What Is Life? Round 2 with Blaise Agüera y Arcas

Product design sage Tim Wood returns to the podcast for a conversation about the deepening integrations between experience design and AI, including a dissection of the trending term “vibe coding.” Currently a design lead at Meta, Tim has hands-on experience leading AI-first design and this episode explores what that means on a tactical level. Having been the Principal Product Designer for AI Platforms at AWS, and Head of Design for Amazon Q Developer, Tim shares hot takes with Robb and Josh on what automated mainframe migration means for SaaS providers as well as the broader business community, which leads to the real-time birth of another new term: “placebo swipes.”  ---------- Support our show by supporting our sponsors!This episode is brought to you in partnership with OneReach.ai — offering turnkey private architecture for building and orchestrating your team’s AI agents with guardrails.Use any AI modelsTrusted enterprise-grade securityNo vendor lock-inDiscover more about the power of orchestrating agentic AI: https://bit.ly/4jBfVRt --------------------- Our new book is out NOW! The revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book about how teams can successfully orchestrate AI agents, Age of Invisible Machines, is now available everywhere! https://a.co/d/im5rb8F#InvisibleMachines #Podcast #TechPodcast#AI #AgenticAI#AIPodcast#UXDesign #ExperienceDesign #AIDesign #UserExperience #AIAntegration #SaaS#DigitalTransformation #Coding#VibeCoding#TechTrends#EnterpriseAI#aiagents #aibooks #bestsellingbooks #aws #meta

What is the explosion of AI solutions in the marketplace doing to pillars of experience design? On this Ask Us Anything episode of Invisible Machines, Robb and Josh respond to a question from Dr. Irina Wagner,  listener who works as a generative AI UX researcher at a massive US healthcare company. The answer to her question has connections to Robb’s time working in the sound department at Warner Bros., on films ranging from Galaxy Quest to The Thin Red Line. At its core, success in UX comes down to storytelling. People love stories—give them a compelling one, and they will follow you. As adoption increases, AI is likely to expose bad design by putting a premium on effective storytelling and good taste. This episode takes a deeper look at these elements, offering a fresh perspective and some hard truths about technology and design.---------- Support our show by supporting our sponsors!This episode is brought to you in partnership with OneReach.ai—offering turnkey private architecture for building your team’s AI agents with guardrails.Use any AI modelsTrusted enterprise-grade securityNo vendor lock-inDiscover more about AI agents and how your team can build and scale them: https://bit.ly/3DCxgu8 --------------------- Our new book is on it's way! The revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book about successful adoption of AI agents, Age of Invisible Machines, is now available for preorder on Amazon: https://bit.ly/4hwX0a5 #InvisibleMachines #Podcast #TechPodcast#AI #AIPodcast#UXDesign #ExperienceDesign #Storytelling #AIDesign #UserExperience #HumanCenteredDesign #TechInnovation #DesignThinking #DigitalTransformation #FutureOfAI #MachineLearning #ProductDesign #CreativeTechnology

