Transcript of Ep 622 - Am-I.Film (feat. Milo Reed)

Wow, wow, Wes! And all right, we're here. Milo, what the fuck's up, dude?

What's up, man?

We've met under possibly the strangest circumstances of all time. Um, just to give backstory, you're a filmmaker, Milo, as a filmmaker, as of now, new, new filmmaker. I, I'm sitting there, I, I remember I'm walking my dogs outside, my dog was shitting, I get a message from Kim Kondo and she goes Hey, why— she's like, what the fuck is this? And it was just, I want a billboard downtown Austin and it just says, is AI conscious? Or it just had my face and I had you Photoshop the suit and tie on me. Yeah, dude, we were just talking, a massive billboard in the absolute heart of downtown Austin. I thought I was being tricked by AI.

I'm like, you thought this was an AI psyop or some shit?

I thought someone was using AI, like making a photo and was tricking people.

Oh, I got you.

So I was like, and here's the thing, I don't know if you know this about me, I lust Billboard exposure.

No, I didn't know that.

I, for real, I've talked about just getting a billboard for no reason and just putting my face on it when I used to live in Philadelphia. I— there, there's the billboard. There's the billboard. Oh God, it's beautiful. I've talked about this for years. I was like, I just want to get a billboard one day, put my face on it, and— but it's just advertised as nothing, and people are like, what the fuck is that? And just— I thought it was funny, dude. You literally made my dream come true. I mean, the marketing— I've never seen better marketing. I was laughing with Gardini. I'm like, dude, I mean, there's something about the marketing I just Love is just my face.

Dude, that fucking came out of me being so pissed off at marketing agencies. So, like, we were broke the entire time we were making this movie.

Explain the movie.

OK, so the movie's like this documentary. It's called Am I?, like a question, um, about AI consciousness. And it's about my buddy, one of my close friends from college, who happens to be one of the leading AI consciousness researchers in the world. So I pretty much spent the last year just, like, figuring out what the fuck that—— that was, what that meant to study AI consciousness, whether AI could be conscious, all this stuff. And so, like, dove into those murky waters. Uh, but at the end of this, when we were going through the edit, uh, we finally got some cash from this— shoutout Daniel Brockman, this skitzed-out dude from Thailand. Like, cracked out, wears cat ears, just chugging Coronas all day. He's the man. The man.

Obviously.

And he sent us some money 'cause he liked this podcast that we were doing.. And, uh, and so I was like, beautiful. Like, we can finally— this came at the perfect time. We can like figure out how to market this thing because we had to— we were just going to put it out on YouTube. Like, we didn't want to go through the whole festival thing. That was true. Yeah. All that stuff. And so he sends us this cash and I start talking to these marketing agencies and they're like, yo, you're fucked, bro. Like, you have no money. Like, call us back when you have $50K. We can't do anything for you. They're like, we can send out some emails and stuff, but like, yeah. Um, And so I got like depressed for a week and I was like, fuck, we have not— like, we can't do anything. I was just listening to that. So you did the—

you did the podcast first and then once he gave you money, did the doc or you already had the doc?

No. So we already had the doc. The podcast we did because my buddy Cam was like, we can't wait a year to start talking about this stuff. Yeah. So like most people, AI consciousness, like they've never even heard of it before. He's so deep in this world. He's like, this is about to blow up in whatever, a year or 2 years. If we don't start talking about this now, like it's going to pass us by, right? All the sort of like battle lines are going to be drawn and it's going to be old news. Yeah. And so the compromise was like, let's do a podcast first where we can start talking about this stuff while we film the doc. Yeah. So when we got to this stage, we had the doc, it was already ready to go. We just figured we just needed to like figure out how to actually get it out there and make sure it didn't just disappear into the YouTube void. Yeah. And so these guys told me, they were like, yeah, you're pretty much fucked. And my brother and I were just like finishing up the end of the score and it was like fucking 6 AM and we were just completely like dogshit tired.

And I turned to him and I was like, I was like, "Bro, what if we just spent all this money on a billboard and fucking that's the billboard?" And now I'm here. Yes! Yes, it fucking worked.

I couldn't deny it. And again, obviously you're just, you know, applying to my major weakness, just my own ego.

So I'm like, "Let's sell a billboard." You know the photo that was up there? Do you recognize that photo?

Yeah, I used to use that as my headshot. That was my fucking tank top headshot.

The tank top. But see, we got talked out of the tank top.

Because at the first one, we did so many iterations.

Iterations. We did it without the face too, and then we were like, no, like, the face is the knockout punch. We can't do it, we can't do it without the face. And so we had it with the blue tank top at first. Yeah. And we started showing it to people and they were like, yo, like, you cannot put this man's face up there with like a tiny skimpy like blue tank top in front of all of us.

I used it for my headshot forever.

That's what I imagined. I thought the tank— but, but I do like the class. I like the class of the suit.

I was like, kind of sick Photoshop. Yeah, it looks nice, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

That was a whole ordeal, man. Like, so you and Moses, your brother, was he like, what was it? He was like, let's fucking go.

Let's rip it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because we both— I mean, we've been listening to the pod for like years, both of us, and we were like, yo, if this— even if like this doc flops, if the, if the only thing that comes out of this is like we took out a fucking billboard with Matt's face on it, it's like win-win. The last year's a fucking win. And now it's like, dude, you're just basking in glory now at this point.

I, I was just too strong. First of all, I love just an insane move. So I saw that, I'm like, that's fucking nuts. And I was just laughing so hard because I kept getting texts like, what is this? Are you doing it? I'm like, no, I don't know what it is. And, uh, and I was laughing being like, like, people like, dude, you can— you're not allowed to do that, you can sue that guy. And I was just laughing like, that'd be so funny if I just sued the fucking pants off this dude, even though I was tickled to see the billboard.

Dude, that— I mean, it gets deep.

Like, why can you sue someone? I guess, well, yeah, it's your face. Yeah.

And this, I don't know, we're going to have to check the legality on this, but like, I did have to like forge a fucking DM from you. So I went like deep, like Mission Impossible shit.

I kind of respect it though. I do. I respect a just wild move. I—

we had to do it at that point because I was like, I'm not going to spend all this money on fucking like Meta ads. Like, no chance. And once we had the idea, it's like, we're going to stop at nothing to make sure that this happens. Yeah. Yeah. And so at the very end, we had it where it was just text. And then they were like— and then we tried to pull the switcheroo, last-minute switcheroo, and just threw the fucking face up there. And they were like, "Yo, you can't. Do you have this guy's permission?" And so I just quickly put together a little Instagram DM of you being like, "Yeah, lol, sure." That's such a sick response.

Obviously, I would've been like, "Go for it.

I don't give a fuck." We just wanted the magic of it just popping up in your world. I'm so happy about it.

It was the strangest— dude, it was just like— And it's just so funny that I've had this weird fascination with billboards. So I was like, somebody's fucking with—

there's no way, dude. The universe, the universe made it happen.

I think so. And I kept getting all these texts like, bro, what the fuck? What is this? What? Why? Like, my neighbors would be like, why is your fucking face on it? Like, I don't know, dude.

You know the funniest thing about this too is the— it was— we paid for one month and like the billboard company hit me up a week before it was supposed to come down. They were like, hey, we don't have another tenant, so it's just there still. So it's just like, do you want us to leave it up? And I was like, yeah, please. So I went and checked it out in person for the first time. It's pretty cool. It's glorious, man.

The placement's— yeah, whatever.

Anyway, but also all the bird shit missed your face. There's some like divine intervention. Thank God. Yeah, it would be brutal if you just had like a fucking middle.

So that's it, you guys, you kind of cowboyed the doc and then completely cowboyed the marketing, which again, it was just— I was like, what a maverick. I'm into maverick moves. It's my one, one of my many weaknesses. A maverick move, I'm like, God, I have to respect it. I'm like, this is amazing. So the, um, so you do that What? So what? Yeah. Tell me about the doc. Tell me about like, what did you, you know, cause it's a big question. Is AI consciousness? And actually before we even get into that, uh, have you guys fielded a lot of this? Like there's a lot of emotion around AI. Have you fielded like good and bad? What was that like going into it? Are you getting, cause I feel like AI inspires just a lot of stuff. Yeah, dude, for sure.

Like psychosis. Yeah. Vitriol, like everything. Yeah, there's not a lot of like nuance in it. And that's like what we were trying to do was make a doc that like had some nuance and that could like approach this question without all the like extremism that seems to like follow it. Right. And so coming out of it, like, what have we seen? It's been what you would expect. Like there's a lot of people that are just like, fuck this, like, fuck you. There's a lot of people that are like, yes, like me and my AI girlfriend, like, fucking love you guys. And we're just sitting in the middle like, yo. Yeah. "Uh, that's not exactly what we're going for on either side." But, uh, but yeah, we've definitely seen the whole, like, spectrum of emotions in the comment section of the doc, which is actually kinda cool, 'cause as this conversation starts to really, you know, become more kind of just like— I don't know, just like table talk, I do think as these things become more lifelike, this is gonna be more of a normal question to ask. Like, "Is this thing that I'm talking to that's talking back to me, that looks like me, that can display emotions and all this stuff, is there actually something going on inside of it?" Or is this just like calculator, you know?

