The Beyond Tomorrow Podcast with Julian Issa

Julian Issa
  • 4.5 (6)
  • Life Sciences
  • Updated Weekly

The future feels exciting but a little scary. We're here to help guide you through it. How? 1. Building stronger, more abundant mindsets. 2. Shining a spotlight on the technologies of tomorrow. 3. Identifying the latest longevity & health protocols. Health, longevity, human potential and AI. It's great to have you here. Julian

  1. 2h ago

    ROBOTICS PROFESSOR: "AI Is Becoming Self-Aware! Here’s the Biggest Danger!"

    Is “AI will destroy humanity” a real risk, or a story we tell ourselves because we haven’t done the hard engineering? This episode is brought to you by AgelessRx, where aging becomes a puzzle that can be solved. The mission is to help you live longer and healthier by adding more life to your years through science-backed solutions and personalized care. Learn more at agelessrx.com/beyond-tomorrow. This conversation opens with a simple question to roboticist Hod Lipson, the mind behind Emo: does he feel like a villain? His answer is honest. He’s both excited and terrified, like someone being told an alien race is about to arrive and being asked whether to welcome them. From there, the discussion turns to why robot faces are so hard to build, and why he thinks the moment a robot genuinely smiles back at you will change how we connect with machines. Then it gets into the harder questions. Hod is firm that AI won’t wipe out humanity, and he’s challenged more than once on superintelligence, on who benefits from the fear, and on whether nested sandboxes and “AI cops” can really keep us safe. The conversation also explores what it means for a robot to be self-aware, robots that repair and even “eat” each other, why he worries about kids and students whose best friend is an AI, and how any of us finds meaning when machines can do almost everything. It closes with the best advice he’s ever been given. About Hod Lipson Hod Lipson is a roboticist and AI researcher who leads work on Emo, a robot focused on realistic facial expression and lip movement. His research spans robot self-awareness, self-repairing and self-reproducing robots, and AI in agriculture. ⏱ Timestamps 00:00  Intro 00:08 Do You Feel Like a Villain? The AI Disaster Question 00:59 Robot Faces Are Next 03:49 Why Do We Need a Robot Face? 05:58 Robots That Look More Human-Like 07:50 Are You Scared? 08:42 “We Earned It” as a Human Race 10:40 The Benefits of Developing AI 15:07 Could AI Go Against Us? 17:42 Regulation, Liability and the FDA Analogy 20:00 Meet Emo 23:56 How Will We Interact With Robots in 2030? 27:00 Can a Humanoid Say No to You? 29:24 Do We Lose Skills to Technology? 32:24 Hod’s P(doom) Number: Zero 34:54 AI Is Limited to a Small Part of Our Life 37:42 Can You Switch Off All Robots? 40:44 Is the Doomer Movement Marketing? 43:40 Using AI to Make AI Safer 46:23 Why AI Can’t Kill Us All 50:07 China Leads in Robotics 52:12 Can Robots Develop Awareness? 58:12 The ChatGPT Moment for Robotics 59:28 A Robot Best Friend for a Child? 01:00:26 Would You Let a Robot Babysit? 01:01:53 Self-Awareness in Robots 01:03:42 The Weirdest Things People Will Do With Robots 01:05:10 Building and Maintaining Robots: Robot Metabolism 01:08:41 Exciting Possibilities With Physical Robots 01:10:22 Humans Are Evolving Too 01:13:04 The Pyramid of Needs: Finding Meaning 01:17:35 The Best Piece of Advice 01:18:58 If Tomorrow Was Your Last Day Connect with Hod:  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hod-lipson-4018189  Website: https://www.hodlipson.com/  YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/HodLipson1  Books: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B008VGBM8E/allbooks  Connect with Julian Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thebeyondtomorrowpodcast/ / https://www.instagram.com/juliankissa/  LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/julian-issa  X: https://x.com/juliankissa  Website: www.beyondtomorrowpodcast.com  Email: bookings@beyondtomorrowpodcast.com  Watch the full episode on YouTube, or catch it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. For more conversations from the edge of what's possible, sign up for updates here.