As NASA’s longest-running Chief Administrator, Dan Goldin ushered in an era of “faster, better, cheaper” that prioritized safety while pushing the organization forward. He joins Robb and Josh to discuss his approach to innovation and kick some holes in fallacies like the iron triangle, which he calls “horsepuckey.” Goldin was at the helm of major projects, including a redesign of the International Space Station, and various Mars exploration programs. Robb and Josh dig into his profound 50/50 rule for finding team members who can move the needle on innovation without holding an organization back, which has a surprising connection to the work of Michaelangelo. In this episode:The 2nd edition of Robb and Josh’s bestselling book, Age of Invisible Machines: A Guide to Orchestrating AI Agents and Making Organizations More Self-Driving: http://bit.ly/4b7Rx7d Michelangelo’s sculptures: https://www.michelangelo.net/sculptures/ Ben R. Rich's book, Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed: https://www.amazon.com/Skunk-Works-Personal-Memoir-Lockheed/dp/0316743003Big Hairy Audacious Goals (BHAG): https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/big-hairy-audacious-goal-bhag.asp The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Free_Trade_AgreementWorld Trade Organization: https://www.wto.org/Czinger, an American automobile manufacturer of hybrid sports cars: https://www.czinger.com/BRIDGE Bike Works, a full cycle manufacturer of carbon fiber bicycles, designed and manufactured entirely in Toronto, Canada: https://www.bridgebikeworks.com/The Invisible Machines episode, "S4E9 Digital Twins in an Agentic World” with Dr. Michael Grieves: https://youtu.be/KsL3w2bVjmw?si=KtKRxw9d_ofszFRs Learn more about Dan Goldin, his initiatives, blog and speaking engagements - and do follow him on Linkedin - he’s got a lot of wisdom as is great at sharing it:https://www.danielsgoldin.com/The revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book, Age of Invisible Machines, is now available for preorder on Amazon: https://bit.ly/4hwX0a5 Support our show by supporting our sponsors!This episode is brought to you in partnership with OneReach.ai—offering turnkey private architecture for building your team’s AI agents with guardrails.Any AI modelsEnterprise-grade securityNo vendor lock-inDiscover more about the power of agentic AI: https://onereach.ai/ai-agents/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_episode_with_dan_goldin&utm_content=1 #TechPodcast#NASA#DanGoldin#Innovation#Leadership #SpaceExploration#Aerospace#TechLeadership#TalentStrategy#STEM#AIPodcast#TechPodcast#InvisibleMachines#ArtificialIntelligence#AIAgents#AgenticAI#TechInnovation

Did the US Copyright office just declare that AI is the artist, not the tool?Does their new report raise more questions than it answers? Robb and Josh welcome back Ed Klaris, Managing Partner at Klaris Law and Columbia Law professor, for part two of their discussion on the office’s ongoing Copyright and Artificial Intelligence report, focusing on copyrightability.Klaris returns with critical insights into what these updates to copyright law mean with more and more people now using generative AI as part of their creative process. The report sets some useful guidelines for which aspects of AI-assisted creative projects are copyrightable, yet it also sparks new questions about the boundaries between human and machine-generated output.Find out more about Ed Klaris and his work here: https://www.klarislaw.comThe revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book, Age of Invisible Machines, is now available for preorder on Amazon! https://bit.ly/4hwX0a5 In this episode, we mention:US Copyright Office’s report on Copyright and Artificial Intelligence (Part 1: Digital Replicas and Part 2: Copyrightability): https://www.copyright.gov/ai/An AI-Generated Picture Won an Art Prize: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/02/technology/ai-artificial-intelligence-artists.htmlDeepSeek, a Chinese artificial intelligence software company: https://www.deepseek.com/What Air Canada Lost In ‘Remarkable’ Lying AI Chatbot Case: https://www.forbes.com/sites/marisagarcia/2024/02/19/what-air-canada-lost-in-remarkable-lying-ai-chatbot-case/Cursor, an AI code editor: https://www.cursor.com/The Invisible Machines episode, "S4E13 Are generative AI tools unlawful to use?”: S4E13 Are generative AI tools unlawful to use? --------------------------------------------------------------------Support our show by supporting our sponsors!This episode is brought to you in partnership with OneReach.ai—offering turnkey private architecture for building your team’s AI agents with guardrails.Any AI modelsEnterprise-grade securityNo vendor lock-inLearn about creating and orchestrating AI agents for your team:https://onereach.ai/ai-agents/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_episode_with_ed_klaris_2&utm_content=1 #AI#AIPodcast#TechPodcast#InvisibleMachines#ArtificialIntelligence#AIAgents#AgenticAI#TechInnovation#GenerativeAI#CopyrightLaw #AILaw#IntellectualProperty#AICopyright#LegalTech#DigitalRights#TechLaw

