Riskgaming

This week’s solar eclipse captured the imaginations of millions of Americans throughout an arc across the continent. One of those entranced was Sam Arbesman, Lux’s scientist-in-residence and a local of Cleveland, which sat in the full zone of totality. Sam also happened to live in Kansas City during the 2017 eclipse, so he has (accidentally) eclipsed-chased in his choices of residence. Briefly, Sam and host Danny Crichton talk about the eclipse, the mesmerizing impact of science, and the unique community that comes together in cities lying in the darkness. Lux is “light” in Latin, and so what happens when darkness descends across the Earth? Surprisingly, something magical and optimistic, showing how science and mathematics has the ability to transmute our passions into something great. Produced by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Christopher Gates⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Music by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Ko⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

During a recent interview, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang emphasized his interest in how Nvidia’s AI processing chips could transform the science of life. He noted that this science, when properly understood, could evolve into a new form of engineering. Currently though, we lack the knowledge of how the extreme complexity of biology works, nor do we have models — namely AI models — to process that complexity. We may not have a perfect understanding of biology, but our toolset has expanded dramatically over the past ten years. Now, with the combination of data, biology and AI, we’re seeing the early signs of a golden era of biological progress, with large-language models that are able to predict everything from protein folding to increasingly, protein function. Entire spaces of our map are being discovered and filled in, and that is leading to some bullish scientists and investors to call the period we are living in the century of biology. But much remains to be done, and that’s the topic of our episode today. Host Danny Crichton is joined by Lux Capital’s bio investor Tess van Stekelenburg. Tess and Danny talk about Nvidia’s recent forays into biology as well as the new foundational model Evo from the Arc Institute. They then look at what new datasets are entering biology and where the gaps remain in our global quest to engineer life. Finally, they’ll project forward on where evolution might be taking us in the future once unshackled by nature. Produced by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Christopher Gates⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Music by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Ko⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Astrobiology has seen major revolutions in the past three decades, challenging old perceptions. The guest, Adam Frank, talks about identifying biosignatures and technosignatures of life. The Habitable Worlds Observatory could be the first satellite dedicated to the search for life. The podcast also discusses the impact of AI on the search for extraterrestrial life and the potential discoveries in astrobiology in the coming years.

Humans are enamored by a good story. The world overloads our mammalian senses, and so we seek any simplifying structure to narrate what we are witnessing and make it more accessible for processing. That simplification doesn’t just reduce the complexity of the world, but also makes it difficult to see the extent by which luck drives the successes of our geniuses — and the failures of others. From scientific discoveries and power-law venture returns to legislative breakthroughs and decisions during war, the world is, essentially, chaos. That might trigger a bout of deep existentialism for many of us, but for Brian Klaas, the hope is that confronting the stochastic nature of the world can lead to better governance and progress. In his new book Fluke, Klaas argues that we need to upend the simplistic statistical analyses and modeling that are common across social science and other domains and replace it with one that can encompass a theory of flukes. That means understanding timing, path dependency, and how the world is a complex system that is far more of a continuous variable than a binary one. With Lux’s scientist-in-residence Sam Arbesman and host Danny Crichton, we all talk about how chaos rules our lives; how a better understanding of complexity can improve investments, science, and life; Darwin’s luck of publishing his research on natural selection; the dangers of the human penchant for finding narrative; the random luck of our life experiences; and why understanding flukes can be a counterpoint to the ideas of moneyball. Produced by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Christopher Gates⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Music by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Ko⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ & Suno

Connections are the key ingredient for careers, society and AI neural networks to boot. Sometimes those connections arise spontaneously and other times they’re planned, but the most interesting ones tend to be planned that go in unexpected directions. That’s the story of David Ha, the co-founder and CEO of Sakana, a world-class generative AI research lab in Tokyo, Japan. We previously announced that Lux led a $30 million founding seed round in the company a few weeks ago on the podcast, but we didn’t dive deeper into the ricochets of David’s peripatetic career. Studying computer science and machine learning at the University of Toronto, he worked down the hall from now-famous AI researcher Geoffrey Hinton. He ultimately headed to Goldman Sachs in Tokyo doing derivatives trading, but on the side, he published a shadow and anonymous blog where he posted random experiments in artificial intelligence. A decade later of serendipitous connections later, and he is now leading one of the emerging national AI leaders for Japan.We talk through the stochastic moments that defined David’s career, why complex systems knowledge would ultimately turn out to be so valuable, the unique features and benefits of Japan, why openly communicating ideas and particularly interactive demos can spawn such serendipitous connections, why industry has produced more innovation in AI than academia, and why Google’s creativity should never be discounted. Produced by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Christopher Gates⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Music by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Ko⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ & Suno