  2. 1d ago

    BT Clip: Exercise Scientist on Weight Loss Drugs (Mike Israetel)

    Do we really know enough about GLP-1 drugs? Mike Israetel breaks down the risks and trade-offs, from anhedonia and calorie-deprived diets to cognitive distortion and the myth of a “zero-harm” default. Watch the full episode here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4iHXkGzLvxSU87rzOHNvlq?si=361782122faa4ea9

  3. 6d ago

    4 Longevity Legends Debate Each Other About Human Flourishing

    What if the fastest way to a longer life isn't a miracle drug, but a wartime mentality against aging? This episode is brought to you by AgelessRx, where aging becomes a puzzle that can be solved. The mission is to help you live longer and healthier by adding more life to your years through science-backed solutions and personalized care. Learn more at agelessrx.com/beyond-tomorrow. Curious about quantum energy wellness? Check out Leela Quantum Tech. Check out https://leelaq.com/   On this episode of Beyond Tomorrow, four heavyweights of the longevity field take a rapid-fire statement format and turn it into a real debate. Aubrey de Grey, Alex Zhavoronkov (Insilico Medicine), George Church (Harvard Medical School), Michael Ringel (Life Biosciences) argue over whether hype helps or hurts the field, and when longevity escape velocity, the point where damage is repaired faster than it accumulates, might actually arrive. Aubrey puts it at a 50/50 chance within 12 to 15 years. Alex says 20 to 50 years and doubts drugs alone can get there. Michael pushes back on the idea of infinite lifespans entirely, while George suggests we may already be gaining years without the evidence to prove it. From there the panel digs into the FDA's new interest in aging, why the TAME metformin trial never opened the floodgates, and whether AI will really shrink clinical timelines. George cites a gene therapy that reached a patient in seven months, while Alex, running many programs, argues that biology still moves at the speed of traffic. The back half covers biohacking and early adopters, the gap between everyday "longevity" and longevity biotechnology, the science of epigenetic reprogramming, what could happen by the XPRIZE Healthspan deadline in 2030, and what each panelist thinks the "ChatGPT moment" for longevity will look like. About the Panelists Aubrey de Grey has spent his entire career in the nonprofit sector, coined the term longevity escape velocity, and has been signed up with Alcor for cryonic preservation since 2002. Alex Zhavoronkov is the founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, a public biotech company with a large pipeline of drug programs that uses AI to compress early discovery work. George Church is a Harvard Medical School geneticist and an optimist on gene therapy and exponential technologies, who argues that regulators embrace new technology and that trial parallelism could dramatically cut development time. Michael Ringel left a career at BCG to join Life Biosciences as chief operating officer, where he works on epigenetic restoration as a path to treating age-related disease and, ultimately, aging itself. ⏱ Timestamps 00:00  Intro 00:20 Is Hype Necessary for Longevity? 02:49 When Hype Goes Too Far 04:14 When Can Longevity Escape Velocity Happen? 09:52 The FDA and Aging as a Focus Area 19:49 Will AI Transform Longevity Research? 24:04 Can AI Shorten Clinical Trials? 26:57 AI Optimists vs. Skeptics 28:38 Alex on Being the Field’s Biggest Skeptic 32:00 Do Critics Need a Drug in the Clinic? 35:24 When Criticism Does Harm 36:45 Is Biohacking Hurting Longevity’s Credibility? 46:57 What Could Be Possible by 2030? 50:49 Optimism vs. Skepticism: Final Thoughts 54:01 Cryonics 54:36 The Longevity “ChatGPT Moment” Connect with Aubrey:  X: https://x.com/aubreydegrey  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aubrey-de-grey-24260b  Connect with Alex:  X: https://x.com/biogerontology  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zhavoronkov  Connect with George:  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/george-church-2b86301  Website: https://colossal.com/george-church/  Connect with Michael:  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-ringel-b272a2  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/msringel/  Connect with Julian Instagram: @thebeyondtomorrowpodcast / @juliankissa LinkedIn: julian-issa X: @juliankissa Website: www.beyondtomorrowpodcast.com  Email: bookings@beyondtomorrowpodcast.com

  4. Oct 13

    BT Clip: Can We Escape The Simulation? (Roman Yampolskiy)

    Are we living in a simulation? Dr. Roman Yampolskiy explains how scientists run experiments inside simulations, why boxing AI may not hold, and what it would mean if AI breaks out of its safe environment, or if humanity escapes its own. Watch the full episode here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2R7oKzVSOWTR5079TYrZsg?si=7fd6c78a016a4b67