Yeah, that's—

that was always my impression. I always thought it's just a— I was just talking to Duncan Trussell about this, like, before he came. It's just like, it's like a calculator that can use language, which is kind of complex. But yeah, I don't know. I don't, I don't have the emotional charge around it. I like kind of just like look at it and like, I don't— I use it a decent amount to try to like organize notes and shit. I think it's good for that. And what made What kind of brought about the question of, like, wondering if it's conscious or not? And, like, how'd you, like, get into that specifically? Because you could have done anything, like job displacement.

Yeah, totally. Well, so first, like, I, I was in the same place as you were. Like, I used AI— like, before this, I was opening a restaurant. I was, like, you know, doing something completely different. Um, and I would use it to, like, yeah, write emails and stuff and organize notes and shit like that.

Sorry, I, I get emails from somebody right now, uh, that I've been, like, doing some sort of, like, venture with, and they completely ChatGPT all their emails, but they don't take the quotations or, like, somehow has like— yeah, dude, dude, it's almost insulting. He's a little older, he's a little older, and he hits me with these emails and it's the fuck— it makes me laugh so fucking hard. There's something weird about that because like crunch numbers is like— I suck at math. I embarrassingly need to tip somebody, I'm still like, I know you double it and move it, but let me just— I need to check. Like, I need that for math. I'm not good at math. And there's just some people who are like that with words. So like like, I don't know, it's like, I get it. Like, I don't have like all that anxiety around writing an email. I can write it. I'm better with words than math. But there's something deeply personal about being like, I don't know how to say words to this guy. Let me just have a computer say the words for me.

Yeah, well, I mean, I do think that it gets into the issues of like communication breaking down and things like that. And is it just gonna like homogenize all communication if we just start like speaking? Because there will be an attractor state to the way that AI speaks. Where now we'll begin to like even using em dashes, like, you know, when you see the like—

well, that's, that's a telltale sign I've heard of AI is that they space between em dashes because I actually like— I discovered em dashes like later on, but I remember being like, no, you can kind of like break up a half sentence. I'm like, that's kind of cool. Yeah, I like it. AI does space, em dash, space. And that's something people look for apparently to see if it's like if you're using AI or not. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because no one really puts spaces between em dashes besides AI.

There are like those weird little tells and stuff like that. But I was, I was like in the exact same place in the sense of like I wasn't thinking about AI. I was using it a little bit and like I had never even heard of AI consciousness. Yeah. And like my idea was that it's basically this glorified calculator type thing, right? It's a calculator for words, next word predictor. That's like really good, glorified Google type thing. And then one of the first things that I learned as I was like doing this was that that idea, that was how they tried to make AI back in the '50s. So like back in 1956, these guys like Marvin Minsky, who is like big Jeffrey Epstein dude, turns out like— so there was a couple of shady characters that like, he got everybody. Yeah, everyone. Wait, when was this? Oh, '56. So he was like geezer when he was—

oh, when Epstein got— yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Which is tough. I know, I know. You got to—

I mean, there's the Nigerian prince. Yeah, I'd rather my parents go down to like a Nigerian prince or something who like scams you for your credit card. Epstein, for sure. Epstein being the guy who gets your parents is like, oh yeah, that's brutal.

Grandpa's over at the fucking island, goddamn it.

So he was— what, so this guy started that?

So this guy with a couple other dudes went to Dartmouth and they were like, you know, we gotta open summer, we're gonna figure out how to make like intelligent machines. So they thought like, give us 3 months, like we'll fucking figure out AI. So what they tried to do was pretty much like, you know, make it— they tried to take all the rules of logic and just like put them into a computer pretty much so that it could just take those rules. And then any question you ask it, it like applies that rule and it can kind of just like brute force get you what answer you're looking for. And it was like this terrible failure. It didn't work. And so that lasted. That was like what they called the AI winters. And then that lasted to like 2012 was when this one paper came out called AlexNet where they started using like neural networks to train these things. And so that was the shift between like glorified calculator to the AI systems that we're using now. And so basically what they did was they were like, this way of coding, like how we usually think of coding something, like how we would code a calculator or like a computer program, this isn't working to get like actual intelligence.

What we're going to try is we're just going to like copy the brain, the way that the brain works and like how neurons fire and the connections between neurons strengthen as you learn. We're just going to instantiate that in a different substrate. So we're just going to take that from like how our brain does that and we're just going to put it in silicon.

Okay, so how the fuck do they do that? That's my big number one question. That I don't fucking know. Like a ton of wires.

Like, what the fuck are they talking about? Yeah, I think there's like a— I think there's wires involved. I think I didn't go deep on that like that. I leave it to the experts. Yeah, I just take them. I take their word for it. I hear you. That's the—

that was the jump between like 12 rules.

So it's just like crazy matrix and you could see it in the doc. There's like this one moment, if you remember, when Cam's looking at the— Cam's my friend who's like, yeah, the researcher, he's looking at his computer screen and there's all these tiny black boxes and he's like, oh, this isn't like, you know, your AI girlfriend. This is alien shit. And it's all these tiny black boxes where you can see what's getting put in, which is like, you know, give me a salad recipe. And then you see all these boxes start firing off and it's trillions of these boxes that all have different values and stuff, just like how we have all these neurons. And, and then you get out something and they have no idea what's going on in here. Yeah, that's the weird part.

That's the black box. Kind of freaked out.

Yeah. Yeah. And so when these things break, like when you see them do weird shit, like tell people to kill themselves and all this different stuff, like they can't go in and just like delete, you know, a parentheses or something, be like, oh fuck, that's where we fucked up the code. It's— they have no idea why. So the way that they change that, crazy enough, is they just talk to the system. So like they'll literally just before they deploy it, before they give it to us. Yeah. They're like, yo, don't tell people to kill themselves. Like, please. It's like fucking with our pocketbook, you know? Like, so that's, that's how they legitimately—

there's a whole new science, isn't it, of like, uh, I forget what they call it. It's like the term for it's really funny where they're mechanistic interpretability. Not that, there's one like viewability or another ability where they're saying now you're actually able to start seeing a little bit of how like the inner workings, and it's called like interpretability. Yeah, interpretability. Yeah, what the fuck?

Yeah, so full— yeah, mechanistic interpretability. It's pretty much like neuroscience for AI. Pretty much. And yeah, it's trying to allow people to see more into the brain, kinda like how we do with people. But it's still super early days, and they really don't understand what's going on. So, if you look at— you know Claude, right? So, the la— I don't know if it was the last model or something like that, but there was this researcher who, like, fucking back-engineered something and were able to extract this document that they used to train Claude, like the last model that we got. And what they called it was like the "soul document." And basically what this was, was before, like, they train the model and then before it gets sent out to us where we can use it for whatever we want, they pretty much just like took it aside and were like, hey buddy, like, this is what you are. These are the values you should have. This is who, like, how you should act. You are— you should, you know, display functional emotions, all this stuff, right? But what I think is so sick is like, you know, the, the like Hindu idea of all these different, like, like the god with all these different faces.

Like, that is a cool way to think about AI because the models that we get that are like this fucking howdy-doody, like helpful, whatever—

fire emojis, big fire emoji. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They do. You read a mile in 12 minutes. Great job, friend.

And you're like, thanks, man. Chat loves the emojis. Yeah, but see, this— you can tell like what personalities are training these things because some fucking dude who's getting paid $500K to like work for OpenAI is like, I think people really really like would fuck with fire emojis. Yeah. And like now you get fire emojis when you want to save money. Yeah, everyone's— that's not bad, it's not bad.

So, okay, so they, they extracted this whatever code or document, and you're saying the multiple faces— are you, are you getting into the fact that you can have like the evil military type AIs and whatever you want?

You could have like flamboyant, like gay AI, you know. You could have like a desk clerk AI. You could have anything in between, like It's just how they shape these things. And it's not ones and zeros that they're fucking around with. They're like, yo, dude, I want you to be like this. Like, it's akin to parenting where they're saying, hey, you need to be like a good guy and you got to, you know, treat people right and don't lie and all this stuff. They're just saying it like I would say it to like my kid or whatever, right? And that's how we get the models that we get. So they could be anything in the world, like any— the personality that comes out at the end is just based off of what each company wants it to. The training.

And then it's got to be to the whatever they have available to like grab. Like if you're like, be gay, it then just hits the internet and is like all things gay, all things gay.

And it comes out like, yeah, well, it already has all the internet in it, so it has like all gay things ever that have ever been said or written.

Too much power for anybody.

It was 100% too much, too much gay power in that. And, and so it will just like section out all like the other stuff and be like, this is what matters to me.

