Stranded Technologies Podcast

Bryan Caplan is a professor of economics at George Mason University and the author of several books, including Open Borders - The Science and Ethics of Immigration, The Case Against Education and the Myth of the Rational Voter.Bryan is one of the most iconoclastic contemporary thinkers, and had a major influence on the themes of this podcast. His books explain much of the emergent incentives created by the political process that stymie economic growth.In this episode, we talk about his new book "Voters as Mad Scientists - Essays on Political Rationality" and use it as a starter to talk about a variety of topics:Bryan on how the alignment of "Chaotic Good" in the world of Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fits his non-conformist style of thinking and practice of breaking bad or unethical laws, as long as you can get away with itWhy voters love to hate business and how the Stockholm Syndrome can help explain it: people like to ally with the powerful, even if they're rich, against rich people or business with less or no political power to hurt themThe politics of what sounds good vs. what is good - explained by social desirability bias, exposed by revealed preferences ("actions speak louder than words") and cemented into practice by status quo biasBryan admits that he's been wrong about cryptocurrency and Bitcoin: F. A. Hayek's idea of de-nationalizing banking has won the day against all oddsIf you're a regular listener to this podcast, you'll chuckle when Bryan compares how someone telling him about Bitcoin for the first time with someone telling him about starting a new country on an island (Prospera is not literally a country though).If starting a new jurisdiction with better laws sounds like a crazy but great idea to you, and your D&D alignment is Lawful-Neutral, Neutral-Good or Chaotic-Good, then come check it out and help us build it - the schedule for coming events is here. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Neil Chilson is a lawyer and computer scientist, he’s the former Chief Technologist at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and a current senior research fellow for technology and innovation at the Center for Growth and Opportunity, and the author of “Getting Out of Control: Emergent Leadership in a Complex World”.Neil has decades of first-hand experience in regulatory policy and introduces the distinction between outcome-based, more common law-like legal approaches to regulation vs. the more well-known statutory and preventative approach.This seemingly technical distinction is very relevant. We start by discussing the "Knowledge Problem" that F. A. Hayek raised in one of the most influential economics papers ever written, "The Use of Knowledge in Society" from 1945.Hayek's insight is that central planners cannot know the facts relevant to making their decisions, because knowledge is "tacit" and value is subjective to the individual. The system of free price-setting is necessary to create an "emergent order" that does not come about by conscious design but by adjustment and small improvements through individuals making rational decisions based on their local information. Neil's work is dedicated to applying the insight of emergent order in business, policymaking, and even personal growth - instead of rushing to ask for an authoritative "man in charge", we should instead embrace humility.Rather than making rules for new technology that is rapidly changing, we should focus on liability for bad outcomes after-the-fact. We apply these insights to debates about the existential risk of artificial intelligence (AI) and the regulatory policy of OpenAI's Sam Altman and Microsoft.While we're optimistic that software and AI are "born-free" technologies relatively unencumbered by regulatory overreach, Neil warns that policymakers in Washington and in international governmental organizations have an agenda: they see the internet as a bad thing, and AI risk is a welcome opportunity to further this agenda.Let's not let the internet and AI become stranded technologies. The future is open.Infinita Website: https://infinitavc.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Michael Huemer is "the best living philosopher, possibly the best who ever lived." (Bryan Caplan)The podcast host Niklas Anzinger considers Michael Huemer to be the greatest intellectual influence on his life and work with Infinita VC to date.In fact, the name Infinita is a reference to Michael's book "Approaching Infinity".Michael is Professor for Philosophy and the University of Colorado Boulder. He is the author of more than eighty academic articles in epistemology, ethics, metaethics, metaphysics, and political philosophy - as well as the author of ten books.This conversation is intended to introduce Michael's work to the listener, particularly the books most relevant to unlocking stranded technologies.The first book we discuss is "Knowledge, Reality and Value." The book is an introduction to philosophy and a masterful one. It teaches the reader why it's