Dystopia Now

To join our group chat or become a subscriber, go here: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow This week we chatted with historian Quinn Slobodian, a professor of international history at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University. His books, which have been translated into ten languages, include, most recently, Hayek's Bastards: Race, Gold, IQ and the Capitalism of the Far Right and Crack-Up Capitalism: Market Radicals and the Dream of a World without Democracy. Intro Anthropic: AI deception risk Patreon: Join Community Chats Quinn Slobodian Tech bros, Trump, and the Silicon Valley nation-state – The Guardian The Bastards of Neoliberalism – New Statesman Elon Musk and the Demography Agenda – New Statesman Crack-Up Capitalism Interview – Jacobin The Bastards of Neoliberalism – New Statesman The Inhuman Future of Intelligence – The Guardian Other Balaji's Private Island School – TechCrunch

This week is Part 1 of our Patreon supporter only series on the Zizians. We discuss the origins of the Zizian ideology in the Rationalism community, MIRI, CFAR, Roko's Basilisk and Doom Circles. To become a subscriber, visit us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow

To become a Patreon supporter go here: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow With guest Nathan Robinson, Editor of Current Affairs, we dive into the career and ideology of Matt Yglesias and his confidently wrong opinions about everything. Yglesias has helped shift mainstream liberalism toward a colder, more cynical worldview that prioritizes elite consensus and data-driven "pragmatism" over solidarity and human dignity. From Sam Bankman-Fried and crypto, to housing, to Palestine, he's the voice of technocratic centrism beloved by Silicon Valley elites. His views reflect a shallow utilitarianism that strips politics of moral urgency and empathy, and we are here to drag that shit. We explore how Yglesias has become a key ideological bridge between neoliberal Democrats and the techno-libertarian right. Nathan J. Robinson – Articles & Book The Opinions of Matt Yglesias Should Be Ignored – Current Affairs Why Effective Altruism and Longtermism Are Toxic Ideologies – Current Affairs We Should Be Neither Anti-Natalist Nor Pro-Natalist – Current Affairs The Dangerous Ideas of Longtermism and Existential Risk – Current Affairs The Myth of American Idealism – Book by Noam Chomsky & Nathan J. Robinson Articles Mentioned in Intro: Democrats, Influencers, and Trump – NYT Charity for Shrimps? Ronny Chieng Explores the Limits of Effective Altruism | The Daily Show Biden's PSA Test and Political Fallout – NYT Matt Yglesias – Writings & Critiques The Troubling Rise of Hitler Revisionism – Slow Boring Some Thoughts on the FTX Implosion – Slow Boring Reds in the Family – Slow Boring Matt Yglesias's Crypto Opinions – Revolving Door Project Matt Yglesias in Biden's Washington – Washington Post Embarrassing Fans of the Super Rich – Jeet Heer Silicon Valley Patronage – Citations Needed Group Chats That Changed America – Semafor Sam Bankman-Fried & Effective Altruism FTX's Collapse and Media Fallout – Semafor How SBF Sweet-Talked the Media – NY Mag Inside the Crazy World of FTX – The Guardian SBF Guilty Verdict – Semafor EA Group Debated SBF's Ethics in 2018 – Semafor Breakthrough Institute Homelessness Meets Cluelessness – Prospect on Michael Shellenberger Ted Nordhaus – The Breakthrough Institute Bad Science in Apocalypse Never – Yale Climate Connections Empathy, Musk Elon Musk on Empathy – CNN The Christian Right's War on Empathy Additional Resources Solidarity – Book by Leah Hunt-Hendrix & Astra Taylor (N+1) International Factory Safety – Slate

To join us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow This week we welcomed comedians Kath Barbadoro (What a Time to Be Alive podcast) and Alex Ptak (Quorators podcast) to go through each letter in the bundle of ideologies. Who invented them, who believes in them, and the impact they are having on our world today. Transhumanism Extropianism Singularitarianism Cosmism Rationalism Effective Altruism Longtermism Extra reading/watching: Intro clip: https://www.tiktok.com/@the.free.press/video/7457615074945944863 The TESCREAL Bundle: https://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/13636/11599 Adam Becker: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/may/03/tech-oligarchs-musk The Politics and Ethics of Transhumanism by Alexander Thomas: https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/the-politics-and-ethics-of-transhumanism TESCREAL overview by Èmile: https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-acronym-behind-our-wildest-ai-dreams-and-nightmares/