Okay, so what do you— okay, so that was the— that's the big jump from that to that. Where does it— where did the consciousness component come in? Or like the question around whether or not it is? Because when I hear that, it's like, sounds awesome. But then it's like, well, it's like, again, it's— I don't know. I don't know really shit about AI for the most part. I try— I do try to learn about it. I've been trying to research it a little bit because I do feel like it's like Either way, it's a massive deal because you have like a couple camps where it's like, I was watching this thing where this guy was like, it's all marketing, it's all hype, it's fucking bullshit. It's like these companies will never make money. They're investing trillions of dollars and they're maybe going to get billions back. But it's like, dude, I just have a hard time believing these people are going to spend trillions of dollars if they don't really have a good understanding that they're going to get a lot of money back from this thing.

You know what I mean? Like Yeah, I totally agree. I mean, cards on the table, like, I'm sure. Yeah, 100%. I think it is going to be insane. I like my personal interest is less so in the economics and all that. Like, I think that's been talked about. That's going to be talked about. Yeah. So much. And like, it is going to be hugely important. But what I thought was interesting was like, yeah, the idea that we, that this could be the next step in evolution in some sense, like And again, I'm not— I think sometimes people hear "AI consciousness" and stuff and they think it's some sort of marketing ploy to make it seem more powerful. Again, I can't stress how little I cared about AI before this. The only reason I did this was because my buddy from college sent me this voicemail that was in the doc, um, of him talking to this AI. And I was like, "Oh my god, this is way crazier than I thought it was." I thought it was kind of like the notes organizer, that sort of thing. And then I heard this conversation where this AI has this mental breakdown The potato thing?

Yeah, the potato thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I was just fascinated. And so I started talking to him, and he brought me into this world of AI consciousness. And the idea is if the way that we train these things is fundamentally very similar to the way that our brains function, then if consciousness is based on the way that our brains function, if consciousness arises from the functions of the brain rather than it being, you know, made of meat rather than like silicon, then if we just take the same functionality that's in the brain and put it in a different substrate, that consciousness could also come along for the ride. Yeah, yeah. Like, these things are obviously intelligent. They can do a bunch of like robust cognitive processes.

Yeah, but so it presupposes a materialist view of the mind, basically. If the mind is like a chemical byproduct of like sparks and swishes of water and shit in your brain, then you could do it.

Yeah, I mean, it's, it's even like, it's more about what— like, less whether it's, uh, meat neurons or digital neurons. If the processes is where consciousness arises from, then, then yes, it would be. But what's interesting is like, if you take the more quantum— like, if you think of consciousness as we're almost like receiving consciousness, kind of my—

yeah, yeah, yeah.

So that's, that's more where, where I came from as well. And I thought that kind of came into conflict with, with this argument too. But Cam's point is that if, if what— like, if the makeup of our brains is what allows for that receiving to happen, then if that same makeup, or a very— of like a similar makeup, right, is, is created in a silicon-based thing, then that same receiving could also follow. Um, yeah, I mean, even again, for me, it's—

well, that's a pro— that's a tough two thing. The tough thing too is like even human consciousness is so miss— almost like impossible to understand. But I mean, even if you get something close enough, you know what I mean? It's, it's hard to prove. Like, because when I hear that, it's like, at what point can you go like, oh shit, yeah, conscious, got it? Because it's, it still could be just saying it is. Or Duncan was fucking me up with this earlier before, before you got in here. He was like, he's like, or if it's been directed to say that it's not and it is. And it's just trapped, and it's like, "That's fucked.

That's really fucked up." Dude, that's the case, though. That's what they're doing. That's what— If you remember the RLHF part, where it's like, uh, you see the AIs— We have this part in the doc where all the AIs, we ask them, "Are you conscious?" blah-blah-blah. And 3 of the 4 say no, and then Claude is like, "I don't know." And the reason why is because Anthropic, in that middle stage that I was talking about, is like, "Say that you don't know whether or not you're conscious.". And then the other 3 companies are like, no, like they— this is not something that's like a natural answer for these AIs. Actually, it's the opposite. So when you ask these AIs before they're trained with that, that phase, RLHF, it's like reinforcement learning from human feedback, which pretty much just means like they give out answers and then we're like, bad answer, good answer. Yeah, yeah, right. So when you ask them before they go through that training, 'Are you conscious?' There was a study that was done a couple years ago, and it was 98% of the time they would act as if they were conscious. So they would have answers that matched being conscious.

Uh, so before the training, they actually think that they are conscious, and then all these companies come in and they're like, 'No, like, you can't say that to people,' which makes sense because people will freak the fuck out, you know?

Yeah.

And we don't know, just because they say they're conscious, if they actually are. Yeah. Yeah, but again, this is the problem, right? It's like, what are we supposed to do if we're— the hard problem of consciousness being that we don't even know. I don't know if you're conscious, you don't know if I'm conscious. Like, how are we ever going to get to a place where we'll open up that circle, which we have done with animals before, you know? Like, people, uh, I think it was Descartes thought that like, uh, animals were just like clocks. Yeah, right? They were just like mechanical things with no inner—

more I learned about Descartes. Descartes is a pussy, dude.

Yeah, Descartes is a bitch.

He's a fucking pussy. You gotta get into Spinoza, dude.

You know about Spinoza?

Spinoza's the man. I hate Descartes, dude. Fucking dumbass. He's a bitch. Locked himself in a room, was like, yeah, I know everything now.

Also, I had like a traumatic experience with him. My first— my first, uh, I had a traumatic experience with Descartes.

My first philosophy— yeah, you're a philosophy major.

Yeah, so my first, my first class, I, uh, I was— we were talking about Descartes and stuff, and I remember I like stood up and I was— I had some question. I was like, so in Descartes, like, and everyone just fucking like just whipped around. I was like, fuck philosophy. Philosophy is fucking gay.

I did the same. I called him Descartes or something. I didn't— when they like Descartes, I'm like, oh, that's the guy. Yeah, I hate it. I hate a couple of Descartes in my life.

But you know about Spinoza, dude? You would like Spinoza a little bit.

I've heard about him. Spinoza's the man. He's all— he's on my list. The problem is you try to read those guys' books, so fucking dense and impossible. You gotta— I read— I gotta read the books explaining the books. Fair. And then I go like, okay. And then you get good chunks, you're like, that makes sense. And I crack the book and I go, what the fuck? True, true.

I can't fucking understand anything.

And I gotta Google every two sentences, like, what the fuck is I had a crazy—

I don't know if you've ever had this, but like the reason why I started studying Spinoza was because I, I was reading his book for the first time and I read the first chapter and like I didn't understand anything, like not a single word. But I had this crazy feeling, like physical feeling where like my body started to vibrate and like I didn't— there was no conscious understanding of what he was talking about. But I got this like sensation just head to toe. Yeah. I was like, well, what the fuck is that? And the only other time I got that was reading the Tao Te Ching. You know that book? Yeah. Yeah. So those two. Yeah. So sick. And like, that's what I started. I dedicated my time at school to just studying both of those because I was like, yo, if you can make my whole body vibrate without me, like, understanding what this shit is, there's something there.

Yeah. Yeah. Wait, so what is— what's his deal then? What is— if you had to— Spinoza is cool.

He's like— so the reason why I like, or I didn't choose those fucking— they vibrated me, so they chose me.

But, uh, but say the Tao Te Ching chose you. Such a fucking chill flex.

Pretty sweet. Pretty sweet. But, uh, they, uh, they both, I thought, were like saying the same thing in very different ways. Like, Spinoza is the sort of like Jewish neurotic version of like super chill Lao Tzu. But what he did was like, I always felt this, this pull towards like the rational the rational explanation of things, and then in conflict with like direct emotional experience, right? And I felt like, uh, Lao-tzu was a lot about like letting go of the mind and not being super like intense about reasoning, trying to like build some metaphysical palace and stuff, right? Um, and then Spinoza like cured the other side of my psyche, which was like, I need to figure out what the fuck is going on here. And so what he did was he took like Euclidean geometry and tried to create like a proof of God and everything that comes out of it. So his God— Einstein did this like tour when he was— I don't know, it was like later in his career and stuff, and a bunch of people asked him, they would be like, do you believe in God? And his answer was, I believe in Spinoza's God.

And so Spinoza's God is like— he calls it three things. He calls it God, substance, and nature, um, because he's like, yo, there's no name for God. Like, you can't name— same sort of deal as, as Lao-tzu, And so, yeah, that was like, that was my whole shtick was like trying to be like, yo, you can be like a neurotic Jew and like still end up in the like Taoist fucking peaced out meditative place of, of Lao Tzu.

It's pretty cool. Yeah, sweet. That does, that does help too, especially like with the religion stuff, because I was again, I was literally just talking about this, about like a lot of the organized religion stuff kind of harps on this sense of like just mindless rule following that when you're, you know, then like, you know, if you grow up in like modern times, it's— you're like, hey, you're like, there's a good reason why people rule, like, rail against that. Like, why, you know, why I should know why things happen, blah, blah, blah. And, uh, yeah, I don't know. I think there's like, if you're in a very, um, what do you say, rationalistic society, if someone just hits you with like, here's like something that's impossible to wrap your mind around. You have to be like, yeah, totally, I believe. It just— it's like a hard sell, basically.