Blaise Agüera y Arcas, author and CTO of Technology & Society at Google, returns to the podcast to talk about his new work, What is Life?. This limited-edition, pocket-sized book is the first part of a larger print project with MIT Press and Antikythera titled What Is Intelligence?. What is Life? draws fascinating parallels between the life-building chemical reactions taking place in natural chimneys deep in our oceans and the work of Alan Turing and John von Neumann in the mid-twentieth century. Blaise joins Robb and Josh to explore how self-reproduction—and thus life—is inherently computational. This conversation delves into the nested nature of life on Earth and how technology is an extension of our evolution.You can buy Blaise’s books from Hat & Beard Press:Who Are We Now? https://hatandbeard.com/products/who-are-we-now-by-blaise-aguera-y-arcas Ubi Sunt https://hatandbeard.com/products/ubi-sunt-by-blaise-aguera-y-arcas In this episode, we mention:Blaise Agüera y Arcas’s work, “What is Life” — read for free online: https://whatisintelligence.antikythera.orgLynn Margulis’s books: https://www.amazon.com/Books-Lynn-Margulis/s?rh=n%3A283155%2Cp_27%3ALynn%2BMargulisConventional evolutionary theory (Neo-Darwinism): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-DarwinismStephen Jay Gould’s books: https://www.amazon.com/Books-Stephen-Jay-Gould/s?rh=n%3A283155%2Cp_27%3AStephen%2BJay%2BGould W. Brian Arthur’s book, “The Nature of Technology: What It Is and How It Evolves”: https://www.amazon.com/Nature-Technology-What-How-Evolves/dp/1416544062The Invisible Machines episode, "Radically Honest AI with Dr. Anna Lembke": S5E01 Radically Honest AI with Dr. Anna LembkeAnna Lemble’s book, “Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence”: https://www.amazon.com/Dopamine-Nation-Finding-Balance-Indulgence/dp/152474672XRichard S. Sutton and Andrew G. Barto's book, "Reinforcement Learning: second edition: An Introduction (Adaptive Computation and Machine Learning series)" (about temporal difference learning): https://www.amazon.com/Reinforcement-Learning-Introduction-Adaptive-Computation/dp/0262039249/ref=dp_ob_title_bkWolfram Schultz’s work, “Responses of monkey dopamine neurons to reward and conditioned stimuli during successive steps of learning a delayed response task”: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8441015/The direction of time and Boltzmann’s time hypothesis: http://staff.mechmining.uq.edu.au/klimenko/pub/pdf/Phys_Scr_2019.pdfRay Kurzweil's book, "The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology": https://www.amazon.com/Singularity-Near-Humans-Transcend-Biology/dp/0670033847 The story of the Luddites: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LudditeThe Invisible Machines episode, “The Intelligence All Around Us” with James Bridle: S4E4 The Intelligence All Around UsJames Bridle’s' book, “Ways of Being: Animals, Plants, Machines: The Search for a Planetary Intelligence”: https://www.amazon.com/Ways-Being-Machines-Planetary-Intelligence/dp/0374601119 Disney Pixar’s movie, “WALL·E”: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0910970/Joseph Henrich's book, "The Secret of Our Success: How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter": https://www.amazon.com/Secret-Our-Success-Evolution-Domesticating/dp/0691166854 Ethan Mollick's book, "Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI": https://www.amazon.com/Co-Intelligence-Living-Working-Ethan-Mollick/dp/059371671X Learn about creating and orchestrating AI agents for your team:https://onereach.ai/ai-agents/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_episode_with_blaise_aguera_y_arcas&utm_content=1#AI#AIPodcast#TechPodcast#InvisibleMachines#ArtificialIntelligence#AIAgents#AgenticAI#TechInnovation#WhatIsLife#AIandLife#AIResearch#Intelligence#EvolutionAndTechnology#LifeOnEarth#TechAndSociety

