"The Cognitive Revolution" | AI Builders, Researchers, and Live Player Analysis

This 20-min episode comes from our friend Nathaniel Whittemore's excellent daily podcast The AI Breakdown Podcast. This episode aired on June 1, 2023, and covers the latest developments from OpenAI, including new features, a cybersecurity grant program, and their new process rewards model for trading. We hope you enjoy it as much as we do. We're hiring across the board at Turpentine and for Erik's personal team on other projects he's incubating. He's hiring a Chief of Staff, EA, Head of Special Projects, Investment Associate, and more. For a list of JDs, check out: eriktorenberg.com. RECOMMENDED PODCAST: The HR industry is at a crossroads. What will it take to construct the next generation of incredible businesses – and where can people leaders have the most business impact? Hosts Nolan Church and Kelli Dragovich have been through it all, the highs and the lows – IPOs, layoffs, executive turnover, board meetings, culture changes, and more. With a lineup of industry vets and experts, Nolan and Kelli break down the nitty-gritty details, trade offs, and dynamics of constructing high performing companies. Through unfiltered conversations that can only happen between seasoned practitioners, Kelli and Nolan dive deep into the kind of leadership-level strategy that often happens behind closed doors. Check out the first episode with the architect of Netflix’s culture deck Patty McCord. https://link.chtbl.com/hrheretics SPONSOR: Shopify is the global commerce platform that helps you sell at every stage of your business. Shopify powers 10% of ALL eCommerce in the US. And Shopify's the global force behind Allbirds, Rothy's, and Brooklinen, and 1,000,000s of other entrepreneurs across 175 countries.From their all-in-one e-commerce platform, to their in-person POS system – wherever and whatever you're selling, Shopify's got you covered. With free Shopify Magic, sell more with less effort by whipping up captivating content that converts – from blog posts to product descriptions using AI. Sign up for $1/month trial period: https://shopify.com/cognitive This show is produced by Turpentine: a network of podcasts, newsletters, and more, covering technology, business, and culture — all from the perspective of industry insiders and experts. We’re launching new shows every week, and we’re looking for industry-leading sponsors — if you think that might be you and your company, email us at erik@turpentine.co. Subscribe to The AI Breakdown podcast: https://pod.link/1680633614 Subscribe to The AI Breakdown on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheAIBreakdown

This special AI Scouting Report episode from the Law & Artificial Intelligence Certificate Program surveys the current AI landscape for legal professionals. Nathan Labenz walks through the “Good, Bad, and Weird” of frontier models, from using AI to navigate his son’s cancer treatment to emerging forms of deception and reward hacking. He highlights how new systems are pushing the boundaries of math, physics, and legal performance while raising serious safety and governance questions. Listeners will come away with a fast-paced, source-rich overview of where AI is today and the strange future it’s steering us toward. LINKS: Google: Try Google's latest and greatest model, Gemini 3.1 Pro, in AI Studio or the Gemini app.Presentation Link Sponsors: Tasklet: Tasklet: Build your own Cognitive Revolution monitoring agent in one click.Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai VCX: VCX, by Fundrise, is the public ticker for private tech, giving everyday investors access to high-growth private companies in AI, space, defense tech, and more. Learn how to invest at https://getvcx.com Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (03:04) Special Sponsor (05:23) Comprehensive AI overview (Part 1) (16:01) Sponsors: Tasklet | VCX (18:53) Comprehensive AI overview (Part 2) (Part 1) (34:39) Sponsor: Claude (36:51) Comprehensive AI overview (Part 2) (Part 2) (59:43) Reward and sentience (01:04:14) Regulating bad actors (01:09:30) Corporate AI strategies (01:14:59) Episode Outro (01:17:55) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Jassi Pannu, Assistant Professor at Johns Hopkins, explains how rapidly advancing AI is transforming biological research and raising the risk of engineered pandemics. They map today’s biosecurity landscape, from pathogen detection and DNA sequencing to vaccine development, and examine how frontier models can already troubleshoot lab work and bypass data safeguards. The conversation introduces a proposed Biosecurity Data Level framework to restrict only the most dangerous functional biological data while preserving open science. They close with a broader