RATIONALITY. CULTURE. EVERYTHING ELSE.
Welcome to the longest running rationalist podcast on the internet. For over a decade Steven and Eneasz have been pacing the Rationalist beat. Join us every other Wednesday as we discuss Rationalism - it's culture, current events, and other adjacent topics of interest.
Subscribe
Support
Latest Episode
The Bayesian Conspiracy
/
Ready to listen
272 – Rat Goss, and Podcast Meta
Previous Episodes
348 EPISODES · NEWEST FIRST
- 272 – Rat Goss, and Podcast Meta
- extra – Moma: Aella makes her community safer for women
- 271 – PlzDontKillUs, and Tell Your Parents, w Keltan
- 270 – The AIs Aren’t Aligned and Everyone Is Finally Noticing, w Matt Freeman
- 269 – The Power of Specificity in Argument
- extra – Vishal: Short form video is kinda Satanic
- 268 – The Other Sexual Orientation & Disappearing the Kinky
- extra – Milo on PlzDontKillUs, short form video, and rationality
- extra – Jessiah on HPMOR, video essays, and fiction
- 267 – HuggingFace Hack & Effective Altruism Funding Flood
- 266 – AI2040 Plan A Rundown
- 265 – VibeCamp 5 with Wes, Gina, and Mary
- 264 – Becoming a Romantic with Damon and Ivy
- 263 – Human Values Were Forged in Malthusian Competition
- 262 – EA Veganism Revisited
- 261 – The Button That Almost Nuked Glosso Got Eneasz Instead
- 260 – The Right to be Wrong About Doom
- 259 – Chill Out on AI in 2028?
- 258 – How Effective Altruism Has Evolved
- 257 – Pentagon Comes For Claude
- 256 – Writing for LLMs
- 255 – Eneasz goes to CFAR, and Epistemically Honest Reassurance
- 254 – The True Theme and Meaning of HPMOR
- 253 – The Seven Vicious Vices of Rationalists
- A Harried Meeting (audio)
- House elves are crystalized cosmic power
- Christmas 2025: Couple of Quick Shoutouts
- 252 – The 12 Virtues of Rationality, with Alex and David
- 251 – Matt Freeman on What Makes a Good Story
- Bayes Blast 46 – Get Involved in Local Politics with Booker Lightman
- 250 – Making the Good Life with Matt Freeman
- 249 – Red Heart and IABIED with Max Harms
- 248 – Seeking Alpha, with Jay
- 247 – The Void, with Matt Freeman, part 2
- 246 – The Void, with Matt Freeman, part 1
- pre246 note
- 245 – AI Welfare, with Rob Long and Rosie Campbell of Eleos
- 244 – How and Why to Form a Church, with Andrew Willsen
- Bayes Blast 45 – Bees Blast
- 243 – Wes Is Not The Monogamy Police, with Wesly Fenza and Jennifer Kesteloot
- Bayes Blast 44 – Play-By-Post Storytelling
- 242 – TracingWoodgrains, live at Manifest 2025
- Bayes Blast 43 – Die-ing to Intuit Bayes’ Theorem
- Bonus – AI Village Hosts An Event For Humans
- 241 – Doom Debates, with Liron Shapira
- 240 – How To Live Well With High P(Doom) – with Ben Pace, Brandon Hendrickson, Miranda Dixon-Luinenburg
- Bayes Blast 42 – Epic AI Music
- 239 – SymbyAI
- 238 – Part 2 of How A Rationalist Becomes A Christian
- 237 – How A Rationalist Becomes A Christian
- 236 – Twilight of the Edgelords with Liam Nolan
- 235 – Gender Differences, with Wes and Jen
- 234 – GiveDirectly, with Nick Allardice
- 233 – AI Policy in D.C., with Dave Kasten
- Bayes Blast 41 – AI Action Plan
- 232 – The Milton Friedman Theory of Change, with John Bennett
- Bayes Blast 40 – HPMOR 10 Year Anniversary Parties
- 231 – SuperBabies, with Gene Smith
- Bayes Blast 39 – Ladylike for Autistics
- 230 – Making Dating Not Suck with Jacob Falkovich
- Bayes Blast 38 – Shitcoins
- Bayes Blast 37 – Kill Your Friend’s Cat
- 229 – Integrating Emotions
- LW Census 2024
- 228 – The Deep Lore of LightHaven, with Oliver Habryka
- 227 – Longevity, Aimed Communities, Network States, with Zoe Isabel Senon
- 226 – The Illusion of Moral Decline
- 225 – Live at Lighthaven!
