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Razib Khan's Unsupervised Learning: Daily Summaries Delivered
by Razib Khan
Razib Khan engages a diverse array of thinkers on all topics under the sun. Genetics, history, and politics. See: http://razib.substack.com/
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- Today1h 20m
Jason Scharf: Austin's present and future as Texas' tech hub
Today Razib talks to Jason Scharf, a biotech investor and podcaster. A native of San Diego, Scharf is an angel investor and startup advisor focused on the intersection of biology, technology, and business, particularly within TechBio and digital health. He has leadership experience in strategy and market intelligence at major companies like Illumina and Amgen. Scharf now targets investments in the bio-innovation tech stack and care delivery transformation. Additionally, as the host of the Austin Next podcast, he is an advocate for regional innovation ecosystems. Scharf promotes the growth of the Texas Triangle as a premier global hub for biotechnology and frontier tech. Razib and Scharf discuss the growth and appeal of Austin, Texas, highlighting its booming tech scene and business environment. Scharf discusses why he moved from San Diego during the COVID-19 pandemic. They compare Austin's population growth to other major cities, noting Austin's rapid expansion from 400,000 in 1990 to over a million in 2020. They also talk about the impact of autonomous vehicles, the potential for high-speed rail, and the importance of infrastructure and talent in sustaining Austin's future growth. The conversation touches on the broader Texas Triangle and its economic significance to the American economy today and in the future. They highlight the libertarian and business-friendly environment in Texas, allowing for significant developments like Tesla's Gigafactory (the world's second-largest building), and the planned Terfab. Razib compares Austin and San Antonio, noting the former's rapid growth and the challenges it faces, such as infrastructure and housing. They also touch on the cultural and economic dynamics in Texas, emphasizing the importance of storytelling and narrative in shaping the state's future.
- 2 weeks ago1h 16m
Destiny (Steven Bonnell II): a liberal in the age of radical progressives and MAGA
On this episode, Razib talks to streamer and political commentator Destiny (Steven Bonnell II). Destiny first gained prominence in the late 2000s as a professional player and content creator in the video game StarCraft II. Over time, he transitioned from gaming into politics, philosophy, culture, and current events, becoming one of the most influential figures in online debate culture. Known for his fast-paced argumentative style, willingness to engage opponents across the ideological spectrum, and extensive live discussions with politicians, journalists, academics, and fellow creators, Destiny has built a large audience on streaming and video platforms. His content focuses on liberal politics, public policy, social issues, and media criticism, and he has played a notable role in shaping the modern ecosystem of online political commentary and debate. Razib Khan interviews Destiny about his current position on the center-left, with the rise of the far left and the ascendancy of MAGA. Destiny criticizes Trump's foreign policy as irresponsible and incoherent, citing examples like the Venezuela invasion and the Iran situation. He also discusses the challenges of defining political labels, the impact of social media on political discourse, and the need for better messaging from the Democratic Party. He emphasizes the importance of nuanced discussions on issues like transgender rights and foreign policy. Razib and Destiny touch on cultural war issues, particularly the left's obsession with racial identity and the right's response. They debate the impact of DEI policies versus the DOJ's actions under Trump. Destiny argues that conservatives' disengagement from cultural institutions led to their current dominance by the left. They also discuss the media's role in shaping public perception and the decline of ideological debate due to social media echo chambers. The conversation touches on the MAGA movement's reliance on Trump and the lack of genuine engagement in modern political discourse.
- 3 weeks ago1h 13m
Joseph Robertson: bringing Reform UK to the top of British politics
The UK is now in political turmoil, as Keir Starmer has announced his resignation. The next British election is still three years away, but it is hotly anticipated because Labour is going to faceoff against three parties of the Right: the Tories (also known as the Conservaties), Reform UK and Restore Britain. Reform, led by Nigel Farage and stocked with defections from the Tories, has a good chance to win in 2029. On today's episode, Razib talks to Joseph Robertson about the British politican scene. Robertson is Director at Touchpoint Strategy and CPAC Britain, wrote for Epoch Times and has been a long-time conservative political consultant in the UK. Currently, he is aligned with Reform UK. Razib and Robertson discuss the political and economic challenges facing the UK, particularly since the 2019 election and Brexit. Robertson highlights the shift in political allegiances, with the working class moving from Labour to the Tories, and the subsequent rise of Nigel Farage's Reform UK party. They address issues like economic stagnation, high energy costs, and the impact of net-zero policies. Robertson criticizes the inherited socialist Fabian agenda of Labour and the lack of integration among new immigrants. They also touch on the rise of radical Islam and the need for stronger national identity and sovereignty. The conversation concludes with the announcement of CPAC UK, aiming to unite conservative movements globally.
- Jun 26, 20261h 0m
Zineb Riboua: Rising Tides of the Third World
Today on Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Zineb Riboua, a research fellow and program manager of Hudson Institute's Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East. She specializes in Chinese and Russian involvement in the Middle East, the Sahel, and North Africa, great power competition in the region, and Israeli-Arab relations. Riboua's pieces and commentary have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Foreign Policy, the National Interest, the Jerusalem Post and Tablet among other outlets. She holds a master's of public policy from the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University. She did her undergraduate studies in France, where she attended French preparatory classes and HEC Paris' Grande Ecole program. Her Substack is Beyond the Ideological. Razib and Zineb Riboua discuss the concept of Third Worldism (following up on an earlier podcast), its historical context, and its contemporary relevance. Riboua explains that Third Worldism positions the decolonizing world as a historical actor seeking revenge and redistribution from the West, emphasizing the West's role in global South underdevelopment. They explore its manifestations in politics, particularly in the US and Europe, and its influence on foreign policy, highlighting the role of Israel as a central issue. Riboua also touches on the economic and political challenges faced by Iran and the Middle East, and the evolving dynamics of Islam in global politics.
