What if we've become less willing to sacrifice our pawns to take the queen?

This week, Jess and Joey talk about Ezra Klein, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Obama, game theory, defaulting to passion, and nuclear weapons. They don’t talk about David Lightman.

references

• The Ezra Klein Show: Ta-Nehisi Coates on Bridging Gaps vs. Drawing Lines
• Nash equilibrium
• Mutual assured destruction
• A Beautiful Mind
• Pareto principle

What's in your notes?

This week, Aaron and Jess talk about internet chalk, bottle lining, the Pantry Challenge, gold bars, word clothes, and golden milk. They don’t talk about Gold Bond powder.

references

• Heinz Breakfast Ketchup
• Paris is Burning trailer
• The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
• Chinotto
• Astral Chain
• Bossa Bros and Nara
• Sky Full of Elephants by Cebo Campbell

How much do you think you can change your personality?

This week, Joey and Jess talk about life satisfaction, sad auras, nominative determinism, nature versus nurture, Martin Seligman, magical meat sacks. They don’t talk about marinade bags.

references

• Forbes: How Singer-Songwriter EJAE Found Rumi’s Voice In ‘KPop Demon Hunters’
• @thetalesoftayls' sad aura tweet
• Journal of Personality and Social Psychology: Most people's life satisfaction matches their personality traits: True correlations in multitrait, multirater, multisample data. [PDF]
• Nominative determinism
• Eeyore
• Martin Seligman
• Dungeon Crawler Carl

What are places where wisdom exists where it shouldn't?

This week, Joey and Jess talk about the Benner Cycle, feng shui, jelly shoes, BMW dashboards, the bullshit asymmetry principle, and Hitchens's razor. They don’t talk about Christopher Robin.

references

• Human League
• Benner Cycle
• Bagua
• Black–Scholes model
• Joseph Henrich
• Enneagram of Personality
• Strauss–Howe generational theory
• Brandolini's law
• Hitchens's razor

Why do we wave from trains and boats?

This week, Aaron and Jess talk about kids, duck boats, kerchiefs, air travel, cruise ships, and roller coasters. They don’t talk about chucking the deuce.

references

• Knott's Berry Farm
• Medieval Times
• New York Transit Museum
• L.A. Train Festival 2025
• Some Kind of Quest

How are you personally preparing mentally, psychologically for the increased engagement with AI?

This week, Joey and Jess talk about AI psychosis, Blake Lemoine, the Turing Test, cognative security, red teaming, and hats. They don’t (yet) talk about NonsenseLLM.

references

• Psycho Killer and the big suit
• X: Keith Sakata, MD
• The New York Times: They Asked an A.I. Chatbot Questions. The Answers Sent Them Spiraling.
• The New York Times: Chatbots Can Go Into a Delusional Spiral. Here’s How It Happens.
• Washington Post The Google engineer who thinks the company’s AI has come to life
• Bloomberg Technology: Google Engineer on His Sentient AI Claim
• Turing Test
• Johns Hopkins Magazine: The science behind why we see faces in nature
• Study: Barking Up the Wrong Tree: Human Perception of Dog Emotions Is Influenced by Extraneous Factors
• Pareidolia
• Red team
• Planning red teaming for large language models (LLMs) and their applications
• Ig Nobel Prize
• Six Thinking Hats

When is old good and when is old bad?

This week, Jess, Aaron, and Joey talk about The Bible, first editions, berries, Final Destination, whiskey, and Rick Astley. They don’t talk about Flavor Flav.

references

• Dayspring by Anthony Oliveira
• sarcophagus

How do you make sense?

This week, Aaron, Jess, and Joey talk about intention, trust, assumption, context windows, synchronicity, and drinking. They don’t talk about Pal Joey.

references

• Click, Clack, Moo in book form
• Click, Clack, Moo Read Aloud
• Palworld