

Crazy Wisdom
Stewart Alsop
In his series "Crazy Wisdom," Stewart Alsop explores cutting-edge topics, particularly in the realm of technology, such as Urbit and artificial intelligence. Alsop embarks on a quest for meaning, engaging with others to expand his own understanding of reality and that of his audience. The topics covered in "Crazy Wisdom" are diverse, ranging from emerging technologies to spirituality, philosophy, and general life experiences. Alsop's unique approach aims to make connections between seemingly unrelated subjects, tying together ideas in unconventional ways.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Jun 20, 2022 • 1h 6min
Will Urbit Replace Linux? w/ Peter McEvoy
Peter McEvoy Run Time Engineer at Tlon Will Urbit replace Linux? Urbit is so big and ambitious Urbit as an overlay operating system On top of an existing operating system e.g: Mac OS, Windows How far are we from hardware-enabled Urbit? How long will it take for Urbit to go big, like really big? How many developers are working on Urbit right now? 15 engineers at Tlon Tlon is the corporate lynchpin for the effort How many companies are building on Urbit? Who runs the Urbit non-profit? How does someone get a grant from the Urbit non-profit? How do the non-profits work when it comes to supporting open source projects? It's like an ISP non-profit What is Urbit? Human interaction to an online setting Like Stumble Upon Synchronicity and Exploration, Serendipity Google is detrimental because you get exactly what you want from it Stewart realizes how addicted he is to immediate gratification Will people build things on Urbit that will lead to immediate gratification? Will Google become obsolete? How will they adapt? What does it feel like now 3 years after giving up all social media except Linkedin? Will Iboga work for internet addiction (we didn’t speak about it)? As an engineer do you sometimes feel like God or a God? Have you been to China? Would you use something like Duolingo for learning languages? Can you give me insight into building a new spaced repetition software on Urbit? What is a hard break in history (19 minutes)? Does someone in China own a galaxy? Or a star? What is the deal with the Urbit ID? What was your graduate degree in? How far are we away from me being able to write prose? What are the two languages for urbit? Hoon Knock What are virtual machines? How do they work? How long did it take you to get proficient in Knock and Hoon? What is the Urbit Kernel? Arvo Why is functional programming such an aspect of Urbit? Who are the functional programming experts at Tlon or the other companies developing on Urbit? For a newbie at programming, would it be better to learn functional programming? Cal Newport Deepwork How do I design my day to day living so that it brings me joy and don't do things that I don’t want to do? How can we learn how we are being surveilled? What did Alan Watts teach you about Zen? A supposedly fun thing I will never do again A book by david foster wallace Do luxury cruise ships still work? What is search? Why is it different from discovery? Reference https://forvo.com/ for learning pronunciation Show notes Peter’s linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mcevoypeter/ Peter’s email: mcevoypeter@protonmail.com Peters @p (Urbit ID): ~fanfun-mocbud

Jun 13, 2022 • 1h 17min
Is Bitcoin the Universal Basic Income? w/ Michael Hawaii
Michael Hawaii Founder of Ocean Bit Are there a lot of Brazilians in Hawaii? Is Honolulu more beautiful than Rio? How about San Francisco? What is Ocean Energy Thermal (O-Tech)? What type of businesses are high kpax? Why aren’t you a fan of the word innovation? Are you going to build your business remotely? What is the difference between a moral opinion and data driven opinion? How are data packets different from digital money? What was your trip like to Venezuela?(25:00) What did you learn from your trip to Venezuela? Who are the Venezuelans to follow about Bitcoin? What don’t you like about custody? What are food labs? How does Hawaii get its energy? Where does it come from? How long does it take to get ships? Remembering people comes down to their name and where they come from. When did King Hamea Hamea conquer? (45:00) Who is Tim May? Has the FBI ever turned off a Coinbase account of someone who they didn’t like? What is Hanai? Who is Troy Cross @michaelhawaii