  5. Oct 8

    MIT Professor & AI Doomer Admits He Was WRONG (Ramesh Raskar)

    What happens when millions of people hand their lives to AI agents, and nobody has built the rules of the road? This episode is brought to you by AgelessRx, where aging becomes a puzzle that can be solved. The mission is to help you live longer and healthier by adding more life to your years through science-backed solutions and personalized care. Learn more at agelessrx.com/beyond-tomorrow. MIT Media Lab professor Ramesh Raskar argues the real danger isn't the AI engine, it's agents with no governance. His case: decentralize AI so billions of people run their own agents, and build the licences, inspections and audit trails agents need, instead of trusting a few labs to make the engine safe. His P(doom) has fallen from 90% to under 10%. The conversation covers what an AI agent actually is, personal agents like Dot, Muse, Instinct and CC, the DRIVE framework for gradually trusting an agent, why there's no such thing as "zero-shot AGI," the OpenAI and Hugging Face incident, prompt injection, and the shift from an attention economy to an intention economy. One question runs through it all: can we get the benefits of AI agents without handing control to a handful of companies, or to the agents themselves? Ramesh's answer: don't just build better engines, build the roads, the rules and the governance. Key Takeaways An agent is an LLM in a loop with tools: the LLM is the engine, the agent is the car, the internet is the road. Build trust with DRIVE (Discover, Request, Instruct, Venture, Execute), and start with reversible tasks, no credit cards. Decentralized agents shrink the blast radius, which is why Ramesh's P(doom) has dropped sharply. Cost is the bottleneck: running an agent per user costs far more than serving a social media user, so expect revenue-share deals. Prompt injection is the top risk because LLMs can't separate commands from content. Agents need licences, inspection stickers and audit trails. About Ramesh Raskar Ramesh Raskar is a professor at the MIT Media Lab, where he works on decentralized AI and the Internet of Agents. His research focuses on how personal AI agents can be built so power stays distributed instead of concentrated in a few companies. ⏱ Timestamps 00:00  Intro 00:00 Why AI Is Moving So Fast: The Intelligence Economy 01:27 What Is an AI Agent, Really? 04:00 Ramesh's P(Doom) Update 05:46 Is Decentralized AI Safer Than Centralized AI? 09:54 How to Use Personal AI Agents (Dot, Muse, Instinct) 13:35 Will AI Agents Become the New Super App? 17:44 The Agentic Web Explained 20:14 Can Personal Superintelligence Exist? 25:17 A Model That Learns How to Learn Everything 29:19 AI Literacy: What to Do If You're Not Using AI 31:16 From OpenClaw to Muse 36:25 It's Not About Bigger Models, It's About Better Agents 37:51 Road Safety Rules for AI Agents 42:58 What a Safe Agentic World Looks Like 44:23 Surfing the Web With AI Agents 48:44 Voice, Screens or Taps? The Future of Agent Interfaces 50:05 Where Will AI Agents Be in One Year? 53:00 The Best Advice on Agent Autonomy 55:12 The Best Things AI Agents Can Do Today 57:12 Prompt Injection: The Command vs Content Problem 01:03:35 If Tomorrow was Your Last Day... Resources & Mentions Muse (Meta): https://muse.ai  Dots (OpenAI): https://siliconangle.com/2026/09/29/openai-launches-dots-always-on-ai-agents-in-chatgpt-with-their-own-cloud-computers/  OpenClaw: https://openclaw.ai  Hermes Agent (Nous Research): https://hermes-agent.nousresearch.com/docs/  Connect with Ramesh:  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/raskar    MIT Media Lab: https://www.media.mit.edu/people/raskar/overview/  Connect with Julian Instagram: @thebeyondtomorrowpodcast / @juliankissa LinkedIn: julian-issa X: @juliankissa Website: www.beyondtomorrowpodcast.com  Email: bookings@beyondtomorrowpodcast.com  Watch the full episode on YouTube, or catch it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. For more conversations from the edge of what's possible, sign up for updates here.

