Neuroscientist Anil Seth explains how much we can learn about consciousness by studying the brain in these highlights from our full interview — including:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)How our brain interprets reality (00:00:15)How our brain experiences our organs (00:04:04)What psychedelics teach us about consciousness (00:07:37)The physical footprint of consciousness in the brain (00:12:10)How to study the neural correlates of consciousness (00:15:37)This is a selection of highlights from episode #206 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast: Anil Seth on the predictive brain and how to study consciousness. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — so if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode!And if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
Science writer and video blogger Sébastien Moro blows our minds with the latest research on fish consciousness, intelligence, and potential sentience.This is a selection of highlights from episode #205 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast: Sébastien Moro on the most insane things fish can do. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — so if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode.And if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)The ingenious innovations of Atlantic cod (00:00:19)The mirror test triumph of cleaner wrasses (00:05:46)The astounding accuracy of archerfish (00:10:30)The magnificent memory of gobies (00:14:25)The tactical teamwork of the grouper and moray eel (00:17:42)The remarkable relationships of wild guppies (00:22:01)Sébastien's take on fish consciousness (00:26:48)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
Election forecaster Nate Silver gives his takes on: how effective altruism could be better, the stark tradeoffs we faced with COVID, whether the 13 Keys to the White House is "junk science," how to tell whose election predictions are better, and if venture capitalists really take risks.This is a selection of highlights from episode #204 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast: Nate Silver on making sense of SBF, and his biggest critiques of effective altruism. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — so if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode. And if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Rob’s intro (00:00:00)Is anyone doing better at "doing good better"? (00:00:29)Is effective altruism too big to succeed? (00:02:19)The stark tradeoffs we faced with COVID (00:06:02)The 13 Keys to the White House (00:07:53)Can we tell whose election predictions are better? (00:11:40)Do venture capitalists really take risks? (00:16:29)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from our April 2023 episode with host Luisa Rodriguez and producer Keiran Harris on 80k After Hours. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Luisa and Keiran on free will, and the consequences of never feeling enduring guilt or shameAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Keiran’s intro (00:00:00)Jerk Syndrome (00:00:53)The basic case for free will being an illusion (00:05:10)Feeling bad about not being a different person (00:08:29)Implications for the criminal justice system (00:10:57)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #203 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Peter Godfrey-Smith on interfering with wild nature, accepting death, and the origin of complex civilisationAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)Thinking about death (00:00:24)Uploads of ourselves (00:05:32)Against intervening in wild nature (00:12:36)Eliminating the worst experiences in wild nature (00:16:15)To be human or wild animal? (00:21:46)Challenges for water-based animals (00:27:38)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
Watch this episode on YouTube! https://youtu.be/yncw2T77OAcMatt, Bella, and Huon sit down with Conor Barnes to discuss unlikely journeys, EA criticism, discipline, timeless decision theory, and how to do the most good with a degree in classics. Check out:Conor’s 100 Tips for a Better Life: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/7hFeMWC6Y5eaSixbD/100-tips-for-a-better-lifeConor’s writing: https://parhelia.conorbarnes.com/Zvi on timeless decision theory: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/scwoBEju75C45W5n3/how-i-lost-100-pounds-using-tdt
This is a selection of highlights from episode #202 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Venki Ramakrishnan on the cutting edge of anti-ageing scienceAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)Is death an inevitable consequence of evolution? (00:00:15)How much additional healthspan will the next 20 to 30 years of ageing research buy us? (00:03:10)The social impacts of radical life extension (00:05:46)Could increased longevity increase inequality? (00:10:06)Does injecting an old body with young blood slow ageing? (00:14:23)Freezing cells, organs, and bodies (00:18:35)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #201 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Ken Goldberg on why your robot butler isn’t here yetAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)Moravec's paradox (00:00:22)Successes in robotics to date (00:03:51)Why perception is a big challenge for robotics (00:07:02)Why low fault tolerance makes some skills extra hard to automate (00:12:29)How might robot labour affect the job market? (00:17:19)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #200 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Ezra Karger on what superforecasters and experts think about existential risksAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)Why we need forecasts about existential risks (00:00:26)Headline estimates of existential and catastrophic risks (00:02:43)What explains disagreements about AI risks? (00:06:18)Learning more doesn't resolve disagreements about AI risks (00:08:59)A lot of disagreement about AI risks is about when AI will pose risks (00:11:31)Cruxes about AI risks (00:15:17)Is forecasting actually useful in the real world? (00:18:24)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #199 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Nathan Calvin on California’s AI bill SB 1047 and its potential to shape US AI policyAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)Why we can't count on AI companies to self-regulate (00:00:21)SB 1047's impact on open source models (00:04:24)Why it's not "too early" for AI