Anna Lembke, MD, author of the New York Times bestseller Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence, joins Robb and Josh for a discussion about the perils and promise of AI. As a psychiatrist and Chief of the Stanford Addiction Medicine Dual Diagnosis Clinic at Stanford University, Dr. Lembke shares critical insights into the power and nature of behavioral addiction, and how technology and digital media are impacting the dopamine systems in our brains. Drawing from her experience with patients, she shares the concept of radical honesty—a cornerstone of addiction recovery. Together, they explore how radically honest AI could pose less of a threat and help establish healthier boundaries around technology use.In this episode, we mention:Dr. Anna Lemble’s book “Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence”: https://www.amazon.com/Dopamine-Nation-Finding-Balance-Indulgence/dp/152474672X The forthcoming revised and updated 2nd edition of Robb Willson and Josh Tyson’s bestselling book, “Age of Invisible Machines: A Practical Guide to Creating a Hyperautomated Ecosystem of Intelligent Digital Workers”: https://www.amazon.com/Age-Invisible-Machines-Orchestrating-Organizations/dp/1394321554Dr. Anna Lembke’s “The Official Dopamine Nation Workbook: A Practical Guide to Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence”: https://www.amazon.com/Official-Dopamine-Nation-Workbook-Indulgence/dp/0593476212?sr=1-1Pew Research Center survey of U.S. teens ages 13 to 17 conducted Sept. 18-Oct.10, 2024: "Teens, Social Media, and Technology 2024": https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2024/12/12/teens-social-media-and-technology-2024/Learn about creating and orchestrating AI agents for your team:https://onereach.ai/ai-agents/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_episode_with_anna_lembke&utm_content=1#AI#AIPodcast#TechPodcast#InvisibleMachines#ArtificialIntelligence#AIAgents#AgenticAI#TechInnovation#DopamineNation#RadicalHonesty#DigitalAddiction#MentalHealth#TechImpact#BehavioralScience#Dopamine#AnnaLembke

Active inference is a “first principles” approach to understanding behavior and the brain, framed in terms of a single imperative to minimize free energy. The free energy principle describes systems that pursue paths of least surprise, minimizing the difference between predictions based on their model of the world and their sense and associated perception. Dr. Thomas Parr is a practicing clinician and prominent researcher in the field of theoretical neuroscience and he currently works as an NIHR Academic Clinical Fellow in Neurology at the University of Oxford’s Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences. He is also a co-author of Active Inference: The Free Energy Principle in Mind, Brain, and Behavior, written in collaboration with Giovanni Pezzulo and Karl J. Friston.In this episode, we mention:Thomas Parr’s book “Active Inference: The Free Energy Principle in Mind, Brain, and Behavior (co-written with Giovanni Pezzulo and Karl J. Friston): https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/704196/active-inference-by-thomas-parr-giovanni-pezzulo-and-karl-j-friston/Troxler's fading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troxler%27s_fading The Invisible Machines episode “Digital Natives Are Now AI Immigrants” with Marc Prensky: https://youtu.be/CAKumte_JP8?si=OxPKZbRKIegEjBvh Landauer's principle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landauer%27s_principle Learn about orchestrating AI agents for your team:https://onereach.ai/ai-agents/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_episode_with_thomas_parr&utm_content=1#aipodcast#techpodcast#invisiblemachines#ai#artificialintelligence#aiagents#agenticai#techinnovation#neuroscience#activeinference#machinelearning#congitivescience#behavioralscience#futureofai#neuroai#thinkingmachines

