The Zach Show

Are you sure this life is real? How do we know this life is real? What does being “real” even mean? According to Blaise Pascal, everything we know, everything we think we know is real, is a matter of feeling. It’s not a matter of reasoning, ultimately, at the foundation. This concept anchors my conversation today with Yuval Avnur, a Professor of Philosophy at Scripps College and author of Why Read Pascal Today?We dive into Blaise Pascal, the 17th-century true polymath genius who believed that a human being is a heart with a belief-forming mechanism attached as an afterthought. According to Pascal, feeling something with your heart is a way of knowing. We get into why this idea provides the perfect lens to view everything from the escalation of political polarization to rabid online echo chambers to moon-landing conspiracies. Instead of getting trapped in those realities, Yuval argues that Pascal offers a way out. He lays out Pascal’s remarkably modern advice on how to actually persuade someone: stop dunking on them with red-faced, shrieking facts, and start asking why the world looks the way it does from where the other person’s standing. It’s amazing how a guy who died over 350 years ago understands the internet age better than most of us alive today. We also get into whether or not we live in a simulation, what most people completely get wrong about Pascal’s Wager, what a debate would look like between Blaise Pascal, devout Catholic, against staunch atheist Sam Harris, why AI art makes us feel alone, and The Experience Machine Dilemma: Would you abandon reality for a perfectly fake life?Subscribe to The Zach Show 2.0 to gain early access to all future episodes, exclusive AMAs, the ability to suggest guest questions, bonus content, and more: TheZachShow.Supercast.ComYuval Avnur Links:Why Read Pascal Today?Scripps College ProfilePublicationsThe Zach Show Links: The Zach Show 2.0: ⁠https://thezachshow.supercast.com/⁠Spotify: ⁠https://spoti.fi/3zaS6sP⁠YouTube: ⁠https://bit.ly/3lTpJdj⁠Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/auxoro/⁠TikTok: ⁠https://www.tiktok.com/@zachshowpod⁠ Website: ⁠https://www.auxoro.com/⁠Substack: ⁠https://thezachshow.substack.com/⁠If you’re not ready to subscribe to The Zach Show 2.0, rating the show on Spotify or Apple Podcasts is free and massively helpful. It boosts visibility, helps new listeners discover the show, and keeps this chaos alive. Thank you: Rate The Zach Show on Spotify: ⁠https://bit.ly/43ZLrAt⁠Rate The Zach Show on Apple Podcasts: ⁠https://bit.ly/458nbha⁠

Prediction markets are everywhere, but a recent Wall Street Journal investigation raises serious questions about how some platforms are marketed. Zach breaks down the report on Polymarket’s use of paid creators, simulated betting videos, and influencer campaigns, then explores the ethics of financial advertising, celebrity endorsements like Rick Rubin’s, regulatory gray areas, and whether prediction markets are becoming the latest—and most sophisticated—way to sell people false hope and fake wins. Subscribe to The Zach Show 2.0 to gain early access to all future episodes, exclusive AMAs, the ability to suggest guest questions, bonus content, and more: ⁠https://thezachshow.supercast.com/⁠The Zach Show Links: The Zach Show 2.0: ⁠⁠https://thezachshow.supercast.com/⁠⁠Spotify: ⁠⁠https://spoti.fi/3zaS6sP⁠⁠YouTube: ⁠⁠https://bit.ly/3lTpJdj⁠⁠Instagram: ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/auxoro/⁠⁠TikTok: ⁠⁠https://www.tiktok.com/@zachshowpod⁠⁠ Website: ⁠⁠https://www.auxoro.com/⁠⁠Substack: ⁠⁠https://thezachshow.substack.com/⁠⁠If you’re not ready to subscribe to The Zach Show 2.0, rating the show on Spotify or Apple Podcasts is free and massively helpful. It boosts visibility, helps new listeners discover the show, and keeps this chaos alive. Thank you: Rate The Zach Show on Spotify: ⁠⁠https://bit.ly/43ZLrAt⁠⁠Rate The Zach Show on Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠https://bit.ly/458nbha⁠

