Today on the podcast, we have Russ Greene. Russ is the former director of government relations and research at CrossFit, a former games athlete, an Arabic linguist, and is currently an associate director at Stand Together, a nonprofit in the DC area. We discuss the current state of American wealth, governance, and fitness.    The views and opinions expressed on Narratives are those of the guests and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of employers, past or present. 

The podcast delves into the cultural influences of English colonies on modern American culture through 'folkways'. Topics include the characteristics of Puritans, the contrasting values of Cavaliers and Ivy League individuals, the evolution of attitudes towards hierarchy and animals, the history and values of Quakers, Scots migration to America, and the influence of historical contexts on policies and values.

What is artificial intelligence? What does it mean for the future of humanity? What is the state of the art today? Will and his brother Glenn cover out two competing visions of how general artificial intelligence will be designed and develop over the coming century. 

This week on the podcast, we review a working paper entitled "The Rate of Return on Everything." We answer the question, which assets tend to have the highest rates of return over time? What is secular stagnation? Why is economic growth important for a large democracy like the United States, and what we can do to improve growth in a decadent society? Are there tradeoffs between growth and inequality? We also talk about Jack Bogle, modern index investing, and how investing in equities contrasts with investing in real estate.

Why does your dog act like a dog and not your cat? Why does your cat not act like your dog? If cats are better hunters than dogs (hint: they are), why do we hunt with dogs instead of cats? Why do we ride horses rather than cows? Why are cows primarily a food source and not horses? We sit down with Faith Jarvis this week to learn about the domestication of the animals that are our pets and the ones that become our dinner.

What do Machine Learning, the French Horn, Championship Scrabble, the Lotus Evora, cryptocurrency mining and startups have in common?   Eric Smith.   Eric joins Will in this week's episode for an exploration of startup life.

Bobby O'Neal Talton is a 90-year-old award-winning violin maker with a lifetime of experience in the art of creation.  As a boy he built wooden airplanes to fly around the hills of southwest Virginia; as a young married man, he built a house because his family needed a place to live in Springfield. Virginia; as a middle-aged man he moved to banjos, dulcimers. violins, violas and cellos.  Join us as we explore the imagination and creativity of an award-winning nonagenarian artisan.

What's on your mind? This week Will and I review the work of Julian Jaynes and his exploration of how the human mind may have developed and evolved over the last several thousand years. Is mental illness an illness at all or merely an expression of brain function that would have been common in the past?  What are some of the different ways our minds may operate to successfully navigate human interactions?  What is bicameralism and how does it work? How about the role of consciousness?

This week on the podcast, I am joined by my two siblings, Faith and Glenn Jarvis. We talk about some of the problems we see in modern science, our experience with elite overproduction, and how we experience competition. Faith is a biochemist, and Glenn is a Mechanical Engineering major at North Carolina State University.

Here we are, in the dog days of a COVID summer, we thought we would bring you all a show about something a bit more positive-Christmas trees! We have a good friend of mine, Avery Barr, on the show to talk about how Christmas trees go from seed to your living room. We also what CRISPR means for Christmas trees, how to successfully coach high school students, and just what an "air raid" offense is. Avery is a thrid generation Christmas tree farmer, high school football coach, and avid skier. Enjoy!