defense-in-depth strategy—Delay, Deter, Detect, Defend—including DNA synthesis screening, global pathogen surveillance, and practical tools like Far UV sterilization. LINKS: Jassi Pannu: https://x.com/JassiPannuMD Science article that prompted this conversation: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aeb2689 Sponsors: VCX: VCX, by Fundrise, is the public ticker for private tech, giving everyday investors access to high-growth private companies in AI, space, defense tech, and more. Learn how to invest at https://getvcx.com Framer: Framer is an enterprise-grade website builder that lets business teams design, launch, and optimize their.com with AI-powered wireframing, real-time collaboration, and built-in analytics. Start building for free and get 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan at https://framer.com/cognitive Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (05:59) From outbreak to vaccine (17:08) Threat actors and data (Part 1) (21:23) Sponsors: VCX | Framer (23:53) Threat actors and data (Part 2) (31:05) Gain-of-function research risks (Part 1) (37:39) Sponsors: Claude | Tasklet (41:03) Gain-of-function research risks (Part 2) (48:05) AI models in biology (01:00:51) Dangerous AI capabilities (01:07:59) Biosecurity data level framework (01:18:58) Policy, governance, and infrastructure (01:28:53) Defense in depth vision (01:40:43) Episode Outro (01:45:02) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Jesse Genet shares how she built a team of AI agents to transform homeschooling, family life, and personal productivity without a software background. She explains how agents like an AI chief of staff, curriculum planner, and content creator help design personalized lessons, analyze kids’ learning, manage educational toys, and even run TikTok. The conversation covers practical delegation workflows, guardrails and trust, and why she treats AIs like employees with onboarding and clear roles. Jesse also explores local models, privacy, and how AI in the home could reshape future work and family life. Use the Granola Recipe Nathan relies on to identify blind spots across conversations, AI research, and decisions: Sponsors: VCX: VCX, by Fundrise, is the public ticker for private tech, giving everyday investors access to high-growth private companies in AI, space, defense tech, and more. Learn how to invest at https://getvcx.com Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week 4 at https://serval.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (04:57) Homeschooling context and AI (15:55) Building an AI team (Part 1) (19:51) Sponsors: VCX | Claude (23:18) Building an AI team (Part 2) (31:03) Onboarding agents like employees (Part 1) (38:12) Sponsors: Serval | Tasklet (40:31) Onboarding agents like employees (Part 2) (40:57) Context, models, and privacy (48:47) AI intimacy and rights (56:19) Coordinating agents in Slack (01:02:19) Designing an agent superapp (01:08:35) Agent trust and kids (01:17:57) Voice interfaces for families (01:29:51) Curated screens and automations (01:40:28) Sharing setups and software (01:48:43) Local sovereignty and kid devices (01:59:26) Work, disruption, and play (02:04:58) Episode Outro (02:07:45) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Dan Balsam and Tom McGrath from Goodfire return to explore the frontier of mechanistic interpretability and their new research pillar, Intentional Design. They explain the shift from sparse autoencoders to understanding geometric structure in latent spaces, and share a proof-of-concept method for reducing hallucinations using probes and RL. The conversation tackles concerns about reward hacking, principles for shaping the loss landscape instead of fighting backprop, and what this means for aligning powerful models. They also discuss recent Goodfire results on Alzheimer’s prediction, disentangling memorization vs reasoning weights, and how they balance commercial growth with a public benefit mission. Nathan uses Granola to uncover blind spots in conversations and AI research. Try it at granola.ai/tcr with code TCR — and if you’re already using it, test his blind spot recipe here: https://bit.ly/granolablindspot LINKS: Detecting PII for Rakuten Interpretability for Alzheimer's biomarker detection You and Your Research Agent Adversarial examples and superposition Discovering rare behaviors with model diff Priors in time for interpretability Belief dynamics in in-context learning Mixing mechanisms in language models Sparse autoencoder scaling with manifolds Sponsors: VCX: VCX, by Fundrise, is the public ticker for private tech, giving everyday investors access to high-growth private companies in AI, space, defense tech, and more. Learn how to invest at https://getvcx.com Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week 4 at https://serval.