, Kimi K3 & open-source debate (10:45) Diffusion is the real rate limiter (15:50) Agent-first startups vs incumbents (19:00) Nobody reads those contracts — AI's new work (23:35) Silicon Valley's AI Problem / Larry David making AI models (29:20) 13 new types of AI jobs at Box (32:20) The origins of Box / dropping out of college (37:00) Favorite angel investments right now (40:20) Optimism for America's future
American Optimist141,289 Aufrufe • vor 3 Monaten
EPISODE 150: How AI Is Transforming Diligence, Decision-Making & the Future of Investing Joe Lonsdale sits down with John Melas-Kyriazi, co-founder & CEO of Standard Metrics (00:00) Episode intro (02:10) Academia to investor and founder (08:00) The pain point that led to Standard Metrics (12:10) How AI is transforming diligence, data collection & VC (14:20) AI as a technical copilot (17:10) AI analyst vs Human in the loop (19:20) Parsing pitch decks and new AI tools (23:10) How AI search is changing marketing (28:30) Powerful new capabilities and workflows (33:47) How quickly is everything changing?
American Optimist283,369 Aufrufe • vor 6 Monaten
NEW 🚨 The Tech Leader Who Is Shrinking Government, Exposing Billions in Waste & Bringing Back Merit Joe Lonsdale sits down with a16z Managing Partner-turned-OPM Director Scott Kupor at University of Austin (UATX) - Why leave tech to be attacked in DC? - How did he reduce the size of government for the first time in generations? - How is he bringing merit back to the civil service? - What is he doing to incentivize our best minds to serve in government? - Who should join the U.S. Tech Force? Episode 165 out now! (00:00) Episode intro (01:40) a16z's first employee; why leave tech to be attacked in DC? (06:27) Biggest federal workforce reduction in modern history (08:45) How the left killed merit-based hiring (14:40) How Scott is bringing merit back to DC (15:50) Lessons from DOGE (18:20) Hidden costs of outdated systems; Billions for contractors (23:40) Building a US Tech Force and hiring for skills (26:20) Eliminating degree requirement to get the best talent (27:16) Why should a young talented person serve in government? (30:28) Optimism for DC; rejecting the blackpill
American Optimist36,222 Aufrufe • vor 23 Tagen