The construction of Boston’s Big Dig highway tunnels has gone down in history as one of the most infamously delayed and over-budgeted infrastructure projects in the sorry annals of U.S. growth and progress. But Ian Coss sees the project radically different. In hindsight, he argues, the Big Dig was a steal: the good kind. Far from being a gargantuan boondoggle, the project resuscitated downtown Boston and ushered in urban economic benefits and spillovers that dwarf the costs of the project, however one might calculate them. Ian interviewed more than 100 people connected with the Big Dig and spent months editing a nine-episode podcast series titled “The Big Dig” for GBH News, Boston’s National Public Radio affiliate. Through the series, he covers everything from the environmental consciousness of the 1960s and colorful yet idealistic local political figures to the Department of Transportation’s inflation estimate policy and ultimately the decades it took to bring the dream of burying Boston’s unsightly Central Artery freeway. On today’s “Securities” podcast with host Danny Crichton, Danny and Ian debate the merits of the Big Dig megaproject, the complicated construction policies that made the project seem like a loser in front of the public, and just how hard it is to measure the true impact of a project that forever transformed one of America’s founding cities. Produced by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Christopher Gates⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Music by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Ko⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Impulse Labs is rethinking home appliances, aiming to upgrade the user experience. They discuss the lack of innovation in appliances, the potential of electrifying appliances, and their successful experience at CES. They also explore misconceptions about induction stoves, marketing challenges, and the difficulties of upgrading homes in San Francisco.

Colonizing Mars has gone from the speculative fiction section of the bookstore right into the halls of Congress. Entrepreneurs led by Elon Musk have made “Occupy Mars” a tagline, and companies the Earth over are exploring the logistics of settling humans across the Moon and Mars. But what’s the true viability of a Mars settlement plan? Do we have the technology and legal systems in place to make this one-time fiction a reality? Popular cartoonist and author, Zach Weinersmith, wrote “A City On Mars” alongside his wife Kelly Weinersmith to explore that very question. Starting with an optimistic lens, they eventually conceded in the book that the project is one of extraordinary difficulty and are pessimistic at its chances. “A City On Mars” won a slew of best-of awards in 2023 for its delightfully engaging and humorous breakdown of complex physical and biological topics. In this first part of a two-part series, host Danny Crichton and Lux’s scientist in residence Sam Arbesman discuss with Zach the biological and psychological challenges of inter-planetary settlement and why every astronaut lies about their health in outer space. We also explore the challenges of reproduction in space, and what a second generation of settlers might have to endure in the far reaches of our solar system. Produced by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Christopher Gates⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Music by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Ko⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

The current drive for a Mars colony revolves around two central axes: one is a fear of existential risk and the other is a search for existentialism. On the former, philosophers and probabilists remain deeply concerned about humanity’s Achilles heel: that our entire existence depends on the sustenance of a single blue dot in the Milky Way. Humanity’s fate is fundamentally tied to this single rock, which gives little redundancy from an asteroid strike, nuclear winter, or pandemic. At the same time, many entrepreneurs hear a rallying cry when they think about a Mars colony, arguing that a bold and long-term project is precisely what is needed to galvanize humanity to work together, overlook our internecine differences and find transcendence amidst the celestial cosmos. Even if outside our lifetime, a drive toward a space colony could be an existentialism that offers meaning and sustenance to our lives. In this second and final episode, Zack Weinersmith, who along with his wife Kelly Weinersmith are the authorial duo of A City on Mars, join host Danny Crichton and Lux’s scientist-in-residence Sam Arbesman to talk more about their negative prognostication for a Mars colony. Taking a more optimistic view, we also talk with Zach about what we should be doing to prep for a colony, including collecting more laboratory data and expanding science’s understanding of life under microgravity conditions.

The cost of launching a payload into low-earth orbit has shrunk dramatically over the past two decades as SpaceX has aggressively expanded its capability to repeatedly launch payloads into orbit at cheap cost. But accessing orbits farther away from Earth, such as Medium Earth orbit (MEO) and Geostationary orbit (GEO), remain expensive endeavors. Lux’s portfolio company Impulse Space, which is building the next generation of rocket propulsion for space, unveiled the design specs of its new high performance kick stage vehicle Helios today. The vehicle will allow operators to move objects like satellites from Low Earth orbit to orbits farther away at just a fraction of today’s costs, and it’s coming soon in 2026. I talked with Impulse Space’s CEO and founder Tom Mueller about Helios, as well as the growing concerns over space junk, a recent satellite emergency over Christmas, the television show The Expanse, space traffic control and what it means to move things in space and bring them back home.