Latest Interviews
Showing 2476–2490 of 3,244 interview transcripts.
Clear all filters- The Diary Of A CEO1h 34m
Calm App Founder: From $0 To $2 Billion By Making The World Meditate: Michael Acton Smith | E117
Michael Acton Smith, Stephen Bartlett
Michael Acton Smith, founder of the billion-dollar mindfulness app Calm, chronicles his journey from the commercial failures of Perplex City and Moshi Monsters to building a global solution for the mental health crisis. Driven by personal burnout and a realization that meditation could rewire the brain from fear-based reaction to strategic response, Smith transformed Calm into a revenue powerhouse through features like Sleep Stories and a pivot to annual subscription pricing. His narrative underscores a broader cultural shift toward valuing sleep, nutrition, and mental practice as foundational business skills, positioning the treatment of mental health as a prerequisite for solving larger global issues like climate change.
- Lex Fridman2h 59m
Georges St-Pierre, John Danaher & Gordon Ryan: The Greatest of All Time | Lex Fridman Podcast #260
Georges St-Pierre, John Danaher, Gordon Ryan, Lex Fridman
John McDonough, George St-Pierre, and Gordon Ryan discuss strategies for elite combat sports success, emphasizing the development of undervalued technical skills like leg locks and the strategic integration of strength training rather than reliance on brute force. The conversation explores the delicate balance between confidence and fear, the specific nutritional and physiological approaches required for peak performance, and the distinct tactical demands of MMA compared to pure grappling. Finally, the trio offers philosophical insights on evolutionary violence, speculates on hypothetical matchups between legendary fighters, and advises aspiring athletes to pursue mastery in specific innovative areas while maintaining a trusted support system.
- Lex Fridman2h 17m
Thomas Tull: From Batman Dark Knight Trilogy to AI and The Rolling Stones | Lex Fridman Podcast #259
Thomas Tull, Lex Fridman, James Cameron, Warren Buffet
Legendary Entertainment founder Thomas Tull pioneered a capital structure that fused long-term institutional funding with disciplined studio partnerships to produce blockbusters like *The Dark Knight* trilogy and *Jurassic World*. Beyond Hollywood, he extends this philosophy through Tolko Holdings to apply patient capital and AI to legacy industries, while pursuing high-impact ventures ranging from industrial reshoring to the scientific de-extinction of the woolly mammoth. Tull's career also reflects a unique synthesis of creative and entrepreneurial pursuits, spanning minority ownership of the Pittsburgh Steelers, professional musicianship with Ghost Hounds, and a personal investment framework grounded in Stoic resilience and intellectual honesty.
- The Diary Of A CEO1h 35m
Fearne Cotton: THIS Is How To Build Confidence & Set Yourself Free | E116
Former BBC Radio 1 presenter Fern Cotton left mainstream media after a decade of high-pressure performance triggered severe anxiety and depression, leading her to build a new career founded on radical authenticity. Her recent work, including the podcast *Happy Place* and the book *Bigger Than Us*, focuses on replacing industry validation with self-compassion and systemic challenges regarding gender and ambition. Cotton now advocates for prioritizing internal connection over external success metrics as she expands her mission into festivals and digital experiences designed to reduce societal disconnection.
- Lex Fridman2h 45m
Yann LeCun: Dark Matter of Intelligence and Self-Supervised Learning | Lex Fridman Podcast #258
Yann LeCun proposes that self-supervised learning serves as the foundational mechanism for building world models, arguing that this approach mirrors human biological learning far more effectively than current data-hungry supervised methods. While progress in language has been substantial, the field faces significant technical hurdles in applying similar principles to high-dimensional vision, necessitating new architectures to handle uncertainty and causality. LeCun further contends that this paradigm shift is essential for achieving strong AI capable of solving complex scientific problems, though he warns that such capabilities may eventually require addressing the ethical implications of autonomous drives and the potential for machine suffering.
- Milken Institute30 min
Building Community Wealth: How Can We Meet the Moment
Margot Brandenburg, Natalie Foster, Shawn Wooden
Ford Foundation host Margo Brandenburg facilitated a dialogue with Natalie Foster and Connecticut Treasurer Sean Wooden on utilizing community wealth strategies to address the widening racial and economic divide. Foster highlighted the Child Tax Credit's success in reducing child poverty while Wooden detailed Connecticut's pioneering Baby Bonds program as a model for closing the generational wealth gap through state-level innovation. The conversation further examined how public sector expansions of guaranteed income, social bonds, and anti-monopoly policies are reshaping labor markets and providing essential financial buffers during economic volatility.
- Milken Institute30 min
A Conversation with Brian Deese, Director, White House National Economic Council
Following the American Rescue Plan, the U.S. achieved historic economic growth in 2021, with GDP expansion between 5% and 6% and a significant decline in child poverty and evictions. Now, the administration is leveraging these funds alongside the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, led by Mitch Landrieu, to deploy 21st-century industrial strategies that address supply chain bottlenecks and accelerate private capital investment in clean energy. Despite current pressures from the Omicron variant and geopolitical instability, officials emphasize a "bottom-up" approach to sustain recovery while ensuring long-term climate resilience and regional equity.