important to form rational beliefs how to make clear arguments and "wake up" from a state of perpetual intellectual confusion (yes, we all are - and we don't notice it).The second book is "Justice Before the Law", a book about the ethical flaws of the legal system. Michael's key thesis is that actors in the legal system should prioritize what's just over what's the law - that means breaking the law if it's unjust and not unwise to do so. This is an explosive thesis in conflict with existing legal norms.The third book is "The Problem of Political Authority" which argues that existing governments regularly commit what we would consider atrocious violations of individual rights if they were done by any non-governmental actor, and that political philosophy fails to deliver a convincing justification for this special privilege.While all these books have surprising and radical conclusions, what is special about Michael Huemer*s work is his method. Michael clearly states his premises and chooses only those that are based on widely shared beliefs. This results in an extremely clearly written and persuasive style of reasoning.In this episode, we discuss all these books and the implications for entrepreneurs in regulated industries, such as the obligation to follow the law, how to present yourself when you innovate, and how to navigate moral questions that arise in the process.Michael blogs on a Substack called "Fake Nous". This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Today’s episode is another one in the style of episodes 10 and 25 with Niklas' thoughts, synthesizing 1 year of work with the podcast and a VC fund. First, you’ll hear a recording of Niklas's talk at Zuzalu, Vitalik Buterin’s pop-up city in Montenegro. The speech can be watched on YouTube as well.The talk shows the progress made by startup cities and network states, and argues that this is a pivotal moment to unleash a wave of new technological progress; the zero-to-ones are already out there - it's no longer a dream.Afterward, Niklas shares impressions of Zuzalu - he believes the key innovation is to prove the impact of in-person civility, bringing together a highly aligned online community in one place to live and build together. In one quote, it was "a university campus on steroids, with people that actually care and actually build."Zuzalu is already resulting in a couple of new initiatives, some led by Infinita VC taking place within the next couple of months.(1) African Regenerative Cities & Futures @ FreeFlow Eden Zanzibar July 20-23, 2023: This is an event to bring together entrepreneurs, artists, and governance innovators with a focus on African cities & technology.Sign-up & more info here: https://lu.ma/zanzibar_regen(2) ETH Latam in Honduras and Prospera BuildweeksOctober 26-28, 2023: This is the core Ethereum conference for the continent.Watch out for sign-up news here: https://mirror.xyz/ethhonduras.ethAfterward, for all of November, we plan to do a 4-week mini-Zuzalu in Prospera called “Prospera Buildweeks”. - during that time we will do two conferences: Crypto & Futurism, Longevity & Decentralised Science, as well as a Prospera General Summit.Updates on sign-ups are here: https://t.me/+xhTw-dudXBc1NmE6(3) Founders' Journey - Start a Longevity Network State in Latin America​This is a 2-month long journey for biotechnologists, renegade life scientists, and relentless entrepreneurs to radically supercharge human health and extend lifespan, by creating of a longevity-focused network state in Latin America.Sign-up & more info here: https://lu.ma/longevity-journey This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Alexander Bard is a Swedish cyber philosopher, futurologist, and the author of several books ("The Netocrats", "The Global Empire", "The Body Machines", "Syntheism - Creating God in The Internet Age", "Digital Libido - Sex, Power and Violence in The Network Society" together with Jan Söderqvist).He’s also a former music producer, artist and entrepreneur.We start with Alex' history in the music industry, and how he saw the emerging internet and Napster as a Hegelian "negation" of the status quo, leading up as the "synthesis" that Alex actively shaped as a founding contributor to Spotify.In "The Netocrats", Alex foresaw an age where data would replace capital as the source of power over assets, and a new elite it would shape - which turned out to be true in the form the tech giants of our age and the resulting impotence of politics.This old order of nation-states as the source of power is becoming replaced by an internet economy underpinned by Bitcoin and crypto-currencies, leading to perfected and pure capitalism as the source of rational transactions.However, this pure capitalism is not the be-all-end-all.The result that Alex is working towards is "Attentionalism", where sovereign individuals consciously decide what to give their attention to, with the rational-capitalist marketplace only as a basis for our income, not a source of meaning.The sources of meaning are spiritual and could come in the shape of new interpretations of the religions of the East that embrace decentralization.Alex is interested in the frontiers that the "shamanoids" or outliers of civilization gravitate towards, and he sees the new frontier in the form of city-states and special jurisdictions, like Singapore and Dubai shown to be capable stewards.Alex predicts that today's exiteers that build at the new frontiers are tomorrow's elite at these new places. A good reason to be a pioneer at the frontier right now.Infinita Website: https://infinitavc.