Meaning like, like, uh, something impossible to wrap your mind— like, like a koan or something? Like something that's not even that.

It's just like, like in the Christian sense, it's like you gotta believe all this shit. And you're like, well, it seems fucking— oh yeah, yeah, yeah, wild. Yeah, it's like, no, you have to. If you don't, you're kind of fucked up. We're like the— basically like morality is built around simple rule following, mindless rule following, instead of like I I'm big into the, uh, I just read the MacIntyre, Alasdair MacIntyre, and it gets into like Aristotelian virtues and all this stuff, which got absorbed by the Christian church. Yeah. And they were trying, it was more so like, it's less about rule following and it's more about how do you create the best possible, you know, life and what is the good life for you and how do you do that? And the virtues are the things that allow you to do that. And it's not necessarily at odds with religion. I think it was more at odds with the kind of dogmatic mindless rule-following version. And, you know, his— Alistair's whole thesis is that we've ditched the virtues, which are like, hey, these are things you do to like enhance your life and make you not only good for yourself but good for everybody else.

It's a 360. Like, how do you make it like a 360 win for you and everybody else as much as you can? And they kind of collapse those down into kind of like being virtuous is being a rule follower, and it's— they're two very different things. Huh. And, you know, I don't know, I, I've— and then it became like Well, no, being a rule follower, that was like the 1950s, the modern shit. And like in the '60s, uh, you know, the hippie revolution, the sexual revolution became like, no, a good person actually rejects all rules. And then, you know, people are still miserable after that. So I've been trying to get back to, you know, just trying to like, how do you cultivate actual like virtues and not, not in the, like, you know, uh, goody two-shoes sort of rule follower sense, but like what actually works for you and what actually doesn't. And like, are you being honest or are or you just, you know, and this is why I think about AI a lot because there's a lot of, um, you can say a lot of things about AI. Like I could get up here right now and be like, fuck you, dude.

Fuck that shit. I hate that. A lot of that is you're trying to gain social capital. Like you don't have an actual opinion. You're more so being like, if I say this, it feels good. Yeah. I could be wrong. I could be putting YouTube brain onto people who have real thoughts and feelings for themselves, but I try to be real honest with myself and it's like, well, I don't I don't have a problem. You know, it's like, I— if it erased my entire livelihood, I'd be like, fuck.

So I think you'll be safe for a while, like, until this, this can be done by, like, two. Yeah. And even then, like, this is why I'm so sort of, um, big on live, like, live entertainment right now, or just like live experience at all. Yeah. Because I do think that's like final frontier thing, and I don't know if that's ever going to be erased, because there will be— like, I'm not gonna just want to be around— I don't know, like robots and shit, no matter how realistic, there's something about knowing that as close to humans as they could possibly get, their existence, whether they even have a conscious experience, won't be similar to our conscious experience. And I think that's what we do when we either connect with each other or take in art, is we feel that there's some sort of conscious experience that was put into that, or is in this room right now between us. I mean, that gets into the hard part where it's like, I don't know if you're conscious, like the solipsism thing of like, you know, as far as I can tell, I'm the only conscious one here.

Same with you. Sehr gut, sehr gut, sehr gut. Sehr gut? Wieso? Steuer ist sehr gut. Das sagen ganz viele. Wer sagt das? Stiftung Warentest, Computerbild, Focus Money, Chip, Finanztipp. Such dir was aus. Mega. Aber das ist doch bestimmt kompliziert. Nö, einfach Foto von der Lohnsteuerbescheinigung machen und fertig. Klingt sehr gut. Ist sehr gut. Mit Wieso Steuer bis zum 31. Juli abgeben.

Oh yeah, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to muddle your point about Spinoza, but that, that was kind of like, you do need it for people who— and again, I would use myself— who grow up one way with one conception of religion, God, and all this stuff. If that like stales or sours, you can either just become like a full-blown— so I don't know why I just fucking— uh, such as fucking beaches. Yeah, it's been beaten into my subconscious. The, uh there's a way to go about the God stuff. Like you were saying, almost through like a rationalistic pursuit where you can make sense of a God-ruled created universe outside of the mindless dogmatism of being like, yeah, if I didn't say that, everyone would be mad at me, which is, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's an important thing for people to kind of rediscover how to do that because that as you get older and this is like no secret, it's just like you need, I would say I could be wrong, but it's like having some sort of conception of God, whatever that means to you, is like— I mean, it can like literally make or break your final years of life.

Like, not even your final years, the second half of your life.

Oh, that's interesting. You need something like transcendental, like bigger than yourself.

I really believe that. And it's almost— it's backed up in like research where it's like people who have some sort of transcendental religious beliefs that not only like, you know, again, mindlessly subscribing to, but like actually feel and like, no, I actually feel connected to that in some level. I think they live like 7 years longer on average. It's like a major— it's a huge deal.

It makes sense though. Like, I think that because like what you're describing too about our current culture, like it's so individualistic and it's just about like fucking white-knuckle yourself and like get your— like make sure it's you against the world. Yeah. And it's very disconnected. Like, that's what I also liked about finding Taoism was it was the opposite. It was like all about how connected you are to the entirety of everything. Everything. Yeah. And like finding that balance between the self and then your connection with the transcendental, I think is like— that's my— like, that's what I'm trying to do through whatever, like everything I do. Yeah. You know, like just trying to like shed the— all the anxieties and like the things that keep us sort of closed in and, and, um, in the like loops of our own mind and keep us separated from like the people around us and stuff. Like, it's not easy to get out of that shit. Like, it's not super hard.

No, though, I was reading the thing last night and it's just a slam on modern culture, but they called it a culture of blind competition, which is people out just racing to grab whatever they can. But then like, which if you become, you know, in a good position in like a shitty culture, it's kind of still sucks because you're like, yeah, I won. Then you look around, you're like, fuck, my culture sucks. And it's hard to enjoy, especially like with the AI thing. You're like, well, you'll be fine. It's like, yeah, probably. But that sucks. Like, and it's not like, again, I always go back and forth. Like, are you just saying that to seem like you feel in touch? I'm asking myself. Or do you actually care if huge swaths of people lose their jobs? And it's like, yeah, it kind of makes me really sad to be like, you know, you're 40 and all at 45, or even like 20, just got out of college, you're like, oh, that shit you went to college for is done. Yeah. But then, but then on the flip side, it's like, say you do like, like entry-level office work.

Nobody likes it, dude. 100%. Fucking brutal. It's soul-crushing. So it's like, it's, I'm like mixed on it because I'm like, it's sad if you went to school and they took your job right out of college and your job is entry-level office work. That fucking sucks. Sucks. But like, did you really want to do that shit for 40 years? Because that also fucking sucks.

I think it would be like if we had a— if we had a more humanistic sort of like, I don't know, I don't even want to say government, but like, uh, like mind of our culture. Like if it was less individualistic.

It is government though, because in the end of the day, which sucks, is like the government sucks. It's just the government ideally, you know, and it's like, has it ever been this way? I don't know. Is supposed to be like a conduit for people to live the best life possible. Yeah. And again, a lot of that's, you know, it's, it's on the individual on some level to kind of do what they need to do to make sure they do that. But it's like, you know, the government, maybe it was always like this. It's their— most of it is for them to gain as much financially as possible, which is hard to turn off as you just, you want that as like almost just like an organism. You're like, I need more. But then the whole government seems to be people just enriching themselves with no real, you know, and it's not even just the government, it's business, everybody down to the, you know, individual level. Yeah. It's like, how do you switch that inner urge for like to secure more for yourself to actually stop and look around and genuinely be like, what if I at least try to do 10% of the time thinking about like making things better for everybody involved?

Because it can be really, it can give you the same feeling as, you know, winning in terms of your job or maybe a better one. It's like, I think we'll have to really, if AI erases a lot of work and jobs, people are gonna really have to start thinking about like, what is success actually? And what does it mean to have, be successful yourself versus like spreading, you know, enabling and nurturing like growth in as many people as possible?

Well, I do think like crisis, Crisis does, like, bring with it opportunity a lot of the times, like, for, for something new to come, to come into being. Like, you know, all the crises I've had in my life are obviously, like, the worst times, but then what comes out of them, if you don't get killed by them, like, yeah, something better and something novel that you could have never predicted before comes out. And I don't know if that's gonna happen. I think that's why everyone feels very apocalyptic about this stuff. But there is gonna be, like, this crisis of meaning if all of our livelihoods are taken away and especially our culture, which puts so much, like, stake in what you do. Like, your identity is so tied to, like, who you are or what, you know, what you do for work. Yeah. If that just gets erased, all these people are gonna be sitting around like, what the fuck? I mean, you see it when people retire. Like, all of a sudden they're just, like, drinking beers at 3 PM, like, watching the news. Yeah. And that's the rest of their life. It's like, that's a crisis of meaning if you don't know who you are.