Our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow This week we discussed Nick Land's series of essays "The Dark Enlightenment," considered a foundational document for right accelerationists (r/acc) and neoreactionary ideologies (NrX). Plus the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit, Mark Zuckerberg's AI friends, Bryan Johnson's penis de-aging, and AI spirituality. Additional Resources: Segment 1: Bryan Johnson Vanity Fair: The bizarre journey of Bryan Johnson, his anti-aging endeavors, and his controversial experiment in penile rejuvenation. Don't Die, Tech Mogul: Bryan Johnson's Quest Bryan Johnson's Blog on Penis De-Aging Segment 2: AI Is Stealing Your Boyfriend Rolling Stone: How spiritual delusions about AI are fracturing human bonds. AI and Human Relationships: A Cultural Shift Segment 3: Nick Land Vox: Neoreaction as a segment of the alt-right The Alt-Right Explained Slate: John Derbyshire Derbyshire's "Advice" and the Fallout Nick Land's Foundational Text: A dense introduction to accelerationism, emphasizing the destructive potential of speeding up capitalist processes. A Quick and Dirty Introduction to Accelerationism Mark Fisher (Tumblr): A reflection on accelerationism from the left Terminator vs. Avatar: Notes on Accelerationism Viewpoint Magazine: Dark Enlightenment The Darkness at the End of the Tunnel The Guardian: How accelerationism predicted our modern world. Fringe Philosophy that Predicted the Future Financial Times: Dark Enlightenment • Archived Content

If you'd like to become a subscriber to hear more bonus episodes you can do it here: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow his Patreon bonus episode with Kenice Mobley about Bezos vs. Musk on space was so fun we decided to unlock it. Bezos wants us to live in cylinders, Musk wants us to nuke Mars, but both of them want a future where we're all digital beings maximizing value. Some of the wildest information we've talked about so far. Thanks for being one of our patreon subscribers! For further reading: Jason Hickel: https://www.jasonhickel.org/less-is-more Astrotopia: https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/A/bo184287883.html https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2023/12/15/forget-musks-martian-ambition-jeff-bezos-thinks-humans-should-live-in-giant-cylindrical-space-stations/ https://www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/nuke-mars-elon-musk-seems-serious-about-plan-terraform-red-ncna1045181 https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/08/science/starship-spacex-explosion-elon-musk.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/11/technology/elon-musk-spacex-mars.html

Please join us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow For the first half of the episode, we talked about the Semafor reveal of Silicon Valley groupchats and Marc Andreessen's posting addiction + Èmile's article on End Times Eschatology. We covered Yudkowsky's "Fun Theory," cryogenically freezing your head, and the connection between transhumanists and Christianity. Then, we talked to author and former public defender Alec Karakatsanis about his new book Copanganda and the way we are all propagandized about policing and crime. Alec is the founder of the Civil Rights Corps, an organization designed to advocate for racial justice and bring systemic civil rights cases on behalf of impoverished people. This was such a good interview. Apologies for Kate's slightly bad audio in this, we had some internet issues and had to record on the phone. Alec Karakatsanis – Resources THE BOOK! The New Press – Copaganda: How Police and the Media Manipulate Our Communities Substack: Equal Justice Under Law Twitter/X: @equalityAlec Bluesky: equalityalec.bsky.social PDF: The Body Camera by Alec Karakatsanis (Yale Law) Articles and People We Mentioned Truthdig – "The Endgame of Edgelord Eschatology" Vox – "Will AI become God? That's the wrong question." The Guardian – "Tech guru Jaron Lanier: 'The danger isn't that AI destroys us. It's that it drives us insane'" Wired – "Doug Rushkoff Is Ready to Renounce the Digital Revolution" Semafor – "The Group Chats That Changed America" Harper's – "A Letter on Justice and Open Debate" Mother Jones – "The Billionaires Who Want to Live Forever" Chesa Boudin Recall Mission Local – $9 Million Spent on the Boudin Recall 48 Hills – GOP Donors & Big Money in the Recall Portugal & Drug Decriminalization Scientific American – Portugal's Drug Decriminalization Success TIME – What Can the World Learn from Portugal's Drug Policy?

