Why Interdependence Matters: Baratunde Thurston on Democracy and Responsible Tech
Guy Kawasaki's Remarkable People
Guy Kawasaki
4.5 • 679 Ratings
🗓️ 26 November 2025
⏱️ 59 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What does it take to stay grounded when the world feels increasingly disconnected and tech-driven? That’s the question at the center of this conversation with Baratunde Thurston. A cultural critic, outdoor explorer, author, technologist, and host of Life With Machines and America Outdoors, Baratunde is impossible to categorize—and that’s exactly why this episode lands with such force.
We dig into identity, democracy, interdependence, and the real stakes of living alongside powerful technologies.
This episode pushes us to ask: How do we live well with technology? How do we reconnect in a divided time? And how do we build a future rooted in values—not fear?
Don’t miss it.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Here's something remarkable and not in a good way. Disengaged employees cost U.S. companies |
| 0:06.5 | almost $1.9 trillion a year. That's a lot of zeros. Why? Because when teams lack the right |
| 0:13.7 | skills, productivity declines, turnover increases, and strategies stagnate. But it doesn't have to be |
| 0:20.5 | that way. At Project Management Institute, |
| 0:23.1 | home of the PMP and globally recognized certifications, your people can learn to collaborate, |
| 0:29.1 | deliver on time, and actually get things done. The cost of not upskilling? Way higher than the |
| 0:35.4 | investment. Project Management Institute. Find the answers at pmi.org. |
| 0:42.0 | The technological tools being promoted right now are selling loneliness. You don't need people. |
| 0:48.8 | You don't need employees. You don't need human relationships. You don't need human friends. |
| 0:53.2 | Like, here's an AI companion for you. |
| 0:55.3 | Here's an AI agent that can do the job of all these people for you. |
| 0:58.5 | So you can build a $1 billion company all by yourself, as if that's a feature and not the most dangerous bug of all. |
| 1:08.4 | So residing in that space, and I've been learning a lot over the past couple of years |
| 1:12.9 | about the deeper truth of interdependence, even to the foundation of the United States. |
| 1:22.6 | Good morning, everybody. I'm Guy Kawasaki. This is the Remarkable People podcast. And as you know, |
| 1:29.7 | because I've said it now 300 times, we're on this quest and mission to find inspiring |
| 1:36.0 | and informational and quite frankly remarkable people. And we found another one. And I hope I get his name right because he said no one has ever |
| 1:47.5 | mispronounced his name i don't want to refer us one it's baratune day thurston did i get that right |
| 1:54.5 | yeah you crushed it guy yeah yes that was the most you know i i i like have a short introduction of people, but he's a difficult one to introduce because |
| 2:06.7 | he's like a cultural critic. |
| 2:08.9 | He's a comic. |
| 2:10.1 | He's a writer. |
... |
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