Unusually in-depth conversations about the world's most pressing problems and what you can do to solve them. Subscribe by searching for '80000... more
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Episodes
"If you’re a power that is an island and that goes by sea, then you’re more likely to do things... more
"You don’t necessarily need world-leading compute to create highly risky AI systems. The biggest biological design tools right now, like... more
"Ring one: total annihilation; no cellular life remains. Ring two, another three-mile diameter out: everything is ablaze. Ring three, another... more
This is the second part of our marathon interview with Carl Shulman. The first episode is on the economy and... more
This is the first part of our marathon interview with Carl Shulman. The second episode is on government and society... more
"One of the most amazing things about planet Earth is that there are complex bags of mostly water — you... more
"You can’t charge what something is worth during a pandemic. So we estimated that the value of one course of... more
"Suppose we make these grants, we do some of those experiments I talk about. We discover, for example — I’m... more
"Earth economists, when they measure how bad the potential for exploitation is, they look at things like, how is labour... more
"I work in a place called Uttar Pradesh, which is a state in India with 240 million people. One in... more
"The constraint right now on factory farming is how far can you push the biology of these animals? But AI... more
Many of you will have heard of Zvi Mowshowitz as a superhuman information-absorbing-and-processing machine — which he definitely is. As... more
Today’s release is a reading of our career review of AI governance and policy, written and narrated by Cody Fenwick.Advanced... more
"When a friend comes to me with a decision, and they want my thoughts on it, very rarely am I... more
"[One] thing is just to spend time thinking about the kinds of things animals can do and what their lives... more
"The question I care about is: What do I want to do? Like, when I'm 80, how strong do I... more
The World Economic Forum’s global risks survey of 1,400 experts, policymakers, and industry leaders ranked misinformation and disinformation as the... more
Mental health problems like depression and anxiety affect enormous numbers of people and severely interfere with their lives. By contrast,... more
"I think at various times — before you have the kid, after you have the kid — it's useful to... more
Back in December we spoke with Nathan Labenz — AI entrepreneur and host of The Cognitive Revolution Podcast — about... more
Rebroadcast: this episode was originally released in January 2021.You wake up in a mysterious box, and hear the booming voice... more
Rebroadcast: this episode was originally released in October 2021.Preventing the apocalypse may sound like an idiosyncratic activity, and it sometimes... more
Rebroadcast: this episode was originally released in September 2021.If you’re living in the Niger Delta in Nigeria, your best bet... more
Happy new year! We've got a different kind of holiday release for you today. Rather than a 'classic episode,' we've... more
Rebroadcast: this episode was originally released in May 2021.Today’s episode is one of the most remarkable and really, unique, pieces... more
OpenAI says its mission is to build AGI — an AI system that is better than human beings at everything.... more
Lead is one of the most poisonous things going. A single sugar sachet of lead, spread over a park the... more
"It will change everything: it will change our workplaces, it will change our interactions with the government, it will change... more
"We do have a tendency to anthropomorphise nonhumans — which means attributing human characteristics to them, even when they lack... more
Is following important political and international news a civic duty — or is it our civic duty to avoid it?It's... more
"Rare events can still cause catastrophic accidents. The concern that has been raised by experts going back over time, is... more
"One [outrageous example of air pollution] is municipal waste burning that happens in many cities in the Global South. Basically,... more
"One of our earliest supporters and a dear friend of mine, Mark Lampert, once said to me, “The way I... more
"If we carry on looking at these industrialised economies, not thinking about what it is they're actually doing and what... more
"There have been literally thousands of years of breeding and living with animals to optimise these kinds of problems. But... more
"If you and I and 100 other people were on the first ship that was going to go settle Mars,... more
"Now, the really interesting question is: How much is there an attacker-versus-defender advantage in this kind of advanced future? Right... more
"Imagine a fast-spreading respiratory HIV. It sweeps around the world. Almost nobody has symptoms. Nobody notices until years later, when... more
Today’s release is a reading of our Great power conflict problem profile, written and narrated by Stephen Clare.If you want... more
Effective altruism is associated with the slogan "do the most good." On one level, this has to be unobjectionable: What... more
An audio version of the 2023 80,000 Hours career guide, also available on our website, on Amazon and on Audible.If... more
Mustafa Suleyman was part of the trio that founded DeepMind, and his new AI project is building one of the... more
"Do you remember seeing these photographs of generally women sitting in front of these huge panels and connecting calls, plugging... more
"There's no money to invest in education elsewhere, so they almost get trapped in the cycle where they don't get... more
In July, OpenAI announced a new team and project: Superalignment. The goal is to figure out how to make superintelligent... more
Over on our other feed, 80k After Hours, you can now find 20-30 minute highlights episodes of our 80,000 Hours... more
Back in 2007, Holden Karnofsky cofounded GiveWell, where he sought out the charities that most cost-effectively helped save lives. He... more
In Oppenheimer, scientists detonate a nuclear weapon despite thinking there's some 'near zero' chance it would ignite the atmosphere, putting... more
"At the front of the pack we have these frontier AI developers, and we want them to identify particularly dangerous... more
Today’s bonus release is a pilot for a new podcast called ‘The Worst Ideas in the History of the World’,... more
As AI advances ever more quickly, concerns about potential misuse of highly capable models are growing. From hostile foreign governments... more
Can there be a more exciting and strange place to work today than a leading AI lab? Your CEO has... more
GiveWell is one of the world's best-known charity evaluators, with the goal of "searching for the charities that save or... more
What is the nature of the universe? How do we make decisions correctly? What differentiates right actions from wrong ones?Such... more
Imagine you are an orphaned eight-year-old whose parents left you a $1 trillion company, and no trusted adult to serve... more
It’s easy to dismiss alarming AI-related predictions when you don’t know where the numbers came from. For example: what if... more
In this episode from our second show, 80k After Hours, Rob Wiblin interviews Andrés Jiménez Zorrilla about the Shrimp Welfare... more
Being a good and successful person is core to your identity. You place great importance on meeting the high moral,... more
If you want to work to tackle climate change, you should try to reduce expected carbon emissions by as much... more
Can you trust the things you read in published scientific research? Not really. About 40% of experiments in top social... more
By now, you’ve probably seen the extremely unsettling conversations Bing’s chatbot has been having. In one exchange, the chatbot told... more
In many ways, humanity seems to have become more humane and inclusive over time. While there’s still a lot of... more
What’s the opposite of cancer? If you answered “cure,” “antidote,” or “antivenom” — you’ve obviously been reading the antonym section... more
Rebroadcast: this episode was originally released in June 2020. Today’s guest, New York Times bestselling author A.J. Jacobs, always hated... more
Rebroadcast: this episode was originally released in July 2020. 80,000 Hours, along with many other members of the effective altruism... more
Rebroadcast: this episode was originally released in July 2020. Today’s guest, Jennifer Doleac — Associate Professor of Economics at Texas... more
America aims to avoid nuclear war by relying on the principle of 'mutually assured destruction,' right? Wrong. Or at least...... more
John McWhorter is a linguistics professor at Columbia University specialising in research on creole languages. He's also a content-producing machine,... more
Large language models like GPT-3, and now ChatGPT, are neural networks trained on a large fraction of all text available... more
Today’s release is a reading of our article called My experience with imposter syndrome — and how to (partly) overcome... more
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Description
By now, you’ve probably seen the extremely unsettling conversations Bing’s chatbot has been having. In one exchange, the chatbot told a user:... more