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Geoffrey Irving, Chief Scientist at the UK AI Security Institute, explains why our theoretical understanding of machine learning remains fragile even as models surpass experts on critical security tasks. He details AISI’s work on frontier model evaluations, red teaming, and threat modeling across biosecurity, cybersecurity, and loss-of-control risks. The conversation explores reward hacking, eval awareness, and why current safety techniques may struggle to deliver high reliability. Listeners will also hear how AISI is funding foundational research to build stronger guarantees for AI safety. Nathan uses Granola to uncover blind spots in conversations and AI research. Try it at ⁠granola.ai/tcr⁠ with code TCR — and if you’re already using it, test his blind spot recipe here: ⁠https://bit.ly/granolablindspot⁠ Sponsors: Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week 4 at https://serval.com/cognitive Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (04:09) From physics to ML (08:52) AGI uncertainty and threats (Part 1) (18:08) Sponsors: Serval | Claude (21:29) AGI uncertainty and threats (Part 2) (27:35) Control, autonomy, alignment (Part 1) (34:02) Sponsor: Tasklet (35:14) Control, autonomy, alignment (Part 2) (38:44) Inside the UK AC (51:02) Evaluations and jailbreaking (01:01:17) Emerging capabilities and misuse (01:14:20) Agents and reward hacking (01:26:09) Theoretical alignment agenda (01:38:39) Debate and formal methods (01:51:19) Limits of formalization (02:02:27) Future risks and governance (02:16:23) Episode Outro (02:18:58) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing SOCIAL LINKS: Website: https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai Twitter (Podcast): https://x.com/cogrev_podcast Twitter (Nathan): https://x.com/labenz LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/nathanlabenz/ Youtube: https://youtube.com/@CognitiveRevolutionPodcast Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/the-cognitive-revolution-ai-builders-researchers-and/id1669813431 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6yHyok3M3BjqzR0VB5MSyk

Karan Singhal, Head of Health AI at OpenAI, explains how ChatGPT Health is achieving attending-physician-level performance and already serving hundreds of millions of users. He details how OpenAI works with over 250 doctors, built the 49,000-criteria HealthBench evaluation, and ran one of the first randomized trials of AI copilots in clinical care. The conversation explores privacy and safety safeguards, medical multimodality, N-of-1 treatment plans, and how AI could become a standard part of global medical practice. Nathan uses Granola to uncover blind spots in conversations and AI research. Try it at ⁠granola.ai/tcr⁠ with code TCR — and if you’re already using it, test his blind spot recipe here: ⁠https://bit.ly/granolablindspot⁠ LINKS: modeling human wellness Sponsors: Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week 4 at https://serval.com/cognitive Framer: Framer is an enterprise-grade website builder that lets business teams design, launch, and optimize their.com with AI-powered wireframing, real-time collaboration, and built-in analytics. Start building for free and get 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan at https://framer.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (06:11) Cancer story and mission (11:46) Designing safe health AI (Part 1) (17:49) Sponsors: Claude | Serval (21:09) Designing safe health AI (Part 2) (26:48) Uncertainty, HealthBench and robustness (Part 1) (30:23) Sponsors: Framer | Tasklet (32:50) Uncertainty, HealthBench and robustness (Part 2) (38:11) Chain-of-thought and evaluation (46:49) Real-world performance and frontiers (55:35) Multimodal data and science (01:05:36) Personalization, privacy and monitoring (01:15:47) Models, data and incentives (01:29:31) Doctor adoption and workflows (01:38:13) Scalable oversight and alignment (01:51:06) Move 37 and future (02:00:50) Episode Outro (02:03:06) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Olive Song from MiniMax shares how her team trains the M series frontier open-weight models using reinforcement learning, tight product feedback loops, and systematic environment perturbations. This crossover episode weaves together her AI Engineer Conference talk and an in-depth interview from the Inference podcast. Listeners will learn about interleaved thinking for long-horizon agentic tasks, fighting reward hacking, and why they moved RL training to FP32 precision. Olive also offers a candid look at debugging real-world LLM failures and how MiniMax uses AI agents to track the fast-moving AI landscape. Nathan uses Granola to uncover blind spots