This week we answered some questions from our Patreon supporters. It's like a mini episode on a bunch of different topics, including the worst book I've ever heard of. We covered Èmile's journey out of longtermism, Yudkowsky's Harry Potter fan fic, end-times narratives, and how we will one day beat the tech bros by withholding our labor. If you'd like to hear part 2 become a subscriber here: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow Articles Mentioned in This Episode and Further Reading AI Ethics Louisiana is using a mysterious algorithm to decide who gets parole – The Verge https://www.theverge.com/news/647405/louisiana-tiger-algorithm-parole Why Sam Altman wants AI to say "please" and "thank you" – Quartz https://qz.com/open-ai-sam-altman-chatgpt-gpt4-please-thank-you-1851777047 TESCREAL and End Times End Times: How Fascism, the Far Right, Trump, and Musk are converging – The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2025/apr/13/end-times-fascism-far-right-trump-musk Overview of TESCREAL (by Èmile) The acronym behind our wildest AI dreams and nightmares – Truthdig https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-acronym-behind-our-wildest-ai-dreams-and-nightmares/ Effective Altruism & Scandals The sexual harassment scandal tearing Effective Altruism apart – TIME https://time.com/6252617/effective-altruism-sexual-harassment/ Sam Bankman-Fried funded 'woke shit' for transactional purposes, prosecutors allege – VICE https://www.vice.com/en/article/sam-bankman-fried-funded-woke-shit-for-transactional-purposes-prosecutors-allege/ The rise and fall of Sam Bankman-Fried – The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/mar/23/sam-bankman-fried-rise-and-fall-details Defective Altruism – Current Affairs https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/2022/09/defective-altruism Effective Altruism's bait-and-switch: From global poverty to AI doom – Techdirt https://www.techdirt.com/2024/04/29/effective-altruisms-bait-and-switch-from-global-poverty-to-ai-doomerism/ Neoliberalism Neoliberalism's World Order – Review of Quinn Slobodian's Globalists – Dissent https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/neoliberalism-world-order-review-quinn-slobodian-globalists/ The Bastards of Neoliberalism – New Statesman https://www.newstatesman.com/ideas/2025/04/the-bastards-of-neoliberalism The Geneva School, Hayek, and Neoliberal Nationalism – Jacobin https://jacobin.com/2022/11/neoliberalism-geneva-school-nationalism-mises-hayek Review of Hayek's Bastards by Quinn Slobodian – The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/09/books/review/hayeks-bastards-quinn-slobodian.html Race Science, Neoliberalism & Hayek – Jacobin https://jacobin.com/2025/04/race-science-neoliberalism-hayek-slobodian Rationalism Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality – Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality Transhumanism Beyond our ape-brained meat sacks: Can transhumanism save us? – The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/jun/04/beyond-our-ape-brained-meat-sacks-can-transhumanism-save-our-species The Frozen Father of Modern Transhumanism: Upwingers and Downwingers – VICE https://www.vice.com/en/article/the-frozen-father-of-moden-transhumanism/

Please consider becoming a subscriber on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/dystopianow/membership This episode we began with a discussion of Peter Singer and eugenics ideas in the Effective Altruism community. And more Sam Altman-- his firing at Open AI, his doomsday prepping and his version of utopia. Sam Altman & OpenAI Moore's Law for Everything – Sam Altman's Blog OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Is a Survivalist Prepper – Futurism Sam Altman's Manifest Destiny – The New Yorker The Most Powerful Man in AI – New York Magazine OpenAI Controversy The Real Story Behind Sam Altman's Firing From OpenAI – WSJ Former OpenAI Employee Sounds Alarm on Altman – Futurism Sam Altman Reinstated at OpenAI – The Guardian Tech Utopias & Praxis Altman-Backed Praxis Eyes Kyiv and Athens for Tech Utopia – Bloomberg Praxis: Tech Dystopia as the Next America – The Nerd Reich Science, Ethics & Philosophy Dyson Sphere – Wikipedia Simulation Hypothesis – Wikipedia The Matrix as Reality: Simulation Hypothesis Explained – Vox Longevity & Biohacking Sam Altman Invested $180M in Anti-Aging Startup Retro Biosciences – MIT Technology Review Ethics, Exploitation & Effective Altruism Red Cobalt: Mining in the Congo – NPR Shrimp Welfare Project – Official Site Introducing the Shrimp Welfare Project – Effective Altruism Forum Against Speciesism – Jacobin