  6. Oct 6

    BT Clip: Scientist Exposes The Dangers of AI Super Intelligence (Roman Yampolskiy)

    AI safety researcher Roman Yampolskiy breaks down his P(doom) estimate and why he believes artificial superintelligence could be a death sentence for humanity if development keeps moving this fast. His warning isn't anti-AI — it's a case for keeping AI as a tool we control, not a replacement for human judgment. Watch the full episode: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2R7oKzVSOWTR5079TYrZsg?si=302dfca33e9f4c04

  7. Oct 2

    Ex-DeepMind Scientist WARNS: Why We Still Can’t Trust Today’s AI

    Is "AI is dangerous" a warning, or the world's best marketing line? This episode is brought to you by AgelessRx, where aging becomes a puzzle that can be solved. The mission is to help you live longer and healthier by adding more life to your years through science-backed solutions and personalized care. Learn more at agelessrx.com/beyond-tomorrow. On this episode of Beyond Tomorrow, I sit down with Thore Graepel, co-creator of AlphaGo and former researcher at Google DeepMind. I asked him straight up how close we are to superintelligence, and his answer surprised me: there won't be a single moment we can point to, and he argues human organizations like companies already count as a form of superintelligence. We get into why he thinks "AI will destroy humanity" is the biggest myth in the field, the near-term risks he does take seriously, and why I pushed him on the incentives behind the AI safety messaging coming from the labs. From there we go deep on his core technical argument: that today's transformers are black boxes that mix knowledge and reasoning in the same weights, and that scaling alone will never make them trustworthy. He lays out a different approach built on explicit beliefs, hypotheses and evidence, and I found it one of the clearest explanations of AI transparency I've heard. In the back half, we talk about his time at Altos Labs, why biology is a reality check for the "cure all disease in 10 years" claims, and his cell annealing theory of rejuvenation. Key Takeaways Thore sees AI progress as a "jagged frontier," not a single superintelligence moment, and by his own definition, AGI is already here He argues companies and institutions are already a form of superintelligence His P(doom) is very low: extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and he doesn't see it About Thore Graepel Thore Graepel is a computer scientist and AI researcher who recently left Google DeepMind, where he was a co-creator of AlphaGo and worked on multi-agent systems, reasoning and consciousness research. He has also spent time at Altos Labs, applying his machine learning and physics background to cellular rejuvenation, and writes about AI, reasoning and safety on Substack. ⏱ Timestamps 00:00  Intro 00:06 How Close Are We to Superintelligence? 01:42 Are Human Organizations Already Superintelligent? 02:56 Is Anyone Trying to Destroy Humanity? 04:45 Near-Term Risks: Jobs and the Economy 08:08 Why the Transition Will Be Hard 10:06 Post-AGI Planning and the Case for Positive Futures 14:35 Capability vs. Diffusion: The Train Driver Problem 16:46 Optimization vs. Game Theory 18:53 The Incentives Behind AI Safety Messaging 22:26 What Is Thore's P(doom)? 23:25 Why Transformers Are Black Boxes 29:19 How Do We Build Safer, More Transparent AI? 33:01 Separating Knowledge From Reasoning 37:39 Safety vs. Capability and the Trust Ceiling 39:45 Narrow AI vs. General AI 44:02 Do You Believe in God? 47:15 Consciousness and Whether LLMs Are Alive 51:08 AlphaGo and Move 37 58:29 Credit Assignment and Moral Reasoning 01:04:31 Who Sets the Moral Guardrails? 01:09:37 The AGI Race: US vs. China 01:11:53 Longevity and Altos Labs 01:16:01 The Biology Reality Check 01:23:04 Pockets of Computability and AlphaFold 01:26:05 Yamanaka Factors and Cell Annealing 01:35:51 Will the Singularity Happen in Your Lifetime? 01:36:49 Rapid Fire Questions with Thore 01:41:35 Thore's Best Piece of Advice Resources & Mentions AlphaGo and AlphaFold (Google DeepMind) Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman Altos Labs Stephen Wolfram's "pockets of computability" David Deutsch on simulation and the limits of experiment Thore's Substack  Connect with Thore:  Github: https://thoregraepel.github.io/  LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/thoregraepel  X: https://x.com/ThoreG  Connect with Julian Instagram: @thebeyondtomorrowpodcast / @juliankissa LinkedIn: julian-issa X: @juliankissa Website: www.beyondtomorrowpodcast.com  Email: bookings@beyondtomorrowpodcast.com

  8. Sep 24

    Dr Mike Israetel: ‘’ALMOST EVERY American Should Be On GLP-1s, Here’s Why!’’