in conversations and AI research. Try it at ⁠granola.ai/tcr⁠ with code TCR — and if you’re already using it, test his blind spot recipe here: ⁠https://bit.ly/granolablindspot⁠ LINKS: Conference Talk (AI Engineer, Dec 2025) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY1iFbDPRlwInterview (Turing Post, Jan 2026) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkUMqWeHn40 Sponsors: Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (04:15) Minimax M2 presentation (Part 1) (17:59) Sponsors: Claude | Tasklet (21:22) Minimax M2 presentation (Part 2) (21:26) Research life and culture (26:27) Alignment, safety and feedback (32:01) Long-horizon coding agents (35:57) Open models and evaluation (43:29) M2.2 and researcher goals (48:16) Continual learning and AGI (52:58) Closing musical summary (55:49) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing SOCIAL LINKS: Website: https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai Twitter (Podcast): https://x.com/cogrev_podcast Twitter (Nathan): https://x.com/labenz LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/nathanlabenz/ Youtube: https://youtube.com/@CognitiveRevolutionPodcast Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/the-cognitive-revolution-ai-builders-researchers-and/id1669813431 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6yHyok3M3BjqzR0VB5MSyk

Vlad Tenev and Tudor Achim from Harmonic explain how they built Aristotle, an AI system that reaches International Mathematical Olympiad gold-medal performance using formally verified Lean proofs. They unpack the architecture behind mathematical superintelligence, including Monte Carlo Tree Search, lemma guessing, and specialized geometry modules. The conversation explores how verifiable reasoning could harden mission-critical software, reshape mathematical practice, and lead to trustworthy superintelligent systems by 2030. Nathan uses Granola to uncover blind spots in conversations and AI research. Try it at ⁠granola.ai/tcr⁠ with code TCR — and if you’re already using it, test his blind spot recipe here: ⁠https://bit.ly/granolablindspot⁠ Sponsors: Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr Framer: Framer is an enterprise-grade website builder that lets business teams design, launch, and optimize their.com with AI-powered wireframing, real-time collaboration, and built-in analytics. Start building for free and get 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan at https://framer.com/cognitive Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (04:58) Math as reasoning (Part 1) (15:22) Sponsors: Claude | Framer (18:51) Math as reasoning (Part 2) (18:51) Inside the Lean language (27:51) Lean intuition and MathLib (Part 1) (34:08) Sponsors: Blitzy | Tasklet (37:08) Lean intuition and MathLib (Part 2) (38:47) Inside Aristotle's architecture (48:33) Scope, boundaries, and applications (54:37) Training, taste, and interpretability (01:08:18) Formal math and software (01:16:50) Limits, entropy, and roadmap (01:25:24) 2030 vision and safety (01:33:38) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Abhi Mahajan (@owlposting) explains how AI is reshaping biology and medicine, including foundation models to predict cancer treatment response and why he’s both skeptical and optimistic about current results. Helen Toner unpacks CSET’s “When AI Builds AI” report and why automated AI R&D is a major source of strategic surprise. Jeremie Harris then explores our lack of control over superhuman AI systems, fragile US–China coordination, and how to maintain situational awareness in a rapidly shifting landscape. Nathan uses Granola to uncover blind spots in conversations and AI research. Try it at granola.ai/tcr with code TCR — and if you’re already using it, test his blind spot recipe here: https://bit.ly/granolablindspot LINKS: Abhi Mahajan's Owl Posting site Heuristics for lab robotics article Deep Research on Noetik AI Sponsors: GovAI: GovAI was founded ten years ago on the belief that AI would end up transforming our world. Ten years later, the organization is at the forefront of trying to help decision-makers in government and industry navigate the transition to advanced AI.  GovAI is now hiring Research Scholars (one-year positions for those transitioning into AI policy) and Research Fellows (longer-term roles for experienced researchers). Both roles offer significant freedom to pursue policy research, advise decision-makers, or launch new initiatives. Applications close 22 February 2026. Apply at: https://www.governance.ai/opportunities Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Part 1 of this live special dives into AI for Science, U.S. AI policy, and the behavior of AI agents in open-ended environments. James Zou explains how interpretability and virtual labs of AI agents can accelerate scientific discovery. Sam Hammond assesses the Biden administration’s AI policy, U.S.