Luminary Luminary.fm
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- Society & Culture
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Kitchen table-style conversations with some of the world’s brightest minds, exploring boundaries of human knowledge. Join us on a pursuit to discover the ideas, intuition, theories and thoughts behind these luminaries.
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Tim O’Reilly on Open Source Alchemy: Shaping the Tech Landscape
Tim O’Reilly is the founder, CEO, and Chairman of O’Reilly Media, a company that has profoundly impacted how generations of software engineers and computer hobbyists have learned programming. Tim is of course a luminary of the technology industry and hardly needs an introduction. It is difficult to overstate the importance of his contributions. Tim has been active in the open source and internet community for decades, providing the intellectual inspiration behind terms like open source software and web 2.0.
Our conversation with Tim centers around open source. We discuss: the characteristics of open source software, which company has best executed on its open source strategy, and how the open source ethos has influenced the tech industry and beyond. We also cover Tim’s latest project around algorithmic rents.
About and From Tim O’Reilly:
Tim O’Reilly: Various Things I’ve Written
Tim O’Reilly – Wikipedia
Recommendations and References:
Richard Stallman
David Stutz
The Man Watching by Rainer Maria Rilke
The Dawn of Everything
Marriana Mazzucato
Herbert Simon
Economics for the Common Good
The Paris Wife
Working Days
East of Eden
David Graeber
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Yochai Benkler on Tech’s True Forces: Capitalism, Institutions, and Ideological Impact
Yochai Benkler is a professor of Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School and co-director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. Yochai is known for coining the term commons-based peer production which describes collaborative efforts or social production in the creation of information goods such as Apache server or Wikipedia. In 2012, he received a lifetime achievement award from Oxford University in recognition of his contribution to the study and public understanding of the Internet and information goods. Yochai has written a number of influential books, including The Wealth of Networks, Network Propaganda, and the Penguin and Leviathan.
Our conversation with Yochai focuses on the role of capitalism, institutions, and ideology in shaping technology and societal outcomes. Yochai’s theory centers around the notion that it is not technology and software that shape change, but rather that the dynamics of power-seeking in capitalism have subsumed and directed technology and software towards the same aim as it always had — which is to maximize profit for a narrow set of profit-reaping classes while legitimizing it under a patina of claims of self-actualization, democratization, social mobility, and improvement in well-being for all. Yochai’s framework pushes back on the prevailing wisdom that technology is the cause of change but rather an arena where the dynamics of capitalism established since the 17th century are driving, while a naturalized view of technology is simply a red herring.
We also discuss the political economy of technology, commons-based peer production as a value generation model, and the value of decentralized blockchain systems like bitcoin and ethereum.This was a very refreshing conversation. It’s clear the world could learn a lot from the wisdom of Yochai Benkler.
About and From Yochai Benkler:
Director, Berkman Klein Center for Entrepreneurial Studies
Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman Professor for Entrepreneurial Legal Studies
Personal website
Practical Anarchism: Peer Mutualism, Market Power, and the Fallible State
The Role of Technology in Political Economy: Part 1
The Role of Technology in Political Economy: Part 2
The Role of Technology in Political Economy: Part 3
Power and Productivity: Institutions, Ideology, and Technology in Political Economy
The Penguin and the Leviathan
Recommendations and References:
Heart of Darkness
Black Reconstruction
Shardlake series
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Jason Crawford on progress and the history of technology
Jason Crawford is the founder of Roots of Progress and a prolific writer on all things technology and progress. Jason was previously a startup founder and engineering manager. His mission is to understand the causes of progress and help usher in a new era of human advancement via a philosophy of progress fit for the 21st century. You can find his essays on rootsofprogress.org.
Our conversation with Jason centers around progress and the history of technology. We cover the relationship between human civilization and technology, assorted inventions, and lessons to consider in the development and implementation of future technologies. We also talk about why progress matters, how things went wrong in the 20th century, and Jason’s idea of a new philosophy of progress. Jason has encyclopedic knowledge of diverse topics which made this an especially rich conversation.