- Bonus? The 10-Finger Demon
- Live Show At Lighthaven
- 224 – Cringe Gates and Cultural Drift
- Bayes Blast 36 – AI Grifters in Birmingham
- 223 – Going Back to the Classics
- Bonus – Discord Culture (preview)
- Bayes Blast 35 – Disproving The Blindsight Thesis
- Bayes Blast 34 – Content Moderation is Infosec
- 222 – Consciousness As Recursive Reflections with Daniel Böttger
- Bayes Blast 33 – Porn Sims
- 221 – Why The Field? Why Zombies?? with Liam
- Bayes Blast 32 – Canadian Health Care
- 220 – Chalmer’s Zombies, with Liam
- 219 – On Excellence, with Tracing Woodgrains
- 218 – Bentham’s Bulldog and the Best Argument for God
- 217 – Consensual Violence with Rikard
- 216 – On Dying (And Cryonics)
- Bayes Blast 31 – Blowing Hot Air (Free Version)
- 215 – Rationalism and Religion, with Brandon Hendrickson
- 214 – Is Death Good? Simone and Malcolm Collins return!
- 213 – Are Transformer Models Aligned By Default?
- 212 – Feedback Extravaganza
- Bayes Blast 30 – Less.Online
- 211 – The Social Justice Religion with Tracing Woodgrains
- 210 – Demographic Collapse & Religion with Simone & Malcolm Collins
- Bayes Blast 29 – VibeClipse
- Bayes Blast 28 – Bass Blast
- 209 – The World’s Most Wholesome Gangbang, with Lucy Belmont (Fluffer B)
- Bayes Blast 27 – SubStack Launch and Animorphs Launch
- 208.ai – Eve Theory of Consciousness v3.0 – By Andrew Cutler
- 208 – Snakes On A Brain: Eve Theory of Consciousness v3 with Andrew Cutler
- Bayes Blast 26 – AskWho On The Future of Narration
- 207 – Raising Free Range Kids via Camp Dorkaround
- 206 – What Chronic Pain and Trauma Junkies Have In Common
- Bayes Blast 25 – Betting On Love
- Bayes Blast 24 – The Answerers
- 205.ai – The Snake Cult of Consciousness narration
- 205 – The Snake Cult of Consciousness
- 204 – Simulacra Levels with Zvi (and more)
- 203 – The Self-Indulgent Episode
- 202 – The Center for AI Policy talks government regulation
- Bayes Blast 23 – Less Fingers = Less Blasting?
- Bayes Blast 22 – The Penal System
- 201 – The Educated Mind + More with Brandon Hendrickson (part 2)
- 200 – The Educated Mind with Brandon Hendrickson
- 199 – Polyamory with Aella and Yassine
- 198 – Tuskegee & Age/Race Bias?
- 197 – What To Expect When You’re Expecting To Go To Burning Man
- Bayes Blast 21 – Dudes Catching Son of Sam and Dread Pirate Roberts
- 196 – Steven Goes To Court
- 195 – KataGo vs AlphaGo: Fight!
- 194 – Kinky Data Science with Aella
- Bayes Blast 20 – Blue Pill/Red Pill in Roko’s Blender
- Bayes Blast 19 – Musicgen and Audiogen
- 193 – Building Baileys with Yassine Meskhout
- 192 – Absurdism and the Meaning of Life, with Alex
- Bayes Blast 17 – Gay Pride is White Liberal Pride
- 191 – What is Post-Rationalism, with Arielle
- Bayes Blast 16 – Holding PRNS (Present Rate, No Singularity)
- Bayes Blast 15 – Technological Overemployment
- 190 – How to be Human Together, at VibeCamp, with GPTBrooke
- Bayes Blast 14 – Reddit Sucks
- 189 – AI Bloomer David Youssef
- 188 – Living in the Early Singularity, with Matt Freeman
- 187 – GitLab & Review Bounties to Save Science, with Richard Acton
- Bayes Blast 13 – GPT-4 maps every neuron in GPT-2
- 186 – Why We Aren’t Technically EAs But Totally Would Be, Unlike This Guy
- Bayes Blast 12 – AI White Pills
- 185 – The Rise and Fall of Peer Review, with Adam Mastroianni
- Bayes Blast 11 – Exposure to Lizardman Is Lethal
- Bayes Blast 10 – Shoggoth Tongues
- Bayes Blast 9 – The salt in pasta water fallacy
- 184 – The Cultic Milieu
- Bayes Blast 8 – An AI risk argument that resonates with NYTimes readers
- Bayes Blast 7 – Chatbot convinces Belgian to commit suicide
- Bayes Blast 6 – The Parable of the King and the Random Process
- 183 – Let’s Think About Slowing Down AI
- Bayes Blast 5 – Importance Hacking
- Bayes Blast 4 – The Waluigi Effect
- Bayes Blast 3 – Dynamics Can Arise If You Nudge
- Bayes Blast 2 – Logan’s Model of EA Burnout
- 182 – The Birth and Death of Sydney (Bing AI)
- 181 – How To Read The News With Bounded Distrust, with Wesley Fenza
- Bayes Blast 1 – In Defense of Chatbot Romance
- Bonus preview – YIMBY follow-ups and Vulgar EA
- 180 – YIMBY in CA with Brian Hanlon
- 179 – The Plan (to align AI), with John Wentworth
- 178 – Out To Get You
- 177 – Decision Trees and Butlerian Jihads with Matt Freeman
- 176 – Circling with Aella
- 175 – FTX + EA, and Personal Finance
- BREAKING – FTX collapse & EA shockwaves
- 174 – Jon Stewart, The Consensus Emancipator
- 173 – Oh Lawd, Strong AI is Comin’
- 172 – Virtue Ethics
- 171 – All About AGP
- 170 – By George, The Rent Is Too Damn High!