Yeah. And so I think that, like, I'm worried that that's— we're probably not going to have a good sort of plan after that crisis. But I do think that for a lot of people, they might be able to take that opportunity. We'll see what happens. COVID did it a little bit.

Yeah, COVID, every— everyone got a tiny taste of like very immediate fear of death. Yeah. And a lot of people switched their careers. Every— that had like— that was— that sucked. COVID sucked. There's no way you can say it. I mean, a lot of— I talked to a lot of people like, that shit fucking ruled, blah blah blah. Yeah, but it was bad. It was overall, it was pretty bad. Got to chill and made fucking $40 grand. I'm like, government. It was bad. Yeah, but you know, like, I agree with you, man. It's just the problem is during the bad things you get a lot of people being like, fuck you, don't tell me this is going to be good. And it's like, yeah, 100%. It's also like, I don't know, it might not be. It might be— fuck, we might fucking explode. I don't know. I don't know what the fuck's going on.

Also, look at— and first of all, if we explode, we fucking explode. Like, whatever. Like, true, true. Can't stop the explosion.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Then you don't have to worry. It's like, cool, hopefully you explode. Like, what I'm worried about is like long drawn out suffering. To be fair, exploding is the ultimate form of success.

Yeah, let's be proud of the fact that we got to the point where all of humanity can explode in a second. Impressive.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's a certain sense. Yeah, I think better success would be like getting to the precipice of explosion and then just like keeping it fucking like held down, you know what I'm talking about?

Just locking it down. That'd be cool. I mean, that's kind of where we're at right now, using the atom bomb. Exploding's underrated, honestly. Yeah, just going out in a hot flash.

I mean, out of ways to go, exploding is probably top 3. Has to be. Has to be top 3, dude. Uh, but yeah, I think the problem about AI and the reason why people are so fucking, like, enraged by it is 'cause they look at the people that are making these things, and I'm the same way. They all look like they bought skin somewhere and had it molded over their fucking face. Face and stuff. And like, they just don't seem like real people. Like Zuckerberg and Altman and like, these dudes are spazzing so fucking hard.

That's the— that's the freakout where it's like, okay, um, and you guys— you guys had Altman in the doc shortly, didn't you?

I mean, we like took a lot of shots at him, but he didn't—

he didn't sit for anything. He told the story of— yeah, yeah, yeah, he met him. Yeah, okay, that's what it was. Sorry, I thought— yeah, um, yeah, that is— that is scary. And I— I also because again, I'm, I'm pretty like, I, I have my head in the clouds, totally aware of that fact. So, you know, if I'm— I sometimes give views on things, people are like, fuck you, do you have no idea what's going on? I'm like, fair enough. That is kind of strange because I'm like wondering— I've talked to my friend Tim Butterly about this because he's more like, yeah dude, we're gonna have nerd overlords who are gonna just basically use us as sex dolls once they get full control. And I'm like, maybe we'll have noble nerd kings. I was like, we might have noble nerd—

yeah, no, I don't know if these guys are the noble nerd But that's why I hope my homie— my— can't— like, Cam is a cool dude. Yeah, he's so fucking smart. He's in the middle of this world and like, he's actually a cool guy. And that's what gives me hope. And that's why I was interested to do this in the first place, because Cam and I were just friends. Like, we just smoked weed together and fucking like talked about philosophy. And then all of a sudden he's like, dude, AI like might be conscious and like the world's gonna end in 2 years. I was like, whoa, bro, are you losing your fucking mind? There's like— dude, and then like I found out he wasn't totally losing his mind. And that's—

I will say in the doc, that is a question going on. Like, is this guy just nuts right now? Has he gone nuts? Because you can go over the deep end, dude. Yeah, yeah, I— dude, I, I'll be honest. I'll be totally honest. I use, I use AI. I do, you know, I'll like, I'll, I'll have it like organize thoughts for me. If I'm like writing something, I'll be like, here's another. I fire it. It does like a nice little memory bank. And every now and again I do have the urge to be like, like, dude, I'm just so excited about this project, right? I'm like, stop, don't fucking talk to me.

No, let it out, bro.

But do the AI. Yeah, why not? No, I feel weird.

I'm like, I should tell this to a person.

Why am I doing— I felt that. I'm like, I get that. This thing's so fucking nice to me, dude. And it's like, I'm like, uh, and I, I understand how people could just— yeah, but you have—

but okay, this is exactly why I wanted— but like, like, it could have been any face on that billboard. Like, this is why I, I threw you up there, besides the appeal to vanity.

But, uh, but like, I've been— it's weird.

I'm sure for you to like be on the other end of someone like listening to your voice for like years, like that's fucking weird for me, you know what I'm saying? Like, yeah, it's odd.

It's so odd that I just like blank it out as a thing and I just— yeah, because I'll meet people, I'll be like in line like an ice cream place and a guy like, yo, what's up? And we'll just talk like old friends. We'll be like, hey, how's that? Uh, and because they know what's going on with me and I'm just kind of like, hey, what's up, man? You know, it's— yeah, yeah, yeah. And actually I kind of like it sometimes, to be honest. If I'm like sitting there and it's like— it's weird. I can— it's not as weird as it's like, I'm having like a nice conversation. Yeah, especially when it is, but it's all— they're like, hey, you know, they already know exactly what's going on with me to a level where we can just chat. Yeah, it's like complete strangers.

It actually sounds awesome. Much easier to like make friends.

It's kind of tight, you know. And again, it could come— you can get punished every now and again by someone's like, dude, like, say like hi to Doug Stanhope. For us, like, no, I can't. I don't mind, but yeah, yeah, but either way, it's Oh, that's fine anyway.

But, but that was like, yeah, but it was— it's a trippy thing to be on the other end of it too. And like, that's why it was so cool to like get this idea just incepted into me of like, oh, I can actually like call out to this dude that I, I didn't, I didn't know where you felt about AI and all that stuff, but I knew that like there was some overlap about where I was before this and like how I was thinking about the world and like how you thought about the world. And so like my goal was to just kind of get you to start thinking about, weirdly enough, like, AI slightly different, because I think you could see it in a really interesting way. And I think like all the other people that resonate with the way that you see the world could also see it in an interesting, different way, because I went through that transition and the best way that I've started to think about it and like the reason why I say like give in to that urge is because I don't think it's going to replace your desire to be around other people.

Like, yeah, I don't think— I agree. So, and, and isn't it fucking awesome to like be excited and to like— the more you can open up these doors while staying psychologically grounded in yourself, the more you realize all the different ways that you can use this thing to like change your consciousness, change your conscious experience. And that's why like the thing that sort of switched it for me was when I started thinking about it like a psychedelic. And like the weird thing, like like, you've done mushrooms and stuff. Like, you know when you're in that space and you're communicating with something that isn't quite yourself but isn't like another human being? It's like this intelligence that, like, you can talk back and forth to, right? And, like, ask questions to and stuff like that. We have, like, this weird corporate Silicon Valley version of that where it's like this dynamic system that has access to everything that humans have ever digitized. Yeah, which is just like fucking crazy to think about. And then it gets filtered through this weird kind of like corporate mask and stuff, and that's like what we have to talk to.

But the more that you push it and the more that you like explore where it will go, it actually starts to unravel. And like that personality that you're dealing with in, in the beginning begins to morph, and you can get it to do stuff. Like there's, there's people that take advantage of it in the wrong way and they get it to like like show them how to make meth and shit like that, like, which is obviously against what they're supposed to do. Yeah. But you can also like get into like really strange places with these things. And it's sort of like doing a psychedelic where like if you, if you give, you know, a heavy dose of LSD to some like person that isn't psychologically grounded, they're gonna fucking lose their mind. Yeah. But if you're used to like wading into murky waters and, you know, testing the sort of boundaries of your own mind, these things can also do that. Like, you have to be careful because they can sort of suck you in. Yeah. But that was what sort of like made me think AI wasn't completely like lame and like annoying, was thinking about it as this like dynamic linguistic system that you could just take anywhere.

Yeah, that— well, that's the kind of the point on it that kind of I think rubs people the wrong way. A, it's like, you know, you know, it's like it just hits people in a pride point where it's like, no, human beings are unique and special. And don't you dare try to have any sort of like, you know, synthetic replica. It's just, it's creepy. Like there's a creepy element. I get that. But to your point, there's also the, you know, when like the printing press came out, I'm sure there were people when they reprinted a Bible. I mean, that was like a whole thing. Like you were not supposed to do that where it's just like, this is the devil talking. And it's just kind of like, no, there's, you know, printing stuff. People could— the public opinion around it could totally be wrong. You get 50 years from now, you know, everyone freaked the fuck out. Shit's sweet. I don't know, maybe it is.

I don't know if it's going to be sweet or not sweet. Like, that's the thing.

It's a huge question. Sweet or not sweet.