–Gulf AI deals, and the odds current AIs are conscious. Shoshannah Tekofsky shares insights from studying agent performance and emergent behavior in the AI Village. Nathan uses Granola to uncover blind spots in conversations and AI research. Try it at ⁠granola.ai/tcr⁠ with code TCR — and if you’re already using it, test his blind spot recipe here: ⁠https://bit.ly/granolablindspot⁠ LINKS: Model human wellness project doc AI Village 2025 findings report Sponsors: GovAI: GovAI was founded ten years ago on the belief that AI would end up transforming our world. Ten years later, the organization is at the forefront of trying to help decision-makers in government and industry navigate the transition to advanced AI.  GovAI is now hiring Research Scholars (one-year positions for those transitioning into AI policy) and Research Fellows (longer-term roles for experienced researchers). Both roles offer significant freedom to pursue policy research, advise decision-makers, or launch new initiatives. Applications close 22 February 2026. Apply at: https://www.governance.ai/opportunities Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Alexis Carlier, founder of Asymmetric Security, explains how assuming AGI-level intelligent labor should transform cybersecurity from reactive triage to proactive, continuous digital forensics. He breaks down today’s threat landscape—from “spray and pray” cybercrime to nation-state IP theft and North Korean “remote workers.” The conversation explores Asymmetric’s AI agents for deep investigations, their services-first approach to business email compromise, and how specialized digital forensics may differentially accelerate defensive AI capabilities. Nathan uses Granola to uncover blind spots in conversations and AI research. Try it at ⁠granola.ai/tcr⁠ with code TCR — and if you’re already using it, test his blind spot recipe here: ⁠https://bit.ly/granolablindspot⁠ Sponsors: GovAI: GovAI was founded ten years ago on the belief that AI would end up transforming our world. Ten years later, the organization is at the forefront of trying to help decision-makers in government and industry navigate the transition to advanced AI.  GovAI is now hiring Research Scholars (one-year positions for those transitioning into AI policy) and Research Fellows (longer-term roles for experienced researchers). Both roles offer significant freedom to pursue policy research, advise decision-makers, or launch new initiatives. Applications close 22 February 2026. Apply at: https://www.governance.ai/opportunities Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (04:20) Defining AGI and jaggedness (12:27) Modern cyber threat landscape (Part 1) (19:10) Sponsors: GovAI | Blitzy (22:17) Modern cyber threat landscape (Part 2) (29:58) AI-powered cyber defense (Part 1) (33:31) Sponsors: Serval | Tasklet (36:20) AI-powered cyber defense (Part 2) (42:20) Inside digital forensics workflows (51:52) Bootstrapping AI cyber defense (59:17) Shaping the capability frontier (01:08:44) Future of automated forensics (01:17:59) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Blitzy founders Brian and Sid break down how their “infinite code context” system lets AI autonomously complete over 80% of major enterprise software projects in days. They dive into their dynamic agent architecture, how they choose and cross-check different models, and why they prioritize advances in AI memory over fine-tuning. The conversation also covers their 20¢/line pricing model, the path to 99%+ autonomous project completion, and what this all means for the future software engineering job market. Sponsors: Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (03:02) AGI effects without AGI (07:07) Domain-specific context engineering (16:54) Dynamic harness and evals (Part 1) (17:00) Sponsors: Blitzy | Tasklet (20:00) Dynamic harness and evals (Part 2) (30:42) Graphs, RAG, and memory (Part 1) (30:49) Sponsor: Serval (32:26) Graphs, RAG, and memory (Part 2) (41:17) Model zoo and memory (50:07) Planning, scaling, and parallelism (56:13) Pricing, onboarding, and autonomy (01:04:24) Closing the last 20% (01:12:34) Strange behaviors and judges (01:22:23) Reasoning budgets and autonomy (01:33:36) Fine-tuning, benchmarks, and training (01:42:31) Securing AI-generated code (01:49:52) Future of software work (01:57:05) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing SOCIAL LINKS: Website: https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai Twitter (Podcast): https://x.com/cogrev_podcast Twitter (Nathan): https://x.com/labenz LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/nathanlabenz/ Youtube: https://youtube.com/@CognitiveRevolutionPodcast Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/the-cognitive-revolution-ai-builders-researchers-and/id1669813431 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6yHyok3M3BjqzR0VB5MSyk