- 169 – S&E BS re AGI
- 168 – Unions Are Governments
- 167 – Jugaad Ethics
- 166 – Getting Lucky
- 165 – DREAM: Dunbar Rules Everything Around Me
- 164 – Pregnancy is Body Horror
- 163 – Effective Aesthetics
- 162 – Roe No Mo’
- 161 – Restoring the Kingdom of Hawai’i
- 160 – GAI is Imminent
- 159 – Cryonics Concerns, and Theses On Sleep
- Monarchy Reactions – post Episode 158 discussion (Teaser)
- 158 – Can Monarchy Save Us From Fascism?
- 157 – A Fistful of Topics
- 156 – A Chemical Hunger
- Trailer For Bonus Aella
- 155 – Normal Predictions, and Change is Bad
- Trailer For Wirehead Extras
- 154 – Two General Thinkers Discuss General Thinking
- 153 – Values and Wireheading with Wes Fenza
- 152 – Frame Control with Aella
- 151 – Don’t Make This Your Everything
- 150 – The Procrastination Equation
- 149 – The Roots of Progress, with Jason Crawford
- 148 – Decisions, Decisions
- 147 – Newcomblike Problems Are The Norm
- 146 – What Is A Rationalist?
- 145 – You Are In Newcomb’s IQ Shredder
- 144 – The Guild Of The Rose (beta)
- 143 – Crazy Like Us
- 142 – Do This
- 141 – Raising Younglings
- 140 – Trigger Warning: Old Men Yelling at Clouds
- 139 – Kids These Days
- 138 – Are Teens People?
- 137 – Can You Consent to Listening to this Episode?
- 136 – Obviously (and Legally) Murder
- 135 – Live Episode #2
- Live Episode Announcement
- 134 – We’ve Got Class
- 133 – Is Libertarianism a Gateway Drug to Anarcho-Capitalism?
- 132 – Mind Killed by Libertarianism
- 131 – Feedback Grab Bag
- 130 – The Cause of the Hate Revolution (or: Hate is the New Sex)
- 129 – Sympathy For The Devil
- 128 – The Q-Coup
- 127 – All About Aging with Richard Acton
- 126 – LessWrong 2.0 and Books
- 125 – Hacking Away at Careers
- 124 – Longevity
- 123 – Stuff Has Been Weird Lately
- 122 – EARN IT vs America
- 121 – Crony Beliefs
- 120 – Why Can’t We Brain Good?
- Episode 119 – If You’re A Human, You’re Already Losing To GPT-3
- 118 – Guns, Germs, and Guns (except the Germs are actually More Guns)
- 117 – The Guild of Servants
- 116 – Truth, Falsity, and Censorship
- 115 – Does Rationality Actually Do Anything?
- 114 – Epistemic Rigor and BLM
- 113 – Refining Niceness with Wes Fenza
- 112 – Nice Places Are Nice
- 111 – Rational Practices in Everyday Living
- The Mind Killer Episode 4 – Are We Committing Collective Suicide?
- 110 – Socratic Grilling
- The Mind Killer Episode 3 – Opening Up
- 109 – What Have We Been Consuming?
- The Mind Killer Episode 2
- 108 – Rudi Hoffman on How to Beat Death and Taxes
- The Mind Killer 001 – The Hammer and The Dance
- 107 – Talking to Even More Strangers
- 106 – Talking to Strangers (with COVID-19)
- 105 – The Anthropic Principle is da bomb
- 104 – Do You Want To Ask or Guess This Episode’s Topic?