Jun 6, 2022 • 1h 34min
How Do Our Stories Shape Our Realities? - Steven Morris
Steven Morris Electrical engineer & High-Viber of Craziness @lifesmith - the mythology and the crafting of life. The stories we tell ourselves about ourselves and the world is what shapes our reality. Who is Richard Bach, author of “Illusions: the Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah”? Disappearing Clouds: thoughts create reality. Learning Discernment is ongoing. Neutral Learning. Some stories can be retold, some will always be there. Which app uses Spaced Repetition Memorization? Love is an abstract concept. Abstractions from nature implemented in code. (24:00) Blockchain solves the problem of data integrity. Holochain uses distributed hash tables for data maintained by the user first and foremost and the process makes sure that the data is in integrity with the rules in which it is created. “I didn’t get my 6th b**ster, so I can’t spend money anymore.” We are in a worldwide collapse of civilization… but collapse doesn’t have to be a bad thing. Techno Utopia vs. Mad Max @lifesmith

May 30, 2022 • 1h 9min
Why Do I Need a Personal Server? - Galen Wolfe-Pauly
Galen Wolfe-Pauly CEO of Tlon Why do I need a personal server? Why is it that we all have access to centralized servers? Why does all our data need to be in the same place? What is the issue of large scale? How do we consume information? How can I control my software? How do you use a computer as a vehicle for everyday creativity? How should I build my jungle gym? Pitch my new massage table idea. How do you manage writing for your role as CEO? Does Hoon help you in the way it's written? When will Tlon build a new Google Suite? How will writing lead into computer development? How do you deal with unproductive stress? What is landscape? How do you boot an urbit node? 2020: 2021: Work on the infrastructure so that other people can ship apps 2022: Take landscape and split them into other applications Digital Basics OS Simple suite of tools, solo for your own note taking. What will be the business-to-business landscape for Urbit? Real estate investment trust. Landscape as an OS in more high-level stuff. What is an OS? All the stuff, UI Chrome, developer frameworks for building an application. How do you make a toolkit really good? Urbit becomes. What is the problem with Google Docs? How do you visualize your personal data? What are the incentives to hoard other’s data? Sell it to advertisers. How do you build the social media layer on top of the internet? What does the internet look like after Urbit? Do we now have teleportation of the mind? What do you think about ancient Athens and the thing that happened to them as a connected place? How do you think advertising will work within Urbit? What is the technological problem that Urbit solved? How do you know when things turn mildly creepy? Older than blockchain. Who were the early creators of distributed systems? Tell me more about cypherpunk. What are distributed systems? 500 CS graduates in the late 60s. Electrical engineering programs (25 minutes) Area of CS research: A program that runs on a bunch of nodes, which needs them to share data and compute together. How did you find your investors? What does Urbit mean in regards to the future of distributed systems? Where does Gitlab fit into Urbit? Its an F-U to the networked computing industry. What is the industrial software complex? What are the things that are served by a personal virtual machine? What have you learned about the Self and self-identity from creating things on Urbit? What are the upfront costs of learning Hoon? In the early PCs the chip-set matters a lot. Chips run the code through the system. Portability in software. Why does ETH create a virtual machine? Why does it need one? A system as of a bunch of nodes. What do you think of Chia? How do physics flow into computing and new technologies? What is the one definition of computing? Whatever comes next. What is the relationship between Lightning and Urbit? What is an arbitrary contract? What is LUNA (45 minutes)? How do you tell when something isn’t hyped? In what ways was OHM like LUNA? What has woodworking taught you? What is materially useful here? How can you get a categorical win? How should I scope the project? What is the most important thing about building what you are going to build? What are the material constraints of the product you want to build? How will that work with the new technologies coming out of the pipeline? How do you work with people? Look at interviews with the people who wrote cyberpunk. What game? What is Zaibatsu? What is monolithic about the personal computer? What is dynamic land? Ubiquitous computing paper from the late 80s? What is outdoor computing?

