The NonZero-American Prestige punk-rock crossover continues ... Is it time to freak out about Trump? ... Are international norms eroding? ... Jimmy Carter’s legacy ... Heading to Overtime ...

Fixing the International Order (Robert Wright & Trita Parsi)

8 days ago 1h

Intro ... Toward a non-woolly-minded one-worldism ... Has the unipolar moment passed for good? ... International law vs the “rules-based order” ... Is major UN reform possible? ... AI, US-China, and multipolarity ... Rewriting the sanctio

The State of the NonZero Media Empire (Robert Wright)

11 days ago 23m 38s

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Glenn Loury Interviews Bob (Glenn Loury & Robert Wright)

14 days ago 1h 1m

The uncertain future of AI ... What would it mean to “lose the AI race” to China? ... The promise and peril of artificial general intelligence ... The international policy challenges of AI ... Can Trump deliver peace between Russia and Uk

Quasi-Year-End Edition (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)

17 days ago 1h

Worthwhile Canadian conquest ... Late takes on Luigi Mangione ... Elon’s AI motivation ... Is the successor species sentient? (It matters!) ... Paul’s AI freakout has arrived ... AI buzzword of the year revealed ... Bluesky brutality ...

How to End the Ukraine War (Andrew Day, Connor Echols, and Anatol Lieven)

25 days ago 1h

News Round-up ... How progressives should approach Trump's foreign policy ... Anatol Lieven joins to discuss Russia-Ukraine peace talks ...

Marriage on the Rocks (Robert Wright & Conn Carroll)

26 days ago 37m 21s

Conn and the ancestry of this podcast ... Conn’s new book, Sex and the Citizen: How the Assault on Marriage Is Destroying Democracy ... Modern matrimony by the numbers ... Are monogamous societies more egalitarian? ... Why the West went mon

Three Decades of Bad Foreign Policy (Robert Wright & Scott Horton)

28 days ago 1h

Scott’s anti-war libertarianism and his new book, Provoked: How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine ... How the US made the Russia-Ukraine war more likely ... Was Ukraine’s Maidan Revolution a US-b

Are Neocons Taking over Trump 2.0? (Andrew Day, Connor Echols, and James Carden)

Dec 14th, 2024 51m 17s

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Reassembling Syria (Robert Wright & Joshua Landis)

Dec 12th, 2024 41m 21s

Syria’s uncertain political future ... Has the Islamist rebel group HTS actually moderated? ... The extent of retributive violence since Assad fell ... Syria's complicated factional divides ... America's control of Syrian oil fields ..

Covid: The Evidence Against Natural Origin (Robert Wright & Yuri Deigin)

Dec 10th, 2024 1h 1m

Yuri’s high-stakes debate on Covid’s origins ... Pros and cons of Covid vaccines ... Do Covid “coincidences” point to a lab leak? ... Does the pattern of Covid’s initial spread suggest zoonotic origin? ... Why the Wuhan market may have am

Is the Assad Regime Collapsing? (Andrew Day, Connor Echols, and Bassam Barabandi)

Dec 7th, 2024 49m 35s

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Debating the Hunter Biden Pardon (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)

Dec 5th, 2024 1h

A masterclass in audience alienation ... Paul defends Biden’s paternal pardon ... Should family come before societal good? ... The costs of the Hunter pardon ... Was Hunter the victim of a witch hunt? ... Elon sues OpenAI (again) ... Hea

AI and the China Question (Robert Wright & Nathan Labenz)

Nov 27th, 2024 1h

Anthropic’s CEO comes out as a China hawk ... Why so many China hawks in the AI community? ... Gaming out the AGI takeoff timeline ... Last year’s OpenAI coup: What did Ilya see? ... Underappreciated dangers of the China chip war ... Are U

Bibi's Legal Troubles, Trump's Confirmation Struggles (Robert Wright, Andrew Day, and Connor Echols)

Nov 23rd, 2024 1h

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Back Down the JFK Rabbit Hole (Robert Wright & Jefferson Morley)

Nov 21st, 2024 1h

Bob’s trip down the JFK rabbit hole gets real ... Will Trump release the JFK files? ... What the CIA actually knew about Oswald, pre-assassination ... The damning Oswald-CIA connection Jeff uncovered ... Was there a second shooter? Bob’s on

Elon vs Bluesky, Jake Paul vs Tyson, AI vs World Peace (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)

Nov 20th, 2024 1h

Are Bluesky pastures really greener? ... Dissecting SciAm editor’s Bluesky blowup ... Elon’s free speech stolen valor ... The “highlights” of the Paul-Tyson “fight” ... Has the military-industrial complex conquered the AI industry? ... H

Will Trump Go Full-On Authoritarian? (Robert Wright, Derek Davison, and Daniel Bessner)

Nov 15th, 2024 1h

Another high-synergy, brilliant collaboration ... Is Elon our first true oligarch? ... Trump assembles his Justice League of hawks ... Biden’s awful foreign policy team ... Trump’s plan to purge the military ... Will Trump go full-on au

Is Trump a Good Fit for the AI Era? (Robert Wright & Samuel Hammond)

Nov 13th, 2024 1h

Sam’s place on the AI accelerationist-pauser spectrum ... Predicting AI’s near-term impact ... Is regulating AI a fool’s errand? ... Does strong AI governance court authoritarianism? ... Can Trump and Elon be trusted on AI? ... How Sam thi

Is Trump Going Full-On Hawk? (Robert Wright, Andrew Day, and Connor Echols)

Nov 9th, 2024 1h

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Post-Election Reflection Edition (Robert Wright & Paul Bloom)

Nov 7th, 2024 1h

Election 2024: The view from Canada ... Paul praises Bob’s pre-election sermonette ... Why did Trump win? And who’s to blame? ... Did DEI doom Kamala? ... A Kamala campaign post-mortem ... What policies will President Trump 2.0 prioritize?

2024 Pre-Election Extravaganza (Robert Wright & Mickey Kaus)

Oct 31st, 2024 1h

Is Mickey all-in on Trump? ... The “garbage” wars and their aftermath ... Kamala’s path(s) to victory ... Mickey explains the logic of voting for Trump ... Why Trump sucks, why Kamala sucks ... Bob doles out (p)recriminations ... Will Isr

China Viewed from China (Robert Wright & Peter Hessler)

Oct 28th, 2024 1h

Peter’s new book, Other Rivers: A Chinese Education ... Have Chinese people become less hostile to America? ... What Americans get wrong about China ... Why Peter thinks Covid didn’t come from a lab ... China’s transformative recent decade