Become a member on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow This week, we begin to explore the mystery that is Sam Altman of Open AI. We cover the AI Doomer coup, Sam's Worldcoin metal orb that scans your retinas, his friendship with Peter Thiel, and his views on restructuring our government with AItopia. We also talked about the weirdo tech billionaire plot to do a Mars colonization trial run on Greenland. An hour in, we had barely scratched the surface of Sam, so we'll be back with a Part 2. Further Reading on Sam Altman: The Inside Story of Sam Altman's Ouster—and Reinstatement—at OpenAI – TIME https://time.com/6551117/sam-altman-openai-ouster-return/ Sam Altman's Worldcoin Launches Amid Privacy Concerns – The Verge https://www.theverge.com/2023/7/24/23805254/worldcoin-sam-altman-iris-scanning-launch-privacy Sam Altman Has a Big, Scary Plan for the World – The Atlantic https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2023/08/sam-altman-worldcoin-openai-ai-ethics/674928/ Sam Altman's Secret Fundraising Spree – The Information https://www.theinformation.com/articles/sam-altmans-secret-fundraising-spree OpenAI Drama: What Really Happened with Sam Altman – New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/22/technology/openai-sam-altman-chaos.html The Worldcoin Controversy Explained – MIT Technology Review https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/07/25/1076412/worldcoin-biometric-id-sam-altman/ Praxis & Greenland Articles Greenland 'Freedom City'? Rich donors push Trump for a tech hub up north – Reuters https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/greenland-freedom-city-rich-donors-push-trump-tech-hub-up-north-2025-04-10/ I Went to Greenland to Try to Buy It – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2024/11/15/i-went-to-greenland-to-try-to-buy-it-meet-the-founder-who-wants-to-re-create-mars-on-earth/ Peter Thiel Thinks the Next Great City Should Be in Greenland – InsideHook https://www.insidehook.com/internet/peter-thiel-praxis-next-great-city-greenland Cybercity of the Future: How an Ambitious 29-Year-Old Plans to Build Praxis – NY Post https://nypost.com/2025/04/06/world-news/robo-cops-ai-schooling-food-from-3-d-printers-and-post-work-future-are-anticipated-for-praxians/ Tech Utopian Project Praxis Gets $525 Million in Commitments – Wall Street Journal https://www.wsj.com/articles/tech-utopian-project-praxis-gets-525-million-in-commitments-for-planned-heroic-city-f4623e98 Altman-Backed Praxis Scouts Kyiv, Athens for Tech Utopia Base – Bloomberg https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-08/altman-backed-praxis-scouts-kyiv-athens-for-tech-utopia-base

To become a Patreon subscriber and hear our bonus eps: https://www.patreon.com/c/DystopiaNow This week we talked about Curtis Yarvin and his vision of CEO/Monarchies, Network States for Tech Bros-- in the US. And Ezra Klein's more minor tech backed reforms. How much democracy should we have?

This week we talked about the "Abundance Agenda" and it's roots in the Effective Altruism movement. A network of think tanks, Silicon Valley billionaires, and centrist pundits are getting all riled up about zoning ordinances, and possibly trying to take over the Democratic Party? Oh boy. We explore the dark side of Effective Altruism, men's rights activists, IQ Realists, "race science," eugenicists and more lurking in a movement where the biggest scoundrels in society are mixing with Vox writers- EA! This episode was a wild ride, let us know what you think. We'll be back with Thiel Part 2 next week but we had to know-- why did an Atlantic writer podcast with a Nazi? Further reading By Èmile: https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-acronym-behind-our-wildest-ai-dreams-and-nightmares/ https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/jun/16/sam-bankman-fried-ftx-eugenics-scientific-racism https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/12/opinion/richard-hanania-eugenics-billionaires.html https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/09/richard-hanania-origins-of-woke-book/675348/ https://jacobin.com/2023/01/effective-altruism-longtermism-nick-bostrom-racism https://theintercept.com/2019/09/06/exxon-mobil-progressive-policy-institute-climate/ https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/ruben-gallego-crypto-digital-assets-andreessen-yglesias-1235260013/