This crossover episode from the Latent Space podcast features Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan on the 10-year anniversary of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and their expanded Biohub vision. They discuss how a “Frontier Biology Lab” working in sync with a “Frontier AI Lab” could enable breakthroughs like a Virtual Cell and true N-of-1 precision medicine. The conversation covers the acquisition of Evolutionary Scale and ESM3, new biological data collection at scale, and how AI-powered biology might transform drug discovery and disease prevention. Sponsors: Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com Framer: Framer is an enterprise-grade website builder that lets business teams design, launch, and optimize their.com with AI-powered wireframing, real-time collaboration, and built-in analytics. Start building for free and get 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan at https://framer.com/cognitive Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (04:27) CZI origins and focus (08:29) Why tools over cures (14:43) Virtual cells and imaging (Part 1) (20:19) Sponsors: Blitzy | Framer (23:24) Virtual cells and imaging (Part 2) (25:22) Data diversity and grounding (32:30) Evaluating models and Biohub (Part 1) (37:53) Sponsors: Serval | Tasklet (40:42) Evaluating models and Biohub (Part 2) (41:06) Future healthcare and aging (53:39) Modeling scales and immunity (58:53) Timelines, data, and collaboration (01:04:01) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing SOCIAL LINKS: Website: https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai Twitter (Podcast): https://x.com/cogrev_podcast Twitter (Nathan): https://x.com/labenz LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/nathanlabenz/ Youtube: https://youtube.com/@CognitiveRevolutionPodcast Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/the-cognitive-revolution-ai-builders-researchers-and/id1669813431 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6yHyok3M3BjqzR0VB5MSyk

Kevin Frazier and Alan Rozenshtein explore how AI is reshaping the legal profession, from “secret cyborg” lawyers using tools like Harvey to the uncertain future of junior associates and access to legal services. They discuss maximalist legal services, AI-written “complete contingent contracts,” and where AI should fall between strict formalism and legal realism, including Claude’s virtue-ethics-inspired constitution. The conversation then turns to AI’s role in legislation and governance, including outcome-oriented law, the “Unitary Artificial Executive,” and new rights like the Right to Compute and the Right to Share personal data. They close by examining limits on government surveillance and how future debates over AI sentience and welfare could spark social conflict. LINKS: Article on automated AI compliance GDPVal dataset lawyers tasks viewer Polis online deliberation platform Sponsors: Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com Framer: Framer is an enterprise-grade website builder that lets business teams design, launch, and optimize their.com with AI-powered wireframing, real-time collaboration, and built-in analytics. Start building for free and get 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan at https://framer.com/cognitive Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (03:35) Surveying AI-law landscape (14:56) Legal deserts and demand (Part 1) (15:02) Sponsors: Blitzy | Framer (18:06) Legal deserts and demand (Part 2) (Part 1) (28:25) Sponsors: Serval | Tasklet (31:14) Legal deserts and demand (Part 2) (Part 2) (31:14) AI and legal careers (45:10) AI counsel and self-representation (59:50) Maximalist law and outcomes (01:12:30) Rules, principles, and Claude (01:25:26) New rights and restraints (01:38:26) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Dominic Williams, President & Chief Scientist of the DFINITY Foundation and CEO of Caffeine AI, explains the Internet Computer and his vision of a “sovereign cloud where AI builds the web.” He breaks down core innovations like the Network Nervous System, Motoko, and orthogonal persistence, and how AI coding could remove adoption barriers. The conversation explores unstoppable applications, real-world case studies like OpenChat, and the tension between control, security, and decentralization in AI governance. LINKS: Anthropic article on smart contracts Caffeine AI official website Internet Computer network dashboard Liquid Reign book website Sponsors: Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com MongoDB: Tired of