AI was supposed to cure disease, solve climate change, and usher humanity into a futuristic utopia. Instead, some people are now asking ChatGPT if they should cheat on their spouse with their Pilates instructor. In this episode, I dive into Alessandra Ram’s incredible Wired article, “Meet The Sad Wives of AI,” and explore the strange psychological fallout of the AI boom: founders treating chatbots like children, relationships collapsing under nonstop “vibe coding,” and people outsourcing emotional intimacy to machines that endlessly validate them. We unpack why this tech boom feels different from the Gold Rush or dotcom era, why AI may be more psychologically dangerous because it talks back, and what happens when the people building “human connection” tools stop connecting with actual humans. Subscribe to The Zach Show 2.0 to gain early access to all future episodes, exclusive AMAs, the ability to suggest guest questions, bonus content, and more: https://thezachshow.supercast.com/The Zach Show Links: The Zach Show 2.0: ⁠https://thezachshow.supercast.com/⁠Spotify: ⁠https://spoti.fi/3zaS6sP⁠YouTube: ⁠https://bit.ly/3lTpJdj⁠Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/auxoro/⁠TikTok: ⁠https://www.tiktok.com/@zachshowpod⁠ Website: ⁠https://www.auxoro.com/⁠Substack: ⁠https://thezachshow.substack.com/⁠If you’re not ready to subscribe to The Zach Show 2.0, rating the show on Spotify or Apple Podcasts is free and massively helpful. It boosts visibility, helps new listeners discover the show, and keeps this chaos alive. Thank you: Rate The Zach Show on Spotify: ⁠https://bit.ly/43ZLrAt⁠Rate The Zach Show on Apple Podcasts: ⁠https://bit.ly/458nbha⁠

After 27 years inside the French Air Force working on the ethics of drone and autonomous weapons warfare, Dr. Emmanuel Goffi witnessed the shift from battlefield decision-making to remote killing, and now to a world where artificial intelligence may shape reality itself. In this episode, he explains what lethal drone strikes actually look like behind the scenes, how responsibility quietly moves away from political leaders and onto operators, and how militaries carefully construct the narratives that make controversial technologies feel acceptable over time. We also explore Western dominance over AI ethics, the risks of exporting a single moral framework to the rest of the world, and how deepfakes and algorithmic media threaten public trust. At one point, Goffi delivers his starkest warning: “Narrative being shaped by AI is a bigger threat than nuclear weapons.” The next conflict, he argues, may not be fought over territory, but over perception itself.Guest bio: Dr. Emmanuel Goffi is a philosopher of artificial intelligence and a former French Air Force officer who spent 27 years working on the ethics of drone and autonomous weapons warfare. Now co-founder and co-director of the Global AI Ethics Institute in Paris, he studies how emerging technologies are reshaping responsibility, geopolitics, and truth itself. His work focuses on the ethical consequences of AI, and why the future of conflict may be decided as much by narrative as by weapons. Subscribe to The Zach Show 2.0 to gain early access to all future episodes, exclusive AMAs, the ability to suggest guest questions, bonus content, and more: https://thezachshow.supercast.com/Dr. Emmanuel Goffi Links:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emmanuelgoffi/Wikipedia:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmanuel_GoffiResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Emmanuel-GoffiThe Zach Show Links: The Zach Show 2.0: https://thezachshow.supercast.com/Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3zaS6sPYouTube: https://bit.ly/3lTpJdjInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/auxoro/TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@zachshowpod Website: https://www.auxoro.com/Substack: https://thezachshow.substack.com/If you’re not ready to subscribe to The Zach Show 2.0, rating the show on Spotify or Apple Podcasts is free and massively helpful. It boosts visibility, helps new listeners discover the show, and keeps this chaos alive. Thank you: Rate The Zach Show on Spotify: https://bit.ly/43ZLrAtRate The Zach Show on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/458nbha