policies (00:07:54)Why working on state-level policy could have an outsized impact (00:11:47)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #198 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Meghan Barrett on challenging our assumptions about insectsAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)Size diversity (00:00:16)Offspring, parental investment, and lifespan (00:03:18)Headless cockroaches (00:06:13)Is self-protective behaviour a reflex? (00:08:50)If insects feel pain, is it mild or severe? (00:11:54)Evolutionary perspective on insect sentience (00:16:53)How likely is insect sentience? (00:20:25)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #197 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Nick Joseph on whether Anthropic’s AI safety policy is up to the taskAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Highlights:Rob's intro (00:00:00)What Anthropic's responsible scaling policy commits the company to doing (00:00:17)Why Nick is a big fan of the RSP approach (00:02:13)Are RSPs still valuable if the people using them aren't bought in? (00:05:07)Nick's biggest reservations about the RSP approach (00:08:01)Should Anthropic's RSP have wider safety buffers? (00:11:17)Alternatives to RSPs (00:14:57)Should concerned people be willing to take capabilities roles? (00:19:22)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #196 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast. These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Jonathan Birch on the edge cases of sentience and why they matterAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Chapters:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)The history of neonatal surgery without anaesthetic (00:00:23)Overconfidence around disorders of consciousness (00:03:17)Separating abortion from the issue of foetal sentience (00:07:26)The cases for and against neural organoids (00:11:30)Artificial sentience arising from whole brain emulations of roundworms and fruit flies (00:15:45)Using citizens' assemblies to do policymaking (00:22:00)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #195 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast.These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Sella Nevo on who's trying to steal frontier AI models, and what they could do with themAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Chapters:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)Why protect model weights? (00:00:23)SolarWinds hack (00:03:51)Zero-days (00:08:16)Side-channel attacks (00:11:45)USB cables (00:15:11)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #194 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast.These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Vitalik Buterin on defensive acceleration and how to regulate AI when you fear governmentAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Chapters:Rob’s intro (00:00:00)Vitalik's "d/acc" alternative (00:00:14)Biodefence (00:05:31)How much do people actually disagree? (00:09:49)Distrust of authority is a big deal (00:15:09)Info defence and X's Community Notes (00:19:35)Quadratic voting and funding (00:26:22)Vitalik's philosophy of half-assing everything (00:30:32)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #193 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast.These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Sihao Huang on the risk that US–China AI competition leads to warAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Chapters:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)How advanced is Chinese AI? (00:00:25)Is China catching up to the US and UK? (00:05:14)Could China be a source of catastrophic AI risk? (00:07:50)AI enabling human rights abuses and undermining democracy (00:13:53)China's attempts at indigenising its semiconductor supply chain (00:18:14)How the US and UK might coordinate with China (00:20:32)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #192 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast.These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Annie Jacobsen on what would happen if North Korea launched a nuclear weapon at the USAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Chapters:Luisa’s intro (00:00:00)The minutes after an incoming nuclear attack is detected (00:00:22)Deciding whether to retaliate (00:04:24)Russian misperception of US counterattack (00:07:37)The nuclear launch plans that would kill millions in neighbouring countries (00:11:38)The war games that suggest escalation is inevitable (00:15:31)A super-electromagnetic pulse (00:19:12)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
You can check out the video version of this episode on YouTube at https://youtu.be/AUuEaYltONgMatt, Bella, and Cody sit down with Maria Gutierrez Rojas to discuss the 80k’s aesthetics, religion (again), bad billionaires, and why it’s hard to be an org that both gives advice and has opinions.
This is a selection of highlights from episode #191 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast.These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Carl Shulman on government and society after AGIAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Chapters:How AI advisors could have saved us from COVID-19 (00:00:05)Why Carl doesn't support enforced pauses on AI research (00:06:34)Value lock-in (00:12:58)How democracies avoid coups (00:17:11)Building trust between adversaries about which models you can believe (00:24:00)Opportunities for listeners (00:30:11)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong
This is a selection of highlights from episode #191 of The 80,000 Hours Podcast.These aren't necessarily the most important, or even most entertaining parts of the interview — and if you enjoy this, we strongly recommend checking out the full episode:Carl Shulman on the economy and national security after AGIAnd if you're finding these highlights episodes valuable, please let us know by emailing podcast@80000hours.org.Chapters:Intro (00:00:00)Robot nannies (00:00:23)Key transformations after an AI capabilities explosion (00:05:15)Objection: Shouldn't we be seeing economic growth rates increasing today? (00:10:28)Objection: Declining returns to increases in intelligence? (00:16:09)Objection: Could we really see rates of construction go up a hundredfold or a thousandfold? (00:20:58)Objection: "This sounds completely whack" (00:26:10)Income and wealth distribution (00:30:02)Highlights put together by Simon Monsour, Milo McGuire, and Dominic Armstrong