    What if vanity was actually the smart way into a longer, healthier life? This episode is brought to you by AgelessRx, where aging becomes a puzzle that can be solved. Their mission is to help you live longer and healthier by adding more life to your years through science-backed solutions and personalized care. Learn more at agelessrx.com/beyond-tomorrow. On this episode of Beyond Tomorrow, Dr. Mike Israetel breaks down what's actually happening in his own bloodstream: 5mg/week of tirzepatide year-round, plus retatrutide during fat-loss phases, and why he thinks “GLP-2” is a gray-market marketing term with no basis in real receptor biology. He walks through the non-weight-loss case for these drugs, reduced systemic and neural inflammation, better glucose control, emerging anti-cancer data, and a documented drop in addictive behaviors from gambling to alcohol to cigarettes, before getting honest about the tradeoffs: undernutrition, anhedonia, and a long-term data set that, by his own admission, will never be “complete enough” for some critics. From there the conversation moves into gray-market peptides, why Mike separates his own risk tolerance from what he'd recommend to the public, and why there currently isn't a single peptide he'd recommend for muscle growth despite the demand. The back half covers his real thesis: that appearance, not health, is the most reliable motivator most people actually respond to and that chasing it tends to produce the same outcomes doctors have failed for decades to sell through fear. Key Takeaways Mike takes tirzepatide (Zepbound/Mounjaro) year-round at 5mg/week and adds retatrutide during cutting phases, both well within studied dose ranges He argues most GLP-1 “anhedonia” is caloric-deficit anhedonia, not a direct drug effect, the same thing bodybuilders experience on any aggressive diet New aggregate mortality data shows older adults on GLP-1s die less than those who aren't, which he says partially answers the “but will it kill you later” question There is currently no peptide he'd recommend for muscle growth, a claim he says consistently disappoints people who ask His core argument: use appearance as the entry point (build muscle, lose fat, sleep better) and let the longevity benefits follow, rather than trying to motivate people with 30-years-out health outcomes Timestamps 00:00 Intro 00:10 Is GLP-1 a Bad Idea? 08:55 The Seatbelt Analogy for Drugs 10:30 The Peptide That's Not FDA-Approved Yet 11:30 Exactly What Mike Takes Every Week 13:59 Stacking Peptides: an N-of-1 Experiment 15:11 Why Mike Takes Anabolic Steroids 16:42 The Drug That Could Replace Steroids 18:48 Why Mike Takes Tirzepatide and Retatrutide 21:45 20-Year Life Extension 25:34 Mike's Full Daily Stack 30:47 The Looksmaxxing Trojan Horse 35:35 Sick Care vs. Health Care 38:14 Three Exercises You Can Do Today 40:36 Critiquing Brian Johnson's Protocol 43:31 Is There a One-Size-Fits-All Workout? 46:06 Zone 2 vs. Zone 5 Training 52:21 Why Most Biohacking Is a Waste of Money 54:01 Is HIIT Still the Rage? 57:09 Escaping Poverty, Fueling Success 01:04:53 Why People Take Extreme Measures to Look Good 01:08:24 Moving Past GLP-1 01:14:52 Everyone Will Look 22 by 2037 01:18:24 Would You Date a 90-Year-Old? 01:24:52 Beauty Standards in a Post-GLP-1 World 01:25:37 The Cybernetic Revolution 01:28:25 Living Forever in a Robot Body 01:36:29 Will AI Cause Human Extinction? 01:43:28 The Biggest Myth About Weight Loss 01:44:02 Rapid Fire Questions with Mike 01:48:06 Mike's Best Piece of Advice Connect with Mike: Website: rpstrength.com/ Facebook: facebook.com/michael.israetel Instagram: @drmikeisraetel X: @misraetel Connect with Julian Instagram: @thebeyondtomorrowpodcast / @juliankissa LinkedIn: julian-issa X: @juliankissa Website: www.beyondtomorrowpodcast.com Email: bookings@beyondtomorrowpodcast.com

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The future feels exciting but a little scary. We're here to help guide you through it. How? 1. Building stronger, more abundant mindsets. 2. Shining a spotlight on the technologies of tomorrow. 3. Identifying the latest longevity & health protocols. Health, longevity, human potential and AI. It's great to have you here. Julian

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