- Jun 19, 20261h 15m
Brianna Wu: the case for liberalism
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Brianna Wu. Wu is an American video game developer, programmer, and political activist best known as the co-founder and CEO of the independent game studio Giant Spacekat. Raised in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, she attended the University of Mississippi to study journalism and political science but withdrew in 2001 without earning a degree in order to pursue early entrepreneurial ventures. After establishing herself in the tech industry and leading the development of the 2014 indie game Revolution 60, Wu became a prominent advocate for marginalized groups in gaming, a role that expanded significantly after she was targeted during the Gamergate harassment campaign. She later transitioned into political organizing, running for the U.S. House of Representatives in Massachusetts as a Democrat in 2018 and 2020, and co-founding Rebellion PAC to support progressive political initiatives. In the last few years Wu has been pivoting more toward the center, expressing concerns about the power of the anti-Israel faction on the Left. Razib and Wu discuss their political differences, he, being on the political Right his whole adult life, and, Wu, a partisan of the Left. Wu makes the affirmative case for a liberal Left vision of American politics, a welfare state without express support for socialism. They also discuss the excesses of both the woke Left and the MAGA Right, and Wu challenges Razib on the actions of state-level Republicans. She argues that for many Americans the Right presents no option, because it does not welcome many identity categories as the Left does.
- Jun 19, 20261h 24m
Dan Hess: the end of Asians and humanity going to the retirement home
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib has a wide-ranging conversation, again, with Dan Hess, the man behind the More Births account on social media. An engineer with a large family in the DC area, Hess' essays on topics like Israelis' high birth rate have gained the attention of X. He has an account that has come from a few hundred followers to more than 45,000 in less than 4 years. His tweets have been boosted by Elon. Today Razib and Hess start the conversation talking about East Asia, and its massive fertility crisis. Hess makes the case against urban density, observing how low fertility is in some of these Asian cities in particular. Razib also brings up economic and cultural creativity, as he and Hess ruminate on the consequences of reduced dynamism due to an aging population. Hess also argues that we cannot rely on evolution to fix our demographic imbalances; the source nations of immigrants are experiencing demographic collapse as well.
- Jun 6, 20261h 20m
Leonidas-Romanos Davranoglou: the last Hellenes and the children of the Yamnaya
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to geneticist Leonidas-Romanos Davranoglou about two papers, Ancient DNA evidence for the history of the Albanians and Uniparental analysis of Deep Maniot Greeks reveals genetic continuity from the pre-Medieval era. He is an entomologist and evolutionary biologist specializing in insect morphology, biomechanics, bioacoustics, systematics, and taxonomy. Born in Greece, Davranoglou earned a B.Sc. (Hons) in Zoology from Imperial College London (2012–2015) before completing a DPhil (2015–2020) in insect morphology and biomechanics at the University of Oxford under supervisors Graham Taylor and Beth Mortimer. He is currently a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellow at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History (with support from the John Fell OUP Fund), where he investigates the evolutionary origins of sound production in hemipteran insects. He also serves as Curator of Hemiptera and a senior researcher at the Steinhardt Museum of Natural History in Tel Aviv. Over the course of the episode Razib and Davranoglou cover the intersection of history, archaeology and genetics. Who are the Greeks of the Mani peninsula, south of Sparta? Are they particularly "genetically pure" compared to other Greeks, and what is their connection to the ancient Greeks? How do Albanians differ from other Balkan populations and what are their deep origins? The podcast explores genetic results that demystify the demographic history of the southern Balkans, and two of the deeply indigenous peoples to the region.
- May 29, 20261h 20m
Nikolai Yakovenko: 4 years into the age of AI
It's been a minute since we've had Nikolai Yakovenko on the podcast. Yakovenko is a former professional poker player,and was a research scientist at Google, Twitter and Nvidia. With a decade in computer science, Yakovenko has been at the forefront of the large-language-model revolution that has driven to prominence companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, and DeepMind, and an ecosystem that has birthed hundreds of smaller startups. He is also the founder of DeepNewz, an AI-driven news startup. On this podcast, Razib and Yakovenko talk about the current top of the line "frontier labs," OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google's DeepMind, why xAI has faltered, and the reality that only DeepSeek in China seems up to challenging the American firms. Yakovenko notes that AI's transformative impact is mostly in the massive capital influx into the sector, as well as becoming a ubiquitous part of the software engineer's toolkit. They discuss how programming without an AI-assist is now likened to "raw dogging" coding, while artificial superintelligence seems a rather distant prospect. The technology is getting better, but predictions of the doomers seem not to have panned out.
About Razib Khan's Unsupervised Learning
Razib Khan engages a diverse array of thinkers on all topics under the sun. Genetics, history, and politics. See: http://razib.substack.com/
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