E106 - Angus Hervey, Future Crunch

Angus Hervey is a political economist and a journalist specialising in the impact of disruptive technologies on society. Angus is a champion of "intelligent optimism" and co-founder of Future Crunch, a Melbourne-based think tank of sorts dedicated to informed, optimistic thinking about tech and the opportunities that it presents. Before co-founding Future Crunch, Angus was the founding community manager of Random Hacks of Kindness and was the first editorial manager for Global Policy, one of the world's leading international policy journals. He also holds a PhD in International Political Economy from the London School of Economics.

In this wide-ranging chat with Phaedon, Angus discusses the three pillars of intelligent optimism, why he considers social media a drug, what the emergence of "the passion economy" means for online businesses, and why the media can't portray what life is like for the average person. Angus also talks about the key transformative technologies he thinks will drive the next industrial revolution, diving into topics like the distinction between machine learning and artificial intelligence, the valley of death that exists for Australian biotech and the barriers and opportunities for clean energy technologies.

For a regular dose of science, tech and intelligent optimism, subscribe to the weekly Future Crunch newsletter here.

Quickfire Recommendations

-Book: The Biggest Bluff by Maria Konnikova

-Podcast: a16z

-News source: Reddit and The Whippet newsletter by McKinley Valentine

-Favourite holiday: Anywhere in South Africa

-Productivity tool: Cold Turkey (it's a powerful website blocker)

-Favourite founder/CEO: The founders of Tritium and Conflux Technology

-Ted Talk topic: "It's Never as Bad or as Good as You Think It Is"

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