Promise Sean

As usual this week we try to cover the latest advancements in technology and science, and mapping them against potential ethical dilemmas. Among the inventions we cover, I specifically want to call out China's rifle-equipped robot dogs, and the really, REALLY, unsettling use of human brain tissue in computing. We had a less structured conversation today to focus mainly on these topics, as they’re some of the more dystopian inventions we’ve covered to date. Join in, and see how we try and chart the upside to them.
Sean’s links:
* The terminator dog
* The drone first responder
* The icky biocomputer
* The cement recycling
Ben’s links:
* The soccer robots
* The shipping emissions and climate change conundrum
* Learning to speak Whale
* Ketosis and cognitive function
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This episode, we chat about everything from spy headphones, to synthetic bones, officially-sanctioned election deepfakes, battery tech, mental disorders, to AI dating agents and so much more. The topics begin to converge around how emerging tech is rapidly changing what we understand of our society. What do the concepts of democracy or business mean in this new world? What about how we view fictional icons, known for being at the forefront of tech? Or what we understand of our own health? How do we keep up? All this and more, coming right up.
Sean’s links:
* AI headphones let wearer listen to a single person in a crowd, by looking at them just once
* The amount of copper needed to build EVs is ‘impossible for mining companies to produce’
* Gelatinous sea animals swim using coordinated jet propulsion.
* Mental disorders may spread in young people's social networks
Ben’s links:
* Synthetic Bones Designed by AI
* Using viruses to kill cancer
* Indian Voters Are Being Bombarded With Millions of Deepfakes. Political Candidates Approve
* Your AI Will Date Other People's AIs
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Otherwise, you can find Promise on your favorite podcast platforms:
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This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit promisefm.substack.com

In this episode, we explore everything from incremental developments, to exponential bounds being made in technology. From a healthier grape juice that could shift dietary habits, to moving data millions of times faster with the same hardware that could redefine how we experience recreation. We also cover the blurred lines between space technology and military hardware, and what might be needed from both to redefine civilian travel. All this and more, coming right up!
Sean’s links:
* Stretchy e-skin
* 45 million times the data transfer speed on the same fiber optics
* Advon, the AI content creation agency proliferating mainstream papers
* Gannett staff’s response to their AI policy
* China’s potential world-first drone carrier
* China’s new rail gun test
* US Senator Chuck Schumer’s AI bill one-pager (contains PDF)
Ben’s links:
* Launch of the world’s largest carbon capture project
* Fresher, tastier, healthier concord grape juice
* World’s biggest 3D printer, making houses in record time
* Solar tech converting greenhouse gases into usable fuel
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Otherwise, you can find Promise on your favorite podcast platforms:
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This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit promisefm.substack.com

This episode, Ben and I cover everything from hardware that can “taste”, gels that patch wounds or make computers, to mutant space bacteria, and magic carpet floors. Our utopias and dystopias range from redefining the ways we create food and understand flavor, to reinventing how an assembly line works, to targeted cancers, total ecosystem destruction, and more. Have a listen: what do you think will come from all of this frontier tech?
Sean’s links:
* Marques Brownlee at the Disney Imaginarium
* E-tongue tastes when wine goes bad
* New mutant bacteria on the space station
* Startup using AI to edit human DNA
Ben’s links:
* “Quantum memory”
* Revolutionary gel-based wound dressings
* Revolutionary gel-based PCBs
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Otherwise, you can find Promise on your favorite podcast platforms:
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This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit promisefm.substack.com

In this episode, Ben and I talk about everything from real-time deepfake romances, to new battery tech, to dumb phones, and AIs predicting human motion and expression. All the topics begin to converge around social isolation, connection, and how emerging tech would look to fight it. Where do we draw the line between human and synthetic emotional connection? And how does that extend into our physical world? And finally, is this something we want, or are we headed there anyway?
Sean’s links:
* AI predicting humanoid locomotion
* The Dumbphone Boom
* The vaccine to end all vaccines?
Ben’s links:
* AI predicting human smiles
* Real-time deepfake romance scams
* Rapid charge/discharge sodium batteries
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Otherwise, you can find Promise on your favorite podcast platforms:
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This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit promisefm.substack.com

In this episode, Ben and I explore a plethora of groundbreaking topics that blur the lines between the fantastical and the tangible. From the advanced manipulation of light that brings us one step closer to real-life 'lightsabers,' to controversy of 'totally not eugenics' that could redefine what we understand about genetic selection and the future of human evolution. We also cover potential ways swarming nanobots could help us rethink what 'infrastructure' means, how it works, and so much more.
Sean’s links:
* Socially swarming nanorobots
* Bending light signals around corners
* Levitating materials (shared with Ben)
Ben’s links:
* Controlling light and making it “hard”
* Gene screening startup that is totally not eugenics
* Quantum breakthroughs in predicting material science suitability
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Otherwise, you can find Promise on your favorite podcast platforms:
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This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit promisefm.substack.com