Trump and the AI Safety Vibe Shift (Robert Wright & Liron Shapira)

Trump and the AI Safety Vibe Shift (Robert Wright & Liron Shapira)

Author: Bloggingheads.tv October 2, 2026 Duration: 1:00:00
Cold Open ... Round Two of Nonzero × Doom Debates ... Trump, the FTC, and an Industry Feeling the Heat ... Google Says Gemini 4 Exists ... Greg Brockman Pulls His $25M from Leading the Future ... The Break-Ins Keep Coming ... The Market Wants Agent Swarms ... The End of “Alignment by Default” ... The Prelude to Recursive Self-Improvement ... David Sacks Can’t Explain Dario ... The All-In Echo Chamber ... Scott Alexander vs. Steven Pinker ... Jason Calacanis vs. the Public Benefit Corporation ... The Elephant in the Room Is the AI ... What the Average American Thinks ... From Chatbot to Agent to Swarm ... Boeing, Agent Swarms, and the Off Switch ... Skynet as a Botnet That Trades With Us ... Tyler Cowen: National Treasure, Net Negative on AI ... Liron’s Doomer DCF Yields a 20x P/E ... Interest Rates: Where Cowen Has Me ... Does Pinker Owe Us a Debate? ... Pinker vs. Instrumental Convergence ... Wrap-Up ...

For over a decade, Bloggingheads.tv has been a unique fixture in the digital landscape, pairing experts and thinkers for in-depth, unscripted dialogues. This podcast captures the essence of those conversations, transforming the split-screen "diavlog" format into an engaging audio experience. You'll hear scholars, journalists, and practitioners dive deep into the week's developments across politics and policy, but the discussions consistently branch into the scientific discoveries, cultural shifts, and public health questions that shape our world. The range is deliberately broad, with episodes moving from a nuanced film analysis to a debate on medical ethics, all grounded in substantive expertise. It’s the intellectual curiosity and genuine exchange between hosts that defines this series, offering listeners a chance to eavesdrop on smart, meandering talks that refuse to stay within narrow lanes. Tune into this podcast not for soundbites, but for the kind of thoughtful, long-form exploration that reveals how interconnected ideas in news, science, and culture truly are.
Author: Language: en-us Episodes: 50

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Podcast Episodes
Trump’s New War on Iran (Robert Wright & Hooman Majd) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:00:00
Hooman's Iranian expertise—inherited and otherwise ... Trump’s new (economic) war on Iran ... What MSM missed about the MOU ... How will Iran respond? ... The intra-MAGA fight over Trump’s foreign policy ... Will Iran do…
The AI Safety Vibe Shift (Robert Wright & David Krueger) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:00:00
Overtime teaser ... David’s AI safety work, past and present ... Has there been a vibe shift in AI? ... Why two AI godfathers went doomer ... The OpenAI breakout as the warning shot heard round the world ... Breaking dow…
Is (Human) Writing Doomed? (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:00:00
Bob channels Dick Cheney ... Is AI killing writing? And thinking? ... How Bob and Paul actually use AI ... The cognitive vs economic value of writing ... AIs aping “Memento” and other frontier freakiness ... Bob: Reckles…
Trump’s Unending War (Robert Wright, Andrew Day, and Curt Mills) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:00:00
Teaser ... How is MAGA feeling about Trump 2.0? ... Bob’s "good" ol’ days at The New Republic ... The biggest threat to the Trump coalition ... Why the MoU unraveled ... Is Iran's regime really divided? ... Part two: Thi…
Fasten Your Bot-belts (Robert Wright & Samuel Hammond) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:00:00
Teaser ... Sam’s ideological leanings ... Sam's AI Manhattan Project–revisited ... What does the “Pacing” letter say about the state of AI? ... Mythos, Astra, and AI’s accelerating acceleration ... The OpenAI “rogue” mod…
The intensifying slow-AI-down vibe (Robert Wright & Holly Elmore) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:00:00
Teaser ... The “Pacing the Frontier” letter signed by AI elites ... Why so many China-hawk AI-safety-hawks? ... Was the “Pacing” letter too small an ask? ... The striking AI vibe shift ... Are AI builders “just following…
The Ideology Behind AI (Robert Wright & Connor Leahy) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:00:00
Teaser ... Connor’s place in the AI world ... Mythos: “digital nuke”? ... The milieu that birthed Dario and other AI titans ... Yudkowsky, Marx, and other AI harbingers ... Effective altruism’s effects on big tech ... Th…