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Brian J. Robertson is a serial entrepreneur and the creator of Holacracy, a comprehensive practice for governing and running our organizations.Holacracy is an often misunderstood, massively influential social and management system. Yet it is more than that, Brian's goal with Holacracy is to give people a taste of self-governance, personal growth and empowerment to impact society.In this episode, we dive deep into the mind that has nurtured Holacracy and brought it to adoption within 10.000+ organizations worldwide.To start with, Holacracy is a modular, open-source, constitution-based management system with clear rules and management responsibilities. It is not no managers (although it aims to reduce the need for managers), and not no structure.Quite to the contrary, it is more structured. The analogy Brian uses is the emergent order market-based order vs. top-down planning. Markets come up with better, more adapted, and more fit-for-purpose sets of rules, institutions, and regulations.Brian solves for me a tension I thought about for a long time: why is it that firms in a competitive market-based system are run to a large degree by central planners?A key answer of mine we discussed is Ronald Coase's "Theory of the Firm" which talks about the planning horizon versus scale efficiency of greater size.Brian's answer is Holacracy. Organizations can be run more like markets and adapt more to tensions as they arise instead of relying too much on top-down decision-making.We discuss Marc Andreessen's reservations against Holacracy, as well as its place in the order of managerial vs. entrepreneurial capitalism, as well as how it steers organizations towards "Antifragility", a term coined by Nassim Taleb.Holacracy is more than a management system. It can be a guide to personal growth and consciousness.Not coincidentally, Brian is currently working as well on starting a psychedelic church by using some clever legal engineering in a Stranded Technologies-like fashion.This is a rich episode and will give you an appreciation for the concept of Holacracy and how it can supercharge your organization and your personal growth.Join us for upcoming events: https://lu.ma/infinitaInfinita Website: https://infinitavc.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Jonathan Hillis is the founder of Cabin.Cabin is building a network city - a collection of remarkable coliving properties tied by a shared culture, community, economy, and governance.We start by talking about how a combination of science-fiction and American Wilderness romanticism inspired Jon to start Cabin in the Texas Hill Country.Neighborhood Zero is a development on 28 acres, with a creek that runs through the property, rolling hills, grasslands and forests, and pet longhorn cattle running around.Cabin is now a thriving community that has land and real estate development in multiple locations in the USA and internationally (e.g. Portugal, Italy),Jon talks about the pluralism of moral and community governance innovations that Cabin is working on, inspired by the Nobel Prize-winning economist Elinor Ostrom.These practical insights from Jon's work lead us to discuss Balaji Srinivasan's "The Network State" more, and our insights from Zuzalu, Vitalik Buterin's pop-up city.The key insights are that network state-building is a practical endeavor, and it's hard to build real-world things and deal with the day-to-day of living together.Jon recommends starting small and iteratively, just like in software and technology development - and you don't need an architecture or mechanical engineering degree for it. You can just go out there and start building.Jon has learned the value of community, and building things in the real world, and found that evolutionary adaptive processes toward governance are what's needed to rediscover the lost art of building durable and lasting structures.Join the Cabin community: https://www.cabin.city/Join us for upcoming events: https://lu.ma/infinitaInfinita Website: https://infinitavc.