In this episode, we explore Peter Thiel's villain origin story. From his budding commitment to being an edgelord at Stanford to developing the theory that girls ruined everything by voting. Seasteading, blood transfusions, the weird incel parties he throws with Curtis Yarvin. We've got it all. Next week we'll cover the NeoReactionary movement in detail. Futher reading: https://www.cato-unbound.org/2009/04/13/peter-thiel/education-libertarian/ https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/owned-book-peter-thiel-trump-tech-silicon-valley-1235276868/ https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jan/26/elon-musk-peter-thiel-apartheid-south-africa https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/04/inside-the-new-right-where-peter-thiel-is-placing-his-biggest-bets?srsltid=AfmBOop8TkGouVZ72xamuuLVjtZjqQ8rz2G_SBCykFPkOpQGDtS77-j4 https://www.ft.com/content/02217acf-ac64-49c2-acd5-ef4f107f014c

This week we are joined by Paris Marx, host of the podcast Tech Won't Save Us and a tech critic, journalist, author, and international speaker. We talked about Silicon Valley's changing influence in politics, climate policy, and about reasons for optimism as we think about how to confront Musk and Co. in the political arena. This is somewhat of a sister episode to our conversation last week with Jacob Silverman about the tech right that explores the political ideologies of the tech billionaires shaping our country, including within the Democratic Party. To support us on Patreon (and get bonus eps plus a download of our intro song) go here: patreon.com/DystopiaNow Please note we generally record these episodes a few days before publishing so Tesla story was still evolving. Further reading: https://parismarx.com/ https://www.disconnect.blog/ https://www.npr.org/2024/07/12/g-s1-9545/ai-brings-soaring-emissions-for-google-and-microsoft-a-major-contributor-to-climate-change https://www.wired.com/story/true-cost-generative-ai-data-centers-energy/ https://theconversation.com/data-centre-emissions-are-soaring-its-ai-or-the-climate-240137 https://www.versobooks.com/products/2795-road-to-nowhere?srsltid=AfmBOor_bXPpd8aqF9_mHCdTCfJsbfp-V1qFE-ERNFyRVF2RVRfYj365 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvze9dzq8vo https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/08/business/elon-musk-tesla-violence-protests-vandalism.html

To hear the rest of this episode, become one of our Patreon supporters at https://www.patreon.com/DystopiaNow For this bonus episode we were joined by comedian Kenice Mobley to talk about the different space futures Bezos and Musk have in mind. Bezos wants us to live in cylinders, Musk wants us to nuke Mars, but both of them want a future where we're all digital beings maximizing value. Some of the wildest information we've talked about so far.

This week our guest is Jacob Silverman, and independent journalist who has written for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, Slate, The New Yorker & The New Republic. He's the co-author of "Easy Money: Cryptocurrency, Casino Capitalism, and the Golden Age of Fraud." We talked about the growing right wing movement in the tech industry. From the PayPal mafia to President Sh*tcoin today, we dive deep into how a few billionaires are influencing policy from DOGE to how cities treat our unhoused neighbors. Sorry for slight reduction in audio quality this week, we had some issues with our recording software we will fix for next week! This is a fantastic interview you don't want to miss.

This week we welcomed special guest Albert Fox Cahn who is the Executive Director of S.T.O.P. (the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project). We talked about how AI is impacting policing and pricing. We also returned to the subject of Elon's ketamine addiction. Special thanks to Deon Wolf who has been helping with our short videos on instagram and youtube.

This week, Kate and Emile dive deeper into Elon Musk's ideology and explore the debate between two Silicon Valley camps, the AI Doomers and the AI Accelerationists. We explore the effective accelerationism or e/acc movement, a guy named Beff Jezos? Marc Andreessen's Techno Optimist Manifesto, and what Google founder Larry Page really believes. We also talked about what motivated Emile to do Ph.D research on human extinction.

Why is Elon trying so hard to dismantle the administrative state? This may be an answer you haven't heard yet. This week, Emile and Kate host journalist Gil Duran (New Republic, The Nerd Reich) for a discussion about Network States, aka libertarian post democracy colonies that have become a popular idea among tech billionaires. From seasteading to the California Forever tech utopia, from Mars to maybe... the entire US, these guys have their sites set on a feudal structure that makes an Ayn Rand novel look quaint. If you enjoy the episode, please subscribe. An if you prefer to listen in podcast form, we're also on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. As a brand new show, we really appreciate your spreading the word.

In our first episode we explore the question on everyone's mind: what the hell is Elon Musk doing? Well, the answer may be, trying (or pretending to try), winning a robot battle 10 billion years in the future when humanity is replaced with digital beings. Tune in to learn about the ideologies of longtermism and transhumanism and how they may be influencing Elon's actions in the Trump administration.