database limitations and architectures that break when you scale? MongoDB is the database built for developers, by developers—ACID compliant, enterprise-ready, and fluent in AI—so you can start building faster at https://mongodb.com/build Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (03:37) Origins of Internet Computer (10:09) Decentralization philosophy and AI (15:12) Tamper-proof architecture explained (Part 1) (19:43) Sponsors: Blitzy | MongoDB (22:08) Tamper-proof architecture explained (Part 2) (25:25) Network design and scaling (Part 1) (33:30) Sponsors: Serval | Tasklet (35:50) Network design and scaling (Part 2) (36:56) Replication costs and cloud (50:35) Network Nervous System governance (59:33) Caffeine, Motoko and persistence (01:20:19) Self-writing cloud disruption (01:32:30) Resilience and security guarantees (01:41:23) Use cases and limitations (01:49:56) AI misalignment and ensembles (02:00:47) Kill switches and governance (02:09:12) Future of self-writing software (02:11:40) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

In this AMA-style episode, Nathan takes on listener questions about whether fine-tuning is really on the way out, what emergent misalignment and weird generalization results tell us, and how to think about continual learning. He talks candidly about how he’s personally preparing for AGI—from career choices and investing to what resilience steps he has and hasn’t taken. The discussion also covers timelines for job disruption, whether UBI becomes inevitable, how to talk to kids and “normal people” about AI, and which safety approaches are most neglected. Sponsors: Blitzy: Blitzy is the autonomous code generation platform that ingests millions of lines of code to accelerate enterprise software development by up to 5x with premium, spec-driven output. Schedule a strategy session with their AI solutions consultants at https://blitzy.com MongoDB: Tired of database limitations and architectures that break when you scale? MongoDB is the database built for developers, by developers—ACID compliant, enterprise-ready, and fluent in AI—so you can start building faster at https://mongodb.com/build Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ CHAPTERS: (00:00) Ernie cancer update (04:57) Is fine-tuning dead (Part 1) (12:31) Sponsors: Blitzy | MongoDB (14:57) Is fine-tuning dead (Part 2) (Part 1) (26:56) Sponsors: Serval | Tasklet (29:15) Is fine-tuning dead (Part 2) (Part 2) (29:16) Continual learning cautions (34:59) Talking to normal people (39:30) Personal risk preparation (49:59) Investing around AI safety (01:00:39) Early childhood AI literacy (01:08:55) Work disruption timelines (01:27:58) Nonprofits, need, and UBI (01:34:53) Benchmarks, AGI, and embodiment (01:47:30) AI tooling and platforms (01:57:01) Discourse norms and shaming (02:05:50) Location and safety funding (02:15:17) Turpentine deal and independence (02:24:19) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Daniel Miessler shares his Personal AI Infrastructure (PAI) framework and vision for a future where single human owners are supported by armies of AI agents. He explains his TELOS system for defining purpose and goals, multi-layered memory design, and orchestration of multiple models and sub-agents. The conversation dives into cybersecurity impacts, from AI-accelerated testing to inevitable personalized spear-phishing and always-on defensive monitoring. Listeners will learn how scaffolding can turn frontier models into true digital assistants and even help reshape their own working habits. LINKS: PAI principles on GitHub README Daniel Miessler about page How Miessler's projects fit together AI changes predictions for 2026 Fabric open-source AI framework Personal AI Infrastructure GitHub repository Current definition of AGI article Why we'll have AGI by 2028 RAID AI definitions framework article Unsupervised Learning newsletter signup Daniel Miessler LinkedIn profile Sponsors: MongoDB: Tired of database limitations and architectures that break when you scale? MongoDB is the database built for developers, by developers—ACID compliant, enterprise-ready, and fluent in AI—so you can start building faster at https://mongodb.com/build Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive MATS: MATS is a fully funded 12-week research program pairing rising talent with top mentors in AI alignment, interpretability, security, and governance. Apply for the next cohort at https://matsprogram.org/s26-tcr Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Baris Gultekin, VP of AI at Snowflake, explains how “bringing AI to the data” is reshaping enterprise AI deployment under strict security and governance requirements. PSA for AI builders: Interested in alignment, governance, or AI safety? Learn more about the MATS