May 23, 2022 • 1h 9min
What Are the Metaphysics Behind Utopianism? - Francis Pedraza
Francis Pedraza CEO and Cofounder of Invisible How was 2021 NYC like 1929 NYC? Is your business prepared for this recession? How did you prepare for the recession? How does profitability change your business? How do you buy back shares from investors? Ownership pizza pie: how do you convince an investor to buy back shares? How does the Golden age apply to partying on the internet? What is the Xeno paradox? You buy back equity with debt, and fInance with profits. This gets around the “bootstrappinig dilemma”.How does thinking in terms of buying back change the game on what you want to get out of your company? It gets investors aligned. What do you think about debt versus equity? Equity is expensive. How did you make it a deal for your investors? Why do people think about equity wrong? How did you set up the Finance 101 course? How does Heidegger think about the unsaid or the implied? How can I turn this into an online course (12:00)? What do you think about cryptocurrency? How can we uncover abuse, both subtle and not? What is a cashless loan? What is a strike price? What is art in business? What is the downside of loans? What does it mean to have a full recourse loan? How much do people believe in you? How can you make sure that a particular value is aligned? Where do most of your ideas come from? What do you mean by “paternalistic”? What are some maternalistic tricks? How do maternal downsides show up in companies? How does one become financially sophisticated? How do the VC’s abuse management teams? How do you verify if your agents come in full alignment? Selective informance versus neutral informance. What is Invisible’s social media policy? Do you have any agents in Russia? How have you adapted to remote work? What are the edge cases for non-violence? What is ESG? Do weapons manufacturers get ESG money? The road to serfdom Hayek (30:00) Bastiat Grannys lost their money on the stock market, like what is happening to crypto right now. The rule of accredited investors started with FDR. Insider trading created collusion for investing in private companies. 50 million to 100 billion; Theil made a shitload. What are the unseen problems? What are your thoughts on Urbit? What are the metaphysics behind socialism? Why does utopia always require intervention? Whack-a-mole socialism Will technology ever be a full magic wand? It is similar to the question of eternal life. What is the Persian holy epic book? Bhagavad Gita Mahabharata Reminds me of King Ashoka.. Who are the Shatriya? Brahmans are the priests. How can we be warriors for the truth? Am I changing or just progressing? How do I mix this perfection and becoming? What are your thoughts on purgatory? Why does being want to be?Why are there these realms of time? How did you learn how to manage your calendar? Do you like management? God got bored being one thing so he made many things. How do you determine the integrity level of another individual? Who are the Pre-Socratics? Who is Parmenides?There are no clear-cut lines between things. What is that an artifact of? What is New York-ness?Are you using virtual machines?What is the Numerai? Visionary Ventures 2024 profits Why does the world need another venture firm? Turing test is the paradigm for Silicon Valley. A test for humans to see how well they adapt to technology. Slurping slushees on a spaceship with Wall-E. How did such a platonic ideal get done by matrix? Da Vinci TestWhen will the average person be able to defeat Da Vinci in a creativity contest? How do you measure productivity? The rise and fall of American growth. Some people are productive and some are not. The Wizard and the Wand The relationship between the wizard and the wand instead of the wand destroying us all. Are you going to become a digital warlord? How do you reduce the distance between thought and action? How does someone stuck in UBI mindset understand the potential they have? ConversionWhere does the will come from? What is the face you had before you were born? What are the two risks I’m facing right now?How do you remove the possibility of defeat? How do you grow a company? No employees allowed. What does it mean to be an employee? What does it mean to be consultative? What did Marxists teach us about how to create value for both the labor and the ownership class? How do you manage the potential when it comes to finance?

May 16, 2022 • 1h 7min
How can we trust anything anymore? - Sam Patten
A distant cousin, a writer who lives in Maine, and a former political consultant. Why is 1957 a bad time to get stuck in a honey pot? 1962 is when the Cuban missile crisis occurred. What is Mr Jones? Is Russia a threat to the United States? What does a great policy towards Russia look like? What is the policy towards Russia? What is the policy towards China? What are the forms of leverage that China has on the US? How about Russia? Who is Peter Splitzer and his book? What is going to happen to Europe when it comes to alliances with Russia and the US? What does the Monroe doctrine look like from a Russian perspective? What is NATO doing? What is the role of nuclear power? NATO Article 5 was only used after 9/11. Why do you disagree with? What does a desperate Russia look like? Who is Gerhadt Schroder? Is the Ukraine War a civil war? What is the role of the UN in the New World Order, which is essentially a lack of order? The planes never arrived. Who were the victims of Joseph Mcarthy? What is the future of the American political experience? How can the Republican Party stop being reactive? Column for three newspapers Village Soup (Crossfire Hurricane)