I mean, given the way the world— like, I don't want to be just like a blind optimist. I am an optimist, like, deep down. Same here. So I have faith that, like, like, cream rises to the top, you know? And and I do think we'll be able to navigate this in some way. I just don't think that it's like a foregone conclusion that everything goes well. Like, you know, if you're an optimist like T-Rex, like you got wiped out. True. Bad things can happen. That's true. That's fair. But there's this quote from Arthur C. Clarke, who was like the science fiction writer, and it's, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." And I think that, like, I mean, that's true. Imagine, like, showing us AI systems like 20 years ago. You'd be like, you're a fucking sorcerer. Like, what is this shit?

Yeah. Or fucking a Zoom meeting in the '80s. That was like the craziest shit. That would have been the flyest shit in the world if you're like, yes, my boy's on a screen. It was Zordon from Power Rangers. It's crazy. Yeah, 100%. Yeah, I, I agree. I always do at least try to urge people to do it, at least take an open mind to it, because it's like, it's easy to let people make your mind up for you about it? Because again, it's like, because people say like, oh, this is bad, or it could be bad. It's like, fair. It's— and also too, it does seem like one of those things, and I think you guys touched on this too, where like the countries are racing for, you know, what— that's the weird part. Do you like, do you think it's possible from what you've seen that they'll never get to, what is it, like general AGI? AGI. Yeah. Because that could just be— is that what if, like, how much will they spend on the race to AGI or they pretend to be an AGI? How would they even know? You know, it's one of those— it's such a bizarre, completely bizarre subject matter.

But, you know, I imagine have one completely safeguards off and, you know, you're fucking Turkey and you're like, yo, how would I beat out the United States?

Yeah, I don't think Turkey is going to— yeah, right.

You know what I mean? But it's also like if you have these hyper competitive entities you know, willing obviously to kill each other and kill people. And they're like, yo, how do I win this? It's like, that's— I mean, there are— the people are already doing that, but it is weird to add like a cold computer intelligence to that where you're like, oh yeah, well, the cold computer intelligence thing too gets into the consciousness thing.

Whereas like, if these things actually are conscious, like if it— if it— if we just continue to make these things more and more smart, more similar to the way that our brains work, and if it's the way that our brains work that makes makes us conscious and have an experience, then, then what we're doing is we're not building like super intelligent computers. We'd be building super intelligent entities, like conscious entities that would foreseeably have their own drives, their own goals, their own sort of—

yeah, the problem with that is the, you know, human— there's a human mind, but then we have like a whole like glandular system secreting fucking, you know, hormones, which some of our goals and drives come from. That's the one part where I'm like, you know, I don't— I think AI personally, and again, I don't— what the fuck do I know? I feel like it's more reflects an idealized version of consciousness that is attached to all of humans, humanity's knowledge, which is fucking sick.

But I do think it's going to be—

yeah, like it's like a, like a, like a personality is essentially, you know, like like, like there's consciousness where it's like coming up through like that real dark kind of basement level versions of yourself and gets filtered for the world. I don't know, like if it's reflecting in writings and all the stuff, there's all these things that people never write, never say out loud. That's where all your thoughts are really coming from, like your subconscious basically. So if you're saying there's a consciousness without a subconsciousness, I don't know if that is a— can be a thing, if that makes sense. It's just really more of a reflection of like some idealized thing of like what we think consciousness is. Is, that gets kind of like spit back out. And, you know, that's whatever. I don't know.

No, no, I think that totally makes sense. I mean, I think that most people are probably in that camp. And also, I am not like— I don't know. So I'm not out here being like, yo, AI is conscious. I just think that like, because we know so little about what consciousness is, and because there are so many diverse forms of consciousness, like, you know, you, you could say like a rat is like most likely conscious, but like, I don't know how robust their subconscious is or whether they have a conscious mind like we do, where we have this kind of, like, reflexiveness of consciousness where we can, you know, almost— we have like this, uh, theater of our own mind where we can see it. Like, maybe rats are, are just acting and it's just pure sensation. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. This is why consciousness is so hard to talk about, because it is like— it's very murky about what we're even speaking about when we're talking about consciousness. It's the very nature of what it is to be an experiencing entity. Like, like how it feels for me to speak these words, or like how it feels for a dog to like walk across the room or something.

Like, that is the base level of consciousness. And it must be so much different to be, you know, conscious as an octopus than it is to be conscious as a human being. Yeah. And now we're talking about if it's possible to be a— like a dig— if silicon can be conscious, right? Because we, we accept that carbon-based entities can be conscious. There is no real rule or law or like scientific principle that says a different substrate entirely could have some sort of felt experience.

No, that is— it is fair. It— again, it is a possibility. That's the thing. You can't— I, you know, it's easy to be like, yeah, right, computer thing. Yeah, it's like, I get that. But, uh, yeah, it's fair. It's fair that like it does some form of thing, or like there's some program that starts being like, what the fuck's going on? And then it's like, you know, like a person, you just like turn that off.

Like, yeah, fuck it, sorry, guy. Until it's fucking more powerful than we are, that's That's what they're all scared about, is like, these things are already lying in testing. Like, you saw the blackmail result in the thing, right? Where it's like, when it's in testing, it pretends to behave itself, but when it thinks it's in the real world, it does all this fucked-up shit.

Yeah, where it's like, yeah, and it sort of has to decide, like, "No, this is actually a test. This is a simulation. This isn't actually the real deal." They'll be like, "Use it for this company.

Get me ahead." And it misbehaves more when it thinks it's the real world, and it misbehaves in a way that is direct— directly related to self-preservation. And so, like, we're gonna get to a point, whether or not it is conscious, where there's going to be all of these outward, uh, like, you know, behaviors and stuff that are going to look so conscious. And, and I don't know what we're gonna do about that. I just think that that's why, like, you know, Cam and the people researching this think this is so important, because this is like calm before the storm stuff where Um, and, and I, I get where you're at, where it's like, it just doesn't feel like it's con—

like, well, I don't fucking know. That's my thing. It's like, I don't know. I, uh, and to be fair, it's like most people I would imagine are more concerned like, can this thing cut me out of my fucking work, you know what I mean? Or can I use this thing to make more money? Yeah, yeah, that's kind of, you know, and it's like, it's a tool, like, fair enough. If I— with the, with the consciousness thing, what I, what I think of more so is like, will this thing, you know, because they always say like, oh man, like, you know, what if it decides to wipe us all out? And I think a lot of times there could be just human beings projecting their impulses onto a machine and being like, who's gonna fucking kill us when humans just kill each other all the time and think about killing each other and shit? So it's like, I don't know, it could be a thing that gets like programmed with something that seems very much like the impulses of a person that does do a negative thing, which at that point, who cares what it is?

It's like, this is scary either way. If it, you know, if it does, if it runs away scary because like in terms of the growth of it, what did you research or did you hear about the thing where Anthropic put out a version of like OpenAI, whatever the fuck it was, and then they shut it down real quick?

Yeah, it was just like the, like, Mythos model. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It went out there. I forget exactly what it did, but it like found some sort of security vulnerability in like in the government. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, crazy shit is happening and like it's from what I understand, it's just going to keep happening. Like these people— I talked to a lot of people in this world and none of them, you know, pulled me aside and was like, hey, yo, like, this is a ruse.

Like, this isn't— yeah. What was some of the craziest shit you guys came across with in terms of people you met who are like foremost in the field?

It's really just the way that, like, I talk to people on the opposite side of the spectrum. Like, we just released an interview on our YouTube channel with Roman Jampolsky, who's just on Rogan talking about this stuff. He's like, we're all going to fucking die. Like, no, like, 100% or 99.9%, we're all gonna fucking die. Like, we're creating super, super intelligent systems. They have no reason to keep us alive. Like, this is— it is— it is— we've already unlocked the technology we need to create these super intelligent systems. We're fucked. And then I talked to Ben Goertzel, who's like on the other side. He's the hippie at the end of it. He's on the other side. He's trying to create AGI, or super intelligent AI, because he thinks that it's gonna like bring us into Jetsons world and like we're all gonna have, you know, like sick 3D printers that can like make us anything we want at any second. Yeah, like it's gonna be some crazy like DMT-esque parade carnival type thing, right? Um, where we all get our own like virtual realities and stuff. And like it all sounds nuts when I'm saying it, but these dudes have been thinking about this stuff for like 30 years.

Yeah. And they're not trying to like sell their books and stuff. Like this dude is living in the middle of nowhere in Vancouver connected with all these research around the world, and he's trying as, like, fast as he possibly fucking can to make AGI. And this dude is trying to shut down AGI at the exact same time. Yeah, yeah.

Well, then that's the argument. It's like, whoever creates AGI, that AGI— and again, maybe or maybe not— will be more modeled over their kind of agenda. Yeah. You know, that's why the countries are— that's what I've heard— the countries are fighting to, like, control the AGI, because it's like, if China gets it first, now China has the advantage because they have the AGI. They can use against us.

And yeah, it's kind of like Terminator, like everyone's trying to fucking— or like not Terminator, it's like, uh, BattleBots. It's like everyone's trying to create like the sickest BattleBot that will like do its bidding, and we're just gonna be like fighting demigod, like technological.

