The Jackson Downer Podcast

In this first Thought Experiments episode, I work through five hypothetical scenarios and moral dilemmas: whether to enter a perfect simulated life, erase your most painful memory, use a teleporter that may destroy the original you, detain someone because AI predicts a future crime, and choose between saving the person you love or five strangers.Rather than just giving my immediate answers, I challenge those instincts, change the conditions, and examine what these scenarios reveal about happiness, authenticity, memory, personal identity, consciousness, free will, justice, love, sacrifice, and what makes a life meaningful.

In this episode, I talk about the cognitive cost of AI and whether artificial intelligence is weakening our minds, expanding our thinking, or doing both at the same time.I get into cognitive offloading, memory, attention, writing, creativity, research, decision-making, and critical thinking. I also talk about the difference between using AI as a tool and becoming dependent on it, and why it matters whether AI enters before we think or after we have already made the first attempt ourselves.The bigger question is what kind of mind AI is training us to have, and whether the way we use it is making us more capable or more dependent over time.

In this first Listener Questions episode, I answer questions about having a good life that still does not feel like enough, being with a partner who may not share your ambition, becoming more aware of time and how temporary life is, putting yourself out there creatively when you are afraid of being judged, and realizing you may be outgrowing an old friendship.Have a question, a situation you’re dealing with, or something you want my thoughts on for a future Listener Questions episode? Send it to [email protected] you write in, include how you would like to be identified on the show: your first name and general location, your first name only, a nickname, or anonymous. For privacy, I will never use exact cities.

Welcome to the first episode of The Jackson Downer Podcast.In this introductory episode, I talk about what this podcast is, what you can expect from it going forward, and a little about who I am for anyone discovering me for the first time.This show is where I talk about whatever I'm into or find worth exploring - music, personal stories, books, ideas, my latest research, lessons I’ve learned, and occasional conversations with people I find interesting.Thanks for being here at the beginning.