Despite being a massive piece of the bigger AI puzzle, computer vision doesn’t always get the recognition it deserves. Robb and Josh welcome Dr. Jason Corso, Professor of Robotics at University of Michigan for an In Action episode that explores the complexity and power of machines that can see. Jason is the Co-Founder and Chief Science Officer of Voxel51, which is backed by Bessemer Venture Partners, and in this episode he demonstrates open-source tools available for working with massive datasets that include images and videos. The trio also discuss the border implication of adding the context that vision can afford to multi-agent systems.Explore Dr. Jason Corso’s Voxel51 platform: https://voxel51.com/ FiftyOne Open Source: Voxel51's open source toolkit for building high-quality datasets and computer vision models.FiftyOne Teams: Voxel51’s commercial offering based on open source FiftyOne.People can try FiftyOne at try.fiftyone.ai. Voxel51 on Github: https://github.com/voxel51/fiftyoneA course on Coursera that Voxel51 created called "Hands-on Data Centric Visual AI" —  https://www.coursera.org/learn/hands-on-data-centric-visual-aiLearn about orchestrating AI agents for your team:AI agent landing page with the whitepaper: https://onereach.ai/ai-agents/?utm_source=soundcloud+&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=computer_vision_in_action_episode&utm_content=1 Learn about the only tools for orchestrating AI agents that are named a leader by all major analyst firmsAI agent landing page (dev): https://aiagents.onereach.ai/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=computer_vision_in_action_episode&utm_content=1 #AIPodcast#TechPodcast#InvisibleMachines#AI #ArtificialIntelligence#AIAgents#AgenticAI#ComputerVision#MultiAgentSystems#DataScience#TechInnovation#AIinAction#GenerativeAI#NoCode#Automation #DigitalTransformation#AITech

What’s it like to build an AI agent? Daniel Lametti, Associate Professor of Psycholinguistics at Acadia University, Visiting Fellow at the University of Oxford, and Senior Academic Advisor to OneReach.ai, returns to Invisible Machines to demonstrate how easy it can be to create and iterate on AI agents.Like other In Action episodes, you’ll watch as we walk through the practical realities of building these systems. This time, see how professor Daniel Lametti creates an objective-based AI agent that helps users craft and send emails. Though he’s hesitant to think of himself as one, conversational technologies have made Daniel a deft software developer. In this In Action episode, Daniel shares his experiences building AI agents with Robb and Josh. The trio discuss and show how coding languages are moving further into the background as machines become more adept at communicating in human language.Follow Daniel Lametti’s work: https://psychology.acadiau.ca/daniel-lametti.htmlLearn about orchestrating AI agents for your team:https://onereach.ai/ai-agents/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=email_agents_in_action_episode&utm_content=1 #AIPodcast#TechPodcast#InvisibleMachines#AI #ArtificialIntelligence#AIAgents#AgenticAI#GenerativeAI#LLMs#ConversationalAI#InAction#NoCode#Automation #DigitalTransformation#NaturalLangiageProcessing#Email#SoftwareDevelopment#FutureofAI#UXDesign#MachineLearning#AITech

Robb and Josh are joined by Ed Klaris, Managing Partner at Klaris Law, Columbia Law professor, and CEO of KlarisIP, for a conversation about the fate of generative tools like LLMs and AI models that produce audio and video. From Ed’s viewpoint, giant tech companies used stolen content to train the powerful AI models that have quickly changed the world around us. The trio discuss the question of whether or not it’s lawful for us all to use generative AI tools and how IP and copyright law will impact, and be impacted by generative AI. As we wait for landmark decisions that will determine the fate of these tools, this conversation with Ed Klaris offers context and food for thought, and for some maybe even a sense of alarm. In this episode, we mention: The US Copyright Office: https://copyright.gov/ The Statute of Anne, also known as the Copyright Act 1710: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_Anne Google Books copyright case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authors_Guild,_Inc._v._Google,_Inc. AIr Canada AI chatbot case: https://www.forbes.com/sites/marisagarcia/2024/02/19/what-air-canada-lost-in-remarkable-lying-ai-chatbot-case/ Follow Ed Klaris's work: https://www.klarislaw.com/ Learn about orchestrating AI agents for your team: https://onereach.ai/ai-agents/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=copyright_law_episode&utm_content=1 #AIPodcast #TechPodcast #InvisibleMachines #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #AIAgents #AgenticAI #GenerativeAI #LLMs #IntellectualProperty #CopyrightLaw #AIEthics #TechLaw #AIRegulation #DigitalTransformation #Innovation #FutureofAI #AIandIP #LegalTech #AITransparency