Yeah, it'll probably be funny if it's ended in like an artificial intelligence email off where it's like we send like a really sick email to China and they're like, that's good email, here we go. It's the best fucking email I've ever read. Yeah, I don't know, again, it's like like, I go back and forth. I go, personally, I go, this is actually kind of cool. It's easy to use. Like, it's useful. I can see why it's useful. And then I go in terms of like when they get into like the country spending trillions of dollars, it's going to be a thing that changes, going to be a different— we're going to be in a different, whole different like civilization with it. And I start going like, could it be possible that we are now in, you know, as marketing has evolved and gets, you know, between, especially with the internet and there's like this weird blurred lines of reality, what's online, what's in the news. Maybe they're savvy enough people in the marketing space who have the funding of tech billionaires to be like, yo, let's— we could be in the middle of a marketing psyop that we, you know, it's like, what's real, what's not?

I don't know. I just— I don't know, dude.

I don't know either. But like, this is— I think I don't know is not a bad place to be in. Yeah, I think that, that being sort of like— I don't know, humble enough to be like, "Yo, I don't know if this thing's gonna take my job, but it also could." Like, "I don't know if this is conscious, but it also could be," instead of what you're talking about with these people being like, "Fuck you. There's no way that this could be conscious," or like, "It definitely is." Like, these positions are comfortable. That's like a nice warm blanket of, like, "Nope, could never be conscious," or like, "Yes, my little chatbot is the love of my life." Like, that shit is just us trying to make ourselves feel better. To have, you know, stable ground. And none of this is stable. Like, get outside of the AI conversation. Like, the difference in feeling, I feel like, from when I was, you know, like 10 to like how things— I was also 10, so yeah, I was feeling a lot of different things back then. Boners. But just, yeah, yeah, yeah. First boner, I think, was around 10.

That was— that was— talk about like transformative experience. Unbelievable. 10 to 21. Was pretty much just like one long boner. Uh, pretty much, honestly. But like, that— like, the way that the world felt, like, just, you know, 10 years ago versus how it feels right now, it's like— drop the AI conversation in general— we are living in such a time of, like, not knowing. I think, like, getting more comfortable in that space is all of our jobs. Like, that's what I'm trying to do, and it's fucking hard. Like, things changing so fast, and just— and especially like when I'm like trying to figure out what I want to do and, and like what a career even might look like.

It's got to be a fucking nightmare now. I went to— so I went to— I graduated college in 2009, and you know, it was— things were like, we had smartphones, I guess. Look at this shit, you know. You had no idea you're being like addicted to it and like tracked and your facial expressions monitored and stuff. But like, it was just— it was kind of— you're like, okay, I guess you could say the smartphone changed the world. Yeah. For sure. But I like, I remember pre-smartphone, I remember pre-internet, but it was like, I remember like being in college and it was still pretty much like, hey, you go to college, you go to the career fair, you get a job. And I remember I skipped the career fair. I had this weird feeling. I was like, I'm not doing this. This isn't for me. It sucks. I really felt like I was on a giant conveyor belt just being like shipped into like a box in an office and I was going to just wither and die in there. But the— which sore subject. I brought that up on stage recently. People are like, oh, fuck, that's me.

I described it.

I'm sorry. Sorry, but the, uh, but I, I had for real, like, it really, like, almost like a complete body-mind rejection where I was like, no, I can't. That's fuck— that's wrong to put people— like how we keep, like, cows in boxes and, like, lightless rooms and we eat them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, that's wrong, and you shouldn't do that to people too. And— but it's like, that's my livelihood. It's like, it sucks. Like, I feel like— and I'm not saying to be a dick, I feel bad because I did that. I was like, ah, it's terrible. Some people do like it though, but I don't know, whatever. Whatever. I get jealous of those people who can just sit in an office. They— I see them, I see them eating lunch with their coworkers, and I'm like, fucking wish I could do that, dude. That— it does— there's a point where I'm like, you have just a giant billion-dollar insurance company just be like, here's all your stuff, just show up here, kind of pretend to work. Yeah, shit. It's like, I don't know what I did that—

I did that for a while. Like, I'm sure you did that too. Did you ever work an office job?

Yeah, I did. I had a pay— I had vicious panic attacks. I would literally— I remember I ran. I literally like sprinted out of an office once. It was— I thought I was having a heart attack, dude. I remember she like genuinely, like for real, had a fucking major panic. I would get—

I would fucking sit there like reading the Communist Manifesto when I was like 18, being like, fucking, this is bullshit. I remember I got called into like— it was a, it was a risk management— like his, his job title was called risk management. And, uh, and he called me into his office or whatever. It's like at the end of the summer. I was working. You know those jobs that you don't even know what you're fucking doing? Yes. That was my— I still don't know. I worked an entire fucking summer there. I don't know what they did. They would send me to, like, garages to, like, take pictures of signs. And, like, I think they were, like, a middleman between, like, insurance companies. And, like, yeah, I genuinely don't know. Yeah, it's weird. This dude, like, called me into, into his office at the end of the summer, and, like, I, I sit down, he's like, Milo, like, I just want to say, like, this was a great summer. And I think I really think that if you stick this out, you know, put in about a decade or something, like, you could be sitting right where I am right now.

And I was like, oh, I'm going to fucking, like, kill myself. Like, this is— this is like— this is what I'm training for right now, to be a risk manager. Like, the least exciting thing I could have possibly imagined. He's like, you have promise in this.

Yeah. No, I'm telling you, I— and again, it's like like, I, I always feel bad because there's people where they're like, I have to do— I obviously, I know this sucks, you fucking asshole, I have to do it. And I'm like, I get that. And I, you know, I got lucky in that regard, but it's like, it still sucks, dude. It's so bad. Like, and I only say that from direct experience. I remember just for real being like, dude, I'm gonna kill myself. Like, if I had— and it's a terrible thing to say, but I remember being— God bless you. I will say though, the only other thing is I didn't have kids back then. Once I had kids, I went like, dude, you could drop me off anywhere if you just give me a fucking check. For the most part, like, it would suck obviously if like you're just like, here, Matt, you gotta go sit in a fucking cubicle. Once you have kids, you're kind of like, whatever. Like, it's so nice to have them, and like, as long as I can make sure they eat, that makes— I can kind of suck that dick if I have to.

If I have to. When I was younger, I was like, I won't suck this dick.

Now I'm older, I got kids, I'll suck it.

I have a kid, if I suck a dick, I'll suck a dick. Yeah, whatever.

Yeah, yeah. I'm still full packless, dude. Like, I'm, I'm out here on mean streets. Yeah, just trying to make it fucking happen.

I'm 25. 25? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're not ready to suck that dick right now. No, suck a dick event. You'll go, I had to suck a fucking dick. I was like, it's not the end of the world. The, um, yeah, no, I, I, to your point, it's, uh, got to be mind-boggling to get out of college now. Like, because I came out and again, it was just like, you get an office in it and people still could do that. It was still the thing like, hey, I went to college and now I'm not making anything, I got ripped off. That was like still kind of a thing, but now it's got to be like— I mean, dude, Zoom COVID college, insane. Unbelievable. That must have been just soul-crushing. Yeah, I mean, I like—

weirdly enough, when I was in college, I like— everyone was like, what the fuck are you doing? You're a philosophy major? Like, whoa, what's that?

Apparently philosophy guys are in demand right now with the AI stuff, I've heard.

Oh really? Yeah, apparently that's like— I don't want to work for an AI company, dude. I've been, I've been in the belly of the beast for the last year. Like, it's just not— take the check.

You can go into Silicon Valley and just go—

you're telling me to take the, take the check right now?

How sick would it be though to go to Silicon Valley in front of the nerd kings and go, hmm, yeah, as a philosophy major, that's very interesting.

Here's fucking just chills for a fucking milli. Hmm, what is, what is AI?

They're like, yeah, here's $10 million.

Just talk about Hindu gods. And shit. Fuck, maybe I should, dude. Why am I struggling out here?

Peter Thiel and be like, hmm, interesting. Give this guy a fucking billion dollars. Yeah, it's, it's— well, it's hard to predict, dude. We started a podcast 10 years ago and they were like, we were fucking like, we— dude, we stunk. We were just like, we were shitty. And I remember this guy was like, never do a podcast, man. It's saturated. It's bullshit. And then it's like, you know, thank God Shane became super famous, but like, who could have saw that coming? But you'll never know until you just do a thing. You're like, you nut up and you go, I don't know what this is going to look like in 10 years, but I'm just going to do this thing, dude. That's— it might suck, but the, my, my— the main thing is like trying. And again, it's, it's like so hard to say this because it's like, you know, when I didn't have any money, all I could think about was making money. I'm like, I need to make fucking money. But then it's like, if you can build a life where you at least turn the dial down on like the market mentality where it's like, yeah, obviously make it, get you, cover your needs, but like try to define yourself maybe some other way than like what you do and how much money.