- Milken Institute20 min
A Conversation With Kathy Hochul, Governor of New York
Kathy Hochul, Michael Piwowar, Richard Ravitch
Governor Hochul is fortifying New York State's fiscal reserves against potential crises while rejecting tax hikes to stem the out-migration of high-net-worth individuals. Simultaneously, she is collaborating with New York City Mayor Adams on subway safety initiatives and advancing the delayed congestion pricing plan to secure MTA funding. Her administration also prioritized keeping schools open during the Omicron surge through widespread testing and is incentivizing the construction of 100,000 affordable housing units to address long-term economic stability.
- The Economist7 min
China and Russia: MI6’s top concerns
MI6 Chief Richard Moore signaled a strategic realignment for the intelligence service by publicly prioritizing the challenge of China's rise, particularly its access to global data streams which threatens UK sovereignty and artificial intelligence development. Distinguishing this systemic digital threat from traditional Russian kinetic aggression, Moore outlined a dual-track approach to maintain cooperation on global issues while defending British values against authoritarian influence. Simultaneously, he addressed the Ukraine conflict, asserting that Russia's invasion would incur severe economic costs and that Ukraine is now better positioned to resist than in 2014.
- Y Combinator21 min
Where Do Great Startup Ideas Come From? – Dalton Caldwell and Michael Seibel
Dalton Caldwell, Michael Seibel
This presentation analyzes how Airbnb, Coinbase, and Stripe succeeded by disrupting mature markets with superior solutions despite facing intense skepticism from investors regarding market viability, regulatory hurdles, and founder inexperience. Each case study highlights how founders leveraged direct personal pain points to identify critical flaws in existing competitors, ultimately overcoming initial rejections through contrarian product strategies and unexpected timing factors like the 2008 financial crisis. The discussion concludes that successful ventures often begin with grossly underestimated market sizes, expanding significantly as new use cases emerge beyond the founders' initial vision.
- Lex Fridman4h 0m
Brian Keating: Cosmology, Astrophysics, Aliens & Losing the Nobel Prize | Lex Fridman Podcast #257
Experimental radio astronomer Brian Keating discusses how telescopes serve as time machines that fundamentally altered human civilization, while detailing his critical examination of cosmological models like Conformal Cyclic Cosmology and the multiverse. He reflects on the 2014 BICEP2 controversy, the subsequent retraction of claimed primordial gravitational wave detections due to interstellar dust, and critiques the competitive nature of the Nobel Prize system. Keating concludes by outlining his "Assayer Project" to rigorously evaluate competing theories of everything through Bayesian reasoning and shares his pessimistic outlook on the likelihood of finding technological extraterrestrial life.
- The Diary Of A CEO1h 35m
The 1% Mindset: How to 1000x Your Success & Productivity! - Manchester United Director Of Sport
Sir Dave Brailsford applies a psychological framework centered on separating emotional outcomes from controllable process targets to drive the "Marginal Gains" philosophy within British Cycling. By integrating leadership pillars of commitment, ownership, responsibility, and excellence alongside rigorous health monitoring, he cultivated a high-performance culture that prioritizes accountability while adapting to individual human needs. This approach not only secured consistent elite results but also evolved to balance serial winning with the sustainability of personal well-being and public engagement.
- Lex Fridman6 min
GSP teaches Lex Fridman how to street fight
GSP, Lex Fridman, Georges St-Pierre
This presentation outlines asymmetric self-defense strategies for street encounters where the absence of a referee necessitates immediate, decisive action by the defender. Key tactical doctrines include initiating preemptive strikes against vulnerable targets like the eyes or neck to exploit surprise, closing distance against armed attackers, and using specific anatomical counters such as an eye-thrust to break restraints. The discussion also addresses the priority of surrendering property to preserve life unless physical restraint occurs, while introducing novel concepts like a retractable tie designed to counter strangulation attempts.
- The Diary Of A CEO1h 38m
How To Fix Your Focus & Stop Procrastinating: Johann Hari | E114
This analysis argues that a collapsing attention span, driven by twelve systemic factors including surveillance capitalism, ultra-processed diets, and chronic sleep deprivation, is eroding cognitive capacity and preventing societies from solving complex crises. Evidence indicates that algorithms designed to monetize outrage through constant interruption cause measurable IQ drops and flow state disruption, while alternative models like chronological feeds and reduced workweeks demonstrate that productivity and focus can be restored. To counter a predicted future of intensified digital addiction, the presentation advocates for legislative bans on attention-harvesting business models and a cultural return to deep reading and unsupervised play.
- Lex Fridman1h 50m
Mark Normand: Comedy! | Lex Fridman Podcast #255
Comedian Normand discusses his controversial views on marriage, his traumatic childhood in New Orleans, and the distinct creative cultures of comedy hubs like New York, Los Angeles, and Austin. He examines the intersection of technology, specifically robotics and genetic engineering, with human nature while offering advice on embracing failure and finding meaning through struggle. The conversation also covers his personal philosophy on mortality, his relationship with a fiancée, and his admiration for comedians who prioritize integrity over fame.