would not hire someone who thinks they have low IQ. but happy to hire someone that thinks they have low EQ.

interviewed tons of AI experts and @dwarkesh_sp ‘s biggest disagreement with them is that they expect AI capabilities to be much more valuable much sooner than he thinks they will be there’s a narrative that the fortune 500 is not “too lazy/slow” to integrate AI. they could do it now but they aren’t innovative enough…the real reason is that it’s genuinely hard to get human level work out of LLMs still

WWII theory from @dwarkesh_sp: the war with Japan could have been avoided with smarter negotiations. we embargoed oil, they had 2 years before running out, so Pearl Harbor became rational for them

from @dwarkesh_sp on Europe's stagnation: they missed the internet and fracking. without those 2 tailwinds, US would be in trouble too US exceptionalism is more fragile than we think. it hinges on winning the 1 or 2 most important technologies. will we win AI and 1-2 other waves?

most people look at reading 50 books a year as impressive. but if you can't remember them a few years later, where is the value? my new goal is to read fewer books

insight from Dwarkesh: AI models today do a 5/10 job at most language tasks right out of the box, but they don’t get much better over time like human employees do. the lack of on-the-job training is the biggest bottleneck to AI deployment

Wikipedia is fucking incredible. Concise, so well organized and easy to read, frictionless rabbit holing, filled with concrete details (unlike many books, which are largely vacuous monologues). People often ask me for book recs. Most books suck. Read Wikipedia instead lol.

japan went from 20% of america's GDP per capita in the 1950s to 125% (!!!) by 1989, then crashed and is now less than 50%. @dwarkesh_sp discussed whether this was financial crisis or demographics

new World of DaaS with @dwarkesh_sp: 🤖 why AI experts keep overestimating capabilities 📈 Japan's wild economic rise and crash (20% → 125% → 50% of US GDP) 🧠 learning hacks that actually work 💼 the hidden productivity problem in white collar work

checked into a Hampton Inn and I saw the future. it was a singularly pleasurable experience. you check in via the Hilton app and it allows you to select the room of the hotel. just like selecting a seat in a plane, the app gives you a layout of the rooms (floor by floor) and let’s you pick. there were two rooms left on the highest floor and i picked the one i thought was best. then the app creates a mobile key for you. when i got to the hotel (got there late because my flight was delayed 3 hours), i just went straight to the room. i walked straight passed the from desk without even stopping. got to the room and the mobile key actually worked as advertised. i never even interacted with anyone on the hotel staff (which, for someone like me, is preferred) this was awesome. no time checking in. no time waiting in a line. no dealing with the bellman that it waiting anxiously for their $20 tip. just got to go straight to my room (which was wonderful) and go to bed (as I mention, it was late). why can’t every hotel do this?