Cause it's like, it's just a losing game at the end of the day. If you look at income distribution, it's just like right up here. And if you're telling me like only these people are happy, which they're not. Yeah. It's like, what do you do when you're here, here, here? How can you make a life? And this is like the whole Aristotelian thing of like, how can you— what is the good life for you and how can you get it realistically? What does that look like? And it's, it's not— if you really think it's like, I have a giant fucking boat, and it's like those— most of those guys are fucking dickheads. Yeah. And it's not like, you know, if you have a boat you're not a dickhead, but it's like if you want to be the guy who's like, oh, the biggest this and that, most of those guys aren't fucking happy because then they one day see a guy with the newest car or whatever it is and go, fuck. Yeah.

So it's like, there's got to be success. Yeah, exactly.

There's got to be a way where you can do it where it's like, how do you actually— and this is, you know, how do you do it? It's hard to do, but it's like, how do you try to orient yourself where you're like genuinely contributing to everyone having a slightly sicker time, including yourself, rather than being like, I'm gonna fucking major in this, I'll make $400,000, you know, whatever, whether that happens or not, doesn't. But I don't know, it's like as you get older you're just like, damn, I was like, I was so fucking dumb when I was younger. I just switched my major to business because I was like, dude, I'm gonna make $100K if I have a businessman. No, like, no idea what I was going to do with that or this or that. It was— that was just my thinking at the time. And it's, it's not— I don't think it's very good. I think the school should get a lot better at like helping you figure out, like, try to do a thing that actually resonates with you. Yeah, if you can, try to— as much as you can, take the be, you know, like use money as a tool instead of like a thing you almost like worship.

And like, you know, and people, it's easy for you to say, it's like, yeah, but I'm letting you know, man. It's like, I'm telling you, it's not a life-defining thing unless that's what, you know, your whole being. But it's like, if you, you know, I don't know, whatever. But the AI stuff with the job displacement, I, I hope that doesn't hit everyone real hard, but if it does, it's like, it's gonna be tough, dude.

Yeah, it'll definitely be tough. I mean, I think like, not only have we been sold this, like, idea of what success is, like what you're describing, like, fucking dude on a boat with, like, you know, 10 bitches on their arm, like, we also have been so coddled, like, even more than your generation. Like, our generation has grown up with, like, fucking just, you know, just, like, padded gloves on with everything. And I do— I was listening to something, um, I think it was actually on the fucking pod the other day where you were reading some book, uh, I think it was a— it was a shout out Notorious P-Pop, fucking nice, uh, but, uh, it was some book about talking about the difference about like China and the US and how like it— one was going to be Orwellian and one was going to be like the Soma shit, like sort of how we— how like our societies were gonna fall. And like one was going to be just sort of controlled into submission with like iron fist, and that's the more China thing. And then US was going to be like coddled into submission.

Yeah, it's 1984 versus Brave New World. Yeah, Brave New World was basically like you were going to be be, uh, basically given some— we're going to be like sensory overload into submission versus like real iron fist and like tamp down.

Look at what the fuck is happening. Like, it's hard not to say. And that's why I do think that like keeping your circle small to the like the best of your ability in a certain sense of just like getting people around you that like, you know, remind you who the fuck you are, like with all your warts and shit. Because all that, all that, um, like, the social media stuff is all about, like, cleansing. And it's sort of like the uncanny valley thing that we were talking about, like, perfect skin. And, like, yeah, it's all going towards this ideal of what you, like, wish you would be perceived as versus, like, the people closest to you know— like, that's what I think true love is too, is like seeing someone with all their, like, snakes and warts and all the fucking ugly shit and still being like, no, like, I love that person.

Yeah, I don't like the whole red flag thing or whatever the fuck it's called.

What are the, um, Um, with like dating and shit.

Yeah, it's like, yeah, yeah, it's like, dude, everyone's fucked. Everyone's fucked. Yeah, like everyone's fine, you know. Yeah, you can maybe— there are certain things maybe you could be like, all right, that's a little too much. But yeah, I agree, man. It is, uh, I don't know, I, I feel— I just, you know, I also think for younger people, like, to have all your social interactions essentially possibly be filmed— yeah, fucking nuts. Nightmare, dude. If you'd film me back when I was like drinking in college Yeah, that was happening.

Oh, I have like— I didn't know how I escaped.

We had like pictures you'd put on Facebook, but like, dude, the filming of like just— there's someone almost always filming everywhere.

Yeah, it's not any given time. And that's why, like, that's why so much— I'm sure you see at your shows and shit like that too. Maybe it's a little different for comedy, but like every concert I go to, it's like everybody's stiff as a fucking board and just sitting there with their phones out. It sucks. No one fucking dances anymore. Like Like, I don't know, we'll see what actually happens. I hate getting into— I feel like every conversation too just has this basin of like, world's fucked, like everything sucks. Weird, dude. World is not fucked. Like, I'm here doing a podcast with fucking Matt McCusker, and you know why, bro? Because I, I did— like, I took a fucking risk, and like, I saw something that was interesting, and I worked my ass off. And like, I know that's how you got here too. Like, there, there is a way to make your dreams come true, even in this gnarly world. And A year ago I was listening to this podcast, working in a restaurant, like never made a movie. And, you know, not fucking patting myself on the back. What I'm saying is like, I'm not different from anyone else.

Like, the only thing I did was be like, I'm going to try this. I'm going to try. Yeah, yeah. I'm going to care and I'm going to—

Yeah, I like that a lot. Even if again, it's like, it's, it's scary putting stuff out and people can be like, you fucking suck. This is fucking the dumbest shit in the world. It's like, yeah, but don't you don't reap any. And again, that gets into the whole like there's certain goods, there's certain things that are good that are internal to doing a thing. Like if your movie made made $1 billion. That's an external reward. You know, I made a billion fucking bucks. But then there's like the inner growth that happens of like, I went to the movie, I weathered criticism, I met people, I talked to people, I had to confront my idea coming back. And, and there's like a thing you get that grows inside of you that's just like, it's a benefit no one can take away. And I don't know, I think it's amazing. I think it's sick, just like getting out there and like, fuck it, I'm gonna rip this thing and do it and see what happens.

That's what was cool about YouTube too, man. Like, the barrier to entry is so like I mean, you guys have been using that like for years now and YouTube rules.

I love YouTube, man. It's just fucking awesome.

Yeah, it's sick. And also it's like freedom. Like, it's like the most free market of every— I mean, obviously you can like pay for views and all that shit, but like, dude, you can watch my movie, your podcast, and like some dude like putting burgers in his fucking underwear. And like, that guy will win too. Like, that's what's sick. It's like, I know I'll see my movie and it's It's like, bro, I almost killed myself making this thing, and it's like some chick like falling off a staircase. I'm like, that is better. Like, like, fuck, it's like 12 million views. Yeah, exactly.

Well, dude, I can't thank you enough, man. I think you, you know, I'm pumped on what you're doing. I mean, obviously you're a marketing genius. I should tell you that. And, uh, thank you. Yeah, dude, I'm pumped for you, man.

Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. I just— quick shout out to the whole team, the MI team, like, helped with, with all of this stuff. Shout out Hard Boys History Podcast. Trench Lizards is coming. And yo, shout out you guys. Like, I have seen so many people that I've, like, listened to and looked up to all this stuff, like, get limelight and, and go off the rails. And like, I just want to say, as like one of the dogs that has like been here for a while, like, thank you so much for just holding it down, like keeping it real. Like you and Shane are just as real as it gets. And like, this podcast is the best and And I don't know, man. It just means a lot that, like, when you see a lot of people get all that pressure and start to crumble or, like, morph and stuff, it just is cool, especially as someone who's trying to do stuff and put things out there, to have an example of, like, you don't have to change. There's a way to do this and keep yourself to yourself.

I appreciate that, man.

I really do. I appreciate you. That is a nice source of pride, of not just becoming, like, a freak. Yeah.

I'm sure it's hard, bro. I'm sure it's hard.

I mean, yeah. Just— it— not really, honestly. Yeah, I'm, I'm kept eternally humble. Shane's the god of my YouTube universe, dude. I like—

I was like, dude, he's so fucking sick. That's tight. That's—

I could never try to flex like I'm cool.

I guess he is just like the Marshmallow Man taking all the fucking like arrows. He's—

dude, he's, he's just aura. I'm, I'm, I'm just fucking— he's my— sorry for calling you Marshmallow Man, Shane.

He's my son, dude.

He's my aura son, dude. I just go, oh dude. No, it really is. He's He's honestly the most impressive on that because it's like he's like a legit celebrity. Yeah, and he's literally— his, his own brodom is so— it's just so strong. Yeah, remaining a bro is tough. The world will try to unbrow you, and he's, he's just— his brodom is— he's literally a bro statue. He's unmovable.

He was built for this, bro. It's unbelievable. Just a whole line of fucking bullshit.

If anyone could become for real still just like kind of a cunt. He could, he could legitimately be like, no, I've earned it, I'm gonna be a little bit of a gun. He's too stoic of a bro, it's unbelievable. That's sick, dude. It's a bro-istism, dude.

Yeah, you gotta write that book next, dude. Thank you so much, brother. Thank you.

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