May 10, 2022 • 1h 12min
Who was the Bitcoin Jesus? - Bernardo Oliveira
His business is like Jack Mallers’ Strike, but in Brazil. What is the Bitcoin scene like in Brazil? What is Bitcoin Maximalism? Which cryptocurrency is the most reliable? Is there a better alternative to democracy? What is a hardware wallet? What is the Lightning Network? What is Bitcoin Beach? What is the effect of hyper-inflation on bitcoin? Who was the Bitcoin Jesus? What were the Block-Size Wars? What are your favorite psychedelic substances? @didimosats

May 2, 2022 • 1h 10min
What is the Tirrel Corporation? - Christian Langalis
Christian Langalis is the co-founder and C.E.O. of Tirell Corporation What is Orbis Tertiary? What is the Orbis Ledger? Are there any cyberpunk references for Urbit business? What is the distinction of cyber-punk? Dystopia. What is cypher-punk? Who are Timothy May and Satoshi Nakamoto What is the overreach of instrumentalization? What is the atomization of the social? How did computers atomize humans even further? In what ways has studying culture informed your world view? What is the ultimate holy grail for Tirrell? What is an interregnum? What is the role of Urbit in the Web 3.0 ecosystem? How do you maintain legacy systems on an entirely new system that is censorless? What is a Spot ETF and why is it important? What is Bitcoin’s fifth pillar? (15 minutes) What is a cantalon insider? What is the New World Order that George H. W. Bush setup and how does it work now? What is the Minsky Moment? What is the Austrian tendency when it comes to economics? Who are Larry White and George Selgen? What is synthetic commodity money? What is the New Wyoming Bank Charter? What are Full-Reserve Cryptocurrency Banks? What is the difference between a bank and a bitcoin wallet? What are interbank clearing systems? What is the difference between a deferred system and a credit card settlement? What is unchained capital multisig? What is an FBO? What are extant regulations? What is the Nick Land quote (“in the mouth of madness”) (25 minutes)? How did science fiction inform your life? Who is Phil Monk? Urbit strives to have a system that is human scale, that will never require the long-term intervention of a specialized third party. Why do people call Curtis Yarvin an authoritarian? What is peer discovery? What is the contained podcast and who is Barret (36 minutes)? What are your favorite exclaves? How do I use Tirrell? Download the thing (find the thing). What is landscape (groups) programming language? What is the future of NFTs when it comes to fan groups? NFT’s can be digital cellophane wrappers for an album. How many people are in the Tirell corporation? What should someone know about the Urbit foundation? What is Hoon School? Do you have any insight into the people aspect of doing business? How is Tirell corporation set up? What church do you belong to (55 minutes)? What is the correct view of Urbit? What is the Jungen? What is Cottage Core? What is the relationship between Solipsism and being a Luddite? Who is Junger? What is the naming scheme? ~tirrel ~pindet-timmut ~tirrel corporation tirrel.io

Apr 25, 2022 • 1h 13min
How can we minimize conflict and maximize collaboration? - Erik Newton
Erik Newton is the C.O.O. of tlon.io which is the web development service for Urbit. Urbit is a place where you can speak your mind without worry of being censored. He used to be a lawyer, researching how humans can be removed from the execution and enforcement of contracts. He also had a podcast which attempted to pinpoint the causes of conflict in human relationships. Urbit is 3 pieces of technology: A virtual server built from the ground up; very secure, durable, and simple. A peer-to-peer encrypted network connecting all of the servers. A decentralized verification system. Data is not harvested on the Urbit network as it is on other social media networks. Humans can’t put genies back in their bottles. Get ready for Web 3.0! urbit.org tlon.io

Apr 18, 2022 • 56min
What is it like to become part of the outgroup rapidly? - Steve Kirsch
If you are interested in the info on the podcast please make sure to verify yourself the information that is presented You are on your own now for determining what is true. No trusted groups are now responsible for it. You can't outsource it. The best way that I have found to find what is true is to ignore what the mind wants to be true and relentlessly attack your own notions of what is true. Ask is that true? Over and over again until you find out If you verify it yourself please find Steve Kirsch on Substack here: https://substack.com/profile/40661664-steve-kirsch For reference from the audio on the debate between two trained experts: James Lyons-Weiler on Substack: https://substack.com/profile/40349055-james-lyons-weiler


