On this episode of Unsuperivsed Learning Razib talks to native Californian, Inez Stepman. Stepman has an undergraduate degree in philosophy from UC San Diego, and obtained her J.D. from University of Virginia. She is a Senior Policy Analyst at the Independent Women’s Forum, a Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute and a contributor to The Federa…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Christina Buttons, who writes at Buttons Lives. A native Californian and erstwhile artist, Buttons switched to journalism two years ago, writing about gender medicine. A contributor to Quillette, The Post-Millennial and The Daily Wire, Buttons is now a freelance journalist living in Nashville,…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning, Razib talks to returning guest, Sarah Haider. Haider is the co-host of the podcast A Special Place in Hell and the Substack Hold That Thought. A native of Houston, graduate of the University of Texas in Austin, Haider is the founder and former executive director of Ex Muslims of North America. Today Razib a…

Today Razib talks to Aria Babu, a British think-thank professional who is part of the growing number of young men and women who are taking an interest in population decline and promoting pro-natalism. Babu has a degree in chemistry from University College London, and has long worked in areas related to the study of economic growth and entrepreneurs…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Louise Perry. A British journalist known for her commentary on feminism and gender issues, Perry is the author of the book The Case Against the Sexual Revolution. She also contributes to The New Statesman, UnHerd, and The Daily Mail, and has a Substack at Maiden Mother Matriarch. Perry is a gr…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to archeologist and historian Bryan Ward-Perkins about his 2005 book The Fall of Rome: And the End of Civilization. Ward-Perkins was born and grew up in Rome, a son of architectural historian and archaeologist, John Bryan Ward-Perkins. Educated at Oxford University, Ward-Perkins eventually became…

In the final episode of our third series, we discuss Pharmacogenetics. Recorded with a live audience in Berlin, Germany. On the panel we have a wonderful range of guests including Professor and Head of Estonian Biobank, Lili Milani, CEO of Unique Patient Group, Sara Winn, Vita Dolžan, Head of the Pharmacogenetics Laboratory at the Faculty of Medici…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib welcomes back a returning guest, J. P. Mallory, to discuss his reaction to the recent preprint The Genetic Origin of the Indo-Europeans. Mallory is the author of In Search of the Indo-Europeans: Language, Archaeology, and Myth, The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European …

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to professor Sean Anthony about his book Muhammad and the Empires of Faith: The Making of the Prophet of Islam. Anthony is a historian in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at The Ohio State University. He earned his Ph.D. with honors in 2009 at the University of Chicago in Nea…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Nikolai Yakovenko, a returning guest to the podcast, about his new AI startup, DeepNewz, and the state of the LLM-driven AI landscape circa the summer of 2024, where we are in relation to earlier expectations and where we might be in the next decade. Yakovenko is an AI researcher who has worke…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Chad Niederhuth, an erstwhile academic plant geneticist now working in industry. Niederhuth and Razib discuss the reality that in 2024 it is often human genetics that gets the glory, even though experiments on plants go back to the field’s very origins with Gregor Mendel and his peas. Niederhu…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Jonathan Keeperman, an former lecturer in writing at UC Irvine and proprietor of Passage Press. Keeperman also posts on the internet under what was until recently an anonymous pseudonym, Lomez. Unlike many anonymous accounts on X, “Lomez” developed a decade-long identity, to the point where Ke…

In this episode, we discuss language and how to talk about genetics. In this conversation, we are joined by Genetic Counsellor, Zelpha D’Souz from the Manchester Centre for Genomic Medicine, David Ross, who is a rare disease patient and also runs a charity supporting men’s mental health for those diagnosed with a rare disease