Inner Cosmos with David Eagleman

Ep161 "What Do Ancient Brains and Future AIs Have in Common?" with Read Montague

July 6, 2026·1h 3m
Episode Description from the Publisher

What do honeybee brains have in common with human brains -- and with the AI that beat the world's best Go player? What simple algorithm has been hiding inside brains for 100s of millions of years? When babies throw food from a high chair again and again, are they being mischievous or are they running physics experiments? And what does any of this have to do with whether dopamine is more than a pleasure molecule, or whether there are laws of physics we have yet to discover, or whether large language models are going to get outdated in favor of a new approach? Join Eagleman with computational neuroscientist Read Montague to explore how very old systems in our brains map onto the future of AI.

Podzilla Summary coming soon

Sign up to get notified when the full AI-powered summary is ready.

Get Free Summaries →

Free forever for up to 3 podcasts. No credit card required.

Listen to This Episode

Get summaries like this every morning.

Free AI-powered recaps of Inner Cosmos with David Eagleman and your other favorite podcasts, delivered to your inbox.

Get Free Summaries →

Free forever for up to 3 podcasts. No credit card required.