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Erik Voorhees is the founder of Shapeshift, a decentralized crypto exchange, and one of the most important voices in crypto. Erik virtually joined for a fireside chat during Decentralizing Finance 2023 - A Prospera Builders’ Summit on the island of Roatan.We start by establishing the ethics and principles of Bitcoin, crypto, and the separation of state and money. Money is one if not the most important good for a peaceful, market-led world. It does not belong in the hands of governments.Erik has withstood more than a decade of navigating the complex legal and regulatory maze put up by governments. Governments were initially overconfident in the quality of their product - fiat money. However, Elizabeth Warren’s “crypto army” seems like state actors are realizing the threat of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies to their predominance.Crypto has survived many challenges - and Erik believes we’ve come far enough to withstand an even great amount of anti-crypto activism by governments. Bitcoin has proved resilience over and over, and hundreds of millions of people are using it.Not only are we on the verge of realizing the dream of overcoming the traditional, centralized financial system and building a more inclusive one instead. Also, new cities and special jurisdictions are experimenting in governance.While Erik is generally skeptical of legal wrappers for DAOs (decentralized autonomous organizations), he's welcoming the movement towards regulatory pluralism instead of a regulatory monopoly.The transition towards new forms of governance and finance on crypto rails may be perilous, but we have come far in expanding the frontiers.Join us for upcoming events: https://lu.ma/infinitaInfinita Website: https://infinitavc.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Today is the 70th anniversary of the discovery of the structure of DNA, and the 20th anniversary of the sequencing of the human genome.A perfect day to talk to John Cumbers.John is a molecular biologist. He is the founder and CEO of SynBioBeta which promotes synthetic biology to build a more sustainable universe.This episode is a primer on "synbio", the scientific breakthroughs and commercial applications of reading, sequencing and editing DNA to engineer the built world around us by manipulating the organic process of biology. In 2012, the discovery of CRISPR technologies led to rapid progress into a field that has now $10bn in annual investment and unicorn startups such as Ginko Bioworks.The applications range from food production to materials made from microbes, space travel and human health - anything biological to organize the built world.We discuss potential regulatory challenges of synbio, the bad public perception of GMOs (genetically modified organisms) - while some regulatory challenges reduce adoption in places such as the European Union, non-human facing applications face few regulatory bottlenecks. Of course, human-facing applications have the same limitations as healthcare or pharmaceutical and face strong bottlenecks.Does synbio need a network state? There are certainly unsolved challenges, such as the application of synbio to food production in places that need it the most - something currently not possible because of unit economics.Synbio is certainly a nascent field with tremendous potential.Join us for upcoming events: https://lu.ma/infinitaInfinita Website: https://infinitavc.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com

Ingemar Patrick Linden is a professor for philosophy and bioethics who taught for 10 years at NYU.In his book "The Case Against Death", Patrick points out that evolutionary biology explains why we age and die, but not that we must age and die, or that we ought to. “My experiences tell me that unless there is a good afterlife, death is a horrific evil and nothing is more important than preventing good people from dying. I am a death abolitionist and a life prolongevist.”As we've learned in past episodes such as Ep. 15 with Sebastian Brunemeier, scientists have achieved breakthroughs that could radically extend human lifespan.However, not only is longevity biotechnology ("LongBio") held back by numerous political and regulatory obstacles - it is up against what could be an intellectual fad or an age-old taboo of humanity: the vilification of the search for immortality.Since the Ancient Greeks, Plato, Epicurus and the Stoics, a prevalent idea is "the wise view", that it's mature and enlightened to accept death and vain to fight against it.Popular culture vilifies the search for immortality, The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter or Marvel's Doctor Strange, depict immortality-seeking as a bad thing.Patrick's view is simple: "Life is Good. Death is Bad."In this conversation, we address some of the common arguments against the view and talk about the massive potential of life-extending technologies.We concur that society would have to change.Our current political and economic choices are not made for a world with an indefinite lifespan. However, this is not a reason not to do it. This is a reason to do more experiments in human governance, such as Prospera, the modern charter city in Honduras, or Zuzalu - Vitalik Buterin's pop-up city in Montenegro.With improved governance, we can be ready for a world with a prolonged or indefinite human lifespan.Join us for upcoming events: https://lu.ma/infinitaInfinita Website: https://infinitavc.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.infinitacitytimes.com