Summer 2026 Fellowship and submit your name to be notified when applications open: https://matsprogram.org/s26-tcr. He shares the importance of bringing AI directly to governed enterprise data, advances in text-to-SQL and semantic modeling, and why high-quality retrieval is foundational for trustworthy AI agents. Baris also dives into Snowflake’s approach to agentic AI, including Snowflake Intelligence, model choice and cost tradeoffs, and why governance, security, and open standards are essential as AI becomes accessible to every business user. LINKS: AWS' Automated Reasoning checks Sponsors: MongoDB: Tired of database limitations and architectures that break when you scale? MongoDB is the database built for developers, by developers—ACID compliant, enterprise-ready, and fluent in AI—so you can start building faster at https://mongodb.com/build Serval: Serval uses AI-powered automations to cut IT help desk tickets by more than 50%, freeing your team from repetitive tasks like password resets and onboarding. Book your free pilot and guarantee 50% help desk automation by week four at https://serval.com/cognitive MATS: MATS is a fully funded 12-week research program pairing rising talent with top mentors in AI alignment, interpretability, security, and governance. Apply for the next cohort at https://matsprogram.org/s26-tcr Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (03:02) Snowflake 101 and AI (09:25) Text-to-SQL and semantics (19:10) RAG, embeddings and models (Part 1) (19:17) Sponsors: MongoDB | Serval (21:02) RAG, embeddings and models (Part 2) (32:23) Bringing models to data (Part 1) (32:29) Sponsors: MATS | Tasklet (35:29) Bringing models to data (Part 2) (51:14) Designing enterprise AI agents (58:35) Trust, governance and guardrails (01:07:14) Agents and future work (01:15:33) Platforms, competition and value (01:26:04) Enterprise models and outlook (01:40:00) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

In this AMA episode, Nathan gives an update on his son Ernie’s cancer treatment and how frontier AI models are helping him navigate complex medical decisions. PSA for AI builders: Interested in alignment, governance, or AI safety? Learn more about the MATS Summer 2026 Fellowship and submit your name to be notified when applications open: https://matsprogram.org/s26-tcr. He reflects on whether Claude Opus 4.5 and Claude Code amount to AGI-level coding, sharing stories of hospital vibe coding apps for his family. You’ll hear his framework for getting real value from Gemini 3, Claude, and GPT 5.2 Pro, plus his take on AI bubbles, Chinese models, chip controls, and who the true live players are in today’s AI race. Sponsors: MongoDB: Tired of database limitations and architectures that break when you scale? MongoDB is the database built for developers, by developers—ACID compliant, enterprise-ready, and fluent in AI—so you can start building faster at https://mongodb.com/build Framer: Framer is an enterprise-grade website builder that lets business teams design, launch, and optimize their.com with AI-powered wireframing, real-time collaboration, and built-in analytics. Start building for free and get 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan at https://framer.com/cognitive Tasklet: Tasklet is an AI agent that automates your work 24/7; just describe what you want in plain English and it gets the job done. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai Claude Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at ⁠⁠https://claude.ai/tcr⁠ CHAPTERS: (00:00) AMA intro format (00:22) Ernie health update (09:24) Claude 4.5 question (Part 1) (09:29) Sponsors: MongoDB | Framer (11:21) Claude 4.5 question (Part 2) (13:21) Using AI for cancer (19:48) AI value and skill (22:10) Holiday coding projects (Part 1) (22:15) Sponsor: Tasklet (23:27) Holiday coding projects (Part 2) (28:01) Claude code workflow (32:03) Is Claude 4.5 AGI (36:04) AI bubble or not (41:22) VC froth examples (46:09) Chinese models comparison (55:29) H200 exports to China (01:03:40) Google DeepMind strengths (01:11:55) OpenAI strategy outlook (01:22:51) Anthropic culture and strategy (01:36:17) XAI promise and risks (01:48:20) Meta and Microsoft (01:52:29) Part two preview (01:53:39) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing SOCIAL LINKS: Website: https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai Twitter (Podcast): https://x.com/cogrev_podcast Twitter (Nathan): https://x.com/labenz LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/nathanlabenz/ Youtube: https://youtube.com/@CognitiveRevolutionPodcast Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/the-cognitive-revolution-ai-builders-researchers-and/id1669813431 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6yHyok3M3BjqzR0VB5MSyk