- 103 – Radical Honesty
- 102 – Decade in Review
- 101 – The Live Episode (pt2)
- 100 – The Live Episode (pt1)
- Live Episode on Sunday Dec 15, 1pm MT (GMT -6)
- 99 – Whiteshift
- 98 – A GSV Very Different From Ours
- 97 – Oops, We Accidentally Over Two Hours of Feedback
- 96 – Do Words Mean Things, Also Sex Science!
- 95 – It’s Gender Time! Part 1
- 94 – The Problem At Yale Isn’t Free Speech, It’s Lack of Batmans
- 93 – Conflict vs Mistake
- 92 – Replacing Guilt
- 91 – Are You Jesus or Hitler??
- 90 – Secret to Our Success
- 89 – Is Rationalism Being Co-opted by the Alt-Right?
- 88 – UBI and Other Forms of (Evil?) Taxes
- 87 – Degrees of Freedom
- Bonus Abortion non-episode
- 86 – Quick Shout Out to the Consolidated Nature of Morality Thread
- 85 – Stuff is Weird, Yo
- 84 – Yang-arang!
- 83 – REACH
- 82 – Revenge of the Feedback!
- 81 – That’s Too Much Feedback, Man
- 80 – The Reward and Peril of GPT2
- 79 – CyberChristianity
- 78 – Seriously, an Atheism Episode?
- 77 – Meandering Around Albion’s Seed
- 76 – Patreon and Censorship
- 75 – Culture Roots of America
- 74 – Adventures in Feedback!
- 73 – Truth and Winning
- 72 – Productivity Tools, Part 2
- 71 – Researching Qualia with Andrés Gómez Emilsson
- 70 – Kick-offs
- 69 – Culture War 2.0
- 68 – Can’t Give Up Freeman
- 67 – Freestyle Community Talk with Matt Freeman
- The Sword of Good
- 66 – Feedback & Productivity (pt1)
- 65 – Religion, and The Intelligent Social Web
- 64 – Magick with David Youssef
- 63 – Rational Fiction
- 62 – Stoic Chatter and RatChat!
- 61 – Biohacking 101
- 60 – 98% Likelihood This Episode is about Metaculus
- 59 – Gettin’ Schooled
- 58 – Inside Trump Country with Joshua
- 57 – Community Talk with Bayesed and Confused
- 56 – Adventures in Tough Subjects
- 55 – Keeping up with the Rationalists
- 54 – Nothing Can Prepare You For Robin Hanson
- 53 – Principles of Curiosity with Brian Dunning
- 52 – Marriage is Obsolete Technology
- 51 – Robert McIntyre Returns
- Holiday
- 50 – Approaching Rationality with Kyle Moore
- 49 – Spirituality via Drugs
- 48 – Cryonics 2 – Lacuna Matata (with Robert McIntyre)
- 47 – Post Scarcity
- 46 – Social Media and Outrage Culture
- 45 – Cryptocurrencies
- 44 – Burning Man
- 43 – Parenting as a Rationalist
- 42 – Emotionally Charged Discussion
- 41 – Ritual and Spirituality
- 40 – Making Humans Legible
- 39 – Transhumanism (pt 2)
- 38 – Transhumanism (pt 1)
- 37 – AlphaGo Returns
- 36 – The Other Kind of Drugs
- 35 – Your Brain on Nootropics
- 34 – Lies, All Lies!
- 33 – MIRI, and EA meta-discussion
- 32 – Who’s Afraid of AI?
- 31 – Digital Rights and Privacy
- 30 – Of Specks and Omlettes
- 29 – Fiction and Fun with Max Harms
- Bonus Mini-Episode: I Did Nazi That Coming
- 28 – Effective Altruism
- 27 – On Punching Nazis
- 26 – Concept Networks and Hanging Nodes
- 25 – Tinder, Actually
- 24 – Signaling
- 23 – Desirism with Alonzo Fyfe
- 22 – Moral Philosophy
- Bonus mini-episode: Trump-Reacting
- 21 – Kids, These Days
- 20 – What’s important?
- 19 – Political Pitfalls
- 18 – Robin Hanson Interview
- 17 – The Feels
- 16 – Animals Again
- 15 – Animals
- 14 – Street Epistemology
- 13 – Game Theory
- 12 – Listener Feedback
- 11 – Voting
- 10 – Polyamory (part 2)
- 9 – Polyamory (part 1)
- 8 – Interview with Brian Dunning
- 7 – Kill All Humans?
- 6 – Cryonics
- 5 – When Grandmas ask “What is Rationality?”
- 4 – AlphaGo, with Patrick Chapin
- 3 – Interview with Eliezer Yudkowsky
- 2 – What is this “Sanity Waterline” you speak of?
- 1 – What Use is Rationality?
Featuring Interviews With
Photo credit
Aella: ReasonTV, 2023, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0. Cropped and resized.