Erik Torenberg, co-founder of On Deck and Village Global, discusses Turpentine's early stages, optimal fame levels, and limitations of talent selection in venture. They explore fame benefits, balancing privacy, and the relationship between talent and development. The chat also covers innovation in big businesses vs. startups, challenges in talent identification, and merging politics with entertainment culture.

We chat about: -why professors with tenure are not very controversial -marketing as an underrated tool in all facets of life -“ugly truths” as an arbitrage opportunity Bryan Caplan is a Professor of Economics at George Mason University and a research fellow at the Mercatus Center. Known for his unconventional viewpoints, he's the author of several influential books, including “The Myth of the Rational Voter”, “Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids”, and “The Case Against Education”. Bryan is an outspoken individual with strong, sometimes controversial viewpoints on some of the most important issues of our times including education, immigration, and economics.

Dwarkesh Patel, recent college graduate and host of The Lunar Society podcast, discusses the future of intellectual liquidity providers with AI aggregators, reflecting on his podcast guests, and the value of verbal intelligence and charisma in the coming years.

Tyler Cowen, economics professor and author, discusses AI trading crypto, the impact of AI on real interest rates, and the replenishing of low-hanging fruit. They also explore retirement perspectives, urban sprawl, and the pros and cons of traditional publishing.

We chat about: -his journey into cryptography -his thoughts about Ethereum as an early cryptographic advisor in 2014 -geopolitical relations vis a vis Russia, the US, and Vietnam Neal Koblitz is a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Washington as well as an Adjunct Professor at the Center for Applied Cryptographic Research at the University of Waterloo. Koblitz received his undergraduate degree from Harvard University and received his PhD from Princeton University under Nicholas Katz. He is a world-renown mathematician best known for having co-created elliptic curve cryptography (or ECC) in 1985, a technology that underpins many of the information systems that exist today including Bitcoin and Ethereum. He was recently awarded the Levchin Prize in Real World Cryptography in 2021 for his work on ECC. He, along with his wife, runs the Kovalevskaia Fund, a foundation that encourages and aids women in science and technology in developing countries.

We chat about: -his early days playing poker          -insurance markets          -FTX and crypto governance going forward          -the equilibrium number of crypto venture firms          -disagreeableness as the common trait among crypto founders Haseeb Qureshi is a Managing Partner at Dragonfly, a crypto and web3 focused venture firm founded in 2018. Haseeb's path towards becoming a VC today was anything but straightforward: at age 19, he dropped out of college to play poker full-time and became one of the strongest No-Limit Hold 'Em players in the world. Following his poker career, Haseeb discovered Effective Altruism, gave away the vast majority of his poker winnings, and went back to college to pursue tech startups. He ultimately found his way into the anti-fraud team at Airbnb but was quickly red-pilled into the crypto industry, working full time in the space starting in 2017 at Earn.com, which was acquired by Coinbase, and later at MetaStable Capital.