AI, Techno-optimism, and Cosmic Purpose (Robert Wright & Kevin Kelly)
Robert Wright's Nonzero
Nonzero
4.7 • 618 Ratings
🗓️ 10 June 2024
⏱️ 54 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
0:28 Kevin’s place in cyberspace history 6:54 Are we grappling with the pace of tech progress rationally? 20:49 Why Kevin identifies as a techno-optimist 23:12 Is it too early to regulate AI? 30:21 The noosphere, the technium, and species of mind 38:11 Do AI doomers think too highly of thinking? 42:13 Evolution and the question of cosmic purpose 48:42 Should we see AIs as “artificial aliens”?
Robert Wright (Nonzero, The Evolution of God, Why Buddhism Is True) and Kevin Kelly (Wired, The Inevitable, What Technology Wants). Recorded April 29, 2024.
Overtime titles:
Kevin's spiritual transformation.Will AI be like a god to humans? Vice-versa?How expecting near-term death changed Kevin’s life.A bettor way of making AI predictions.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | You're listening to Robert Wright's Non-Zero podcast. You're listening to Robert Wright's Non-Zero Podcast. |
| 0:27.1 | Hi, Kevin. |
| 0:31.5 | Hey, Bob. |
| 0:32.6 | Nice to see you. |
| 0:34.2 | Good to see you. |
| 0:35.0 | Let me introduce this. |
| 0:35.7 | I'm Robert Wright, publisher of the Non-Zero Newsletter This is a non-zero podcast. You are Kevin Kelly, famous techno visionary, and I would say seminal figure in the evolution of Silicon Valley culture. Do you think that's going too far, Kevin? |
| 0:51.8 | Yes. Okay. Let me scale it it down I am a radical |
| 0:57.1 | optimist |
| 0:57.8 | radical technological optimist |
| 0:59.5 | and I think that's my job |
| 1:02.4 | it's a job somebody's got to do |
| 1:04.5 | Kevin and God knows I'm not doing it |
| 1:06.5 | no one else is doing it |
| 1:08.8 | yeah so |
| 1:10.4 | let me say a little more about you, though. |
| 1:14.2 | So you were a co-founder of Wired Magazine and its executive editor for some years thereafter, starting in 1993, I think. |
| 1:23.7 | And before that, you had been for some years editor and publisher of the Whole Earth Review, |
| 1:28.6 | which was an important thing in, this was in, I guess, the early 80s, important thing in |
| 1:35.5 | Silicon Valley culture. |
| 1:36.4 | You played a role in founding the well. |
| 1:38.8 | I don't know if you're technically co-founder, but that was, how do you, how would you |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Nonzero, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Nonzero and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.