About and From Jason Crawford:
https://jasoncrawford.org/
https://rootsofprogress.org/
https://twitter.com/jasoncrawford
The spiritual benefits of material progress
Recommendations and References:
The Ascent of Man: Bronowski, Jacob, Dawkins, Richard
On the Origin of Clockwork, Perpetual Motion Devices, and the Compass
Economics of the singularity | IEEE Journals & Magazine
Robin Hansen
The Population Explosion
Charles I. Jones – Wikipedia
Paul Romer – Wikipedia
Robert Solow – Wikipedia
One Process | Reaction Wheel
Derek Thompson (journalist) – Wikipedia
Noahpinion
Ezra Klein – The New York Times
David Deutsch
Steven Pinker
Where Is My Flying Car? (Audible Audio Edition): J. Storrs Hall, Jonathan Todd Ross, Stripe Press: Books
Ayn Rand – Wikipedia
The Industrial Revolution
The Conservative Futurist by James Pethokoukis | Hachette Book Group
The Industrial Revolution, 1760-1830 – T. S. Ashton – Oxford University Press
Slate Star Codex
FreakTakes
The Lunar Society
The Making of the Atomic Bomb | Book by Richard Rhodes | Official Publisher Page | Simon & Schuster
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Noah Smith on digital technology adoption, energy, and economic progress
Noah Smith is a renaissance man, blogger, and commentator. Noah’s popular blog, Noahpinion, focuses on economics, technology, and current events. He was previously a columnist for Bloomberg and an assistant professor of Behavioral finance at Stony Brook University.
Our wide-ranging conversation covers digital technology, economics, and energy. We discuss Noah’s framework for thinking about technology, digital technology adoption and its implications for economic activity, measures of technological advancement, opportunities and challenges for solar and nuclear energy, and the Noah Smith production function.
About and From Noah Smith:
Noah Smith (writer) – Wikipedia
Noahpinion
Noah Smith (@Noahpinion) / Twitter
140 – The Future is Fiat | Noah Smith (Noahpinion)
Interview: Tyler Cowen, economist and public intellectual
Globalization Is Narrowing the Wealth Gap, One Nation at a Time
Recommendations and References:
Ramez Naam
Robert J Gordon
The New Argonauts
Kardashev Scale
The Measure of Civilization
Grasping Reality, Brad DeLong
Hannah Ritchie
Faster Please
Matthew Yglesias
David Roberts
David Thompson
Jerusalem Demsas
Ezra Klein
Odd Lots
Packy McCormick
Roon
Sam D’Amico
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Carlota Perez on technological revolutions and capitalism
Carlota Perez is a pre-eminent multi-disciplinarian, scholar, and author. Carlota studies the nature of technological change and economic systems, and the lessons provided by the history of technological revolutions. Her book, Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital, is a landmark contribution to the study of technological innovation and change. She has received numerous awards and accolades including most recently an Honorary Doctorate by Utrecht University in the Netherlands.
Our conversation with Carlota centers around her framework for studying technological change and the adoption of digital technologies. We discuss the ideas behind technology cycles, the role of capitalism in influencing change, the difference between the current digital paradigm and prior technology revolutions, the role government can play in accelerating the adoption of digital technologies, and get a preview of her upcoming book which features the role of governments in shaping technological revolutions.
About and From Carlota Perez:
Personal website
Carlota Perez: Wikipedia
Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital
The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State
Carlota Perez (@CarlotaPrzPerez) / Twitter
Carlota Perez | UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose – UCL – University College London
Carlota Perez – Agenda Contributor | World Economic Forum
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Clay Shirky on value generation, ChatGpt, and education
Clay Shirky is the Vice Provost of Educational Technologies at New York University and an associate professor at the New York University Tisch school of arts. He is a prominent thinker on the social and economic effects of the Internet and the Web. Clay has authored a number of books, including Here Comes Everybody and Cognitive Surplus.
Our conversation with Clay gravitates around models of value generation in the context of digital technologies and the impact of ai on education. We talk about the social and economic impact of digital technologies, the nature of the internet, and why distributed version control is a new and important form of arguing. We also touch on how the university model of education might co-evolve with the growth of digital technology.
About and From Clay Shirky:
Clay Shirky
Clay Shirky: Wikipedia
Clay Shirky (@cshirky): Twitter
Clay Shirky: TED Speaker
Clay Shirky: Books
Clay Shirky: Institutions vs. collaboration
Recommendations and References:
ChatGPT Is Here — What’s NYU Doing About It? – YR Media
Beware the Shirky Principle: John M Jennings
Clay Shirky Quotes: BrainyQuote
Danah Boyd: Wikipedia
David Weinberger: Wikipedia
Yochai Benkler: Wikipedia
Marshall McLuhan
Attribution of “we shape our tools and then our tools shape us”
Ward Cunningham
John Herman Randall Jr: Wikipedia.
Bob Lewis: books, biography, latest update
Midjourney
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Music:
Music used in this podcast: Simplex Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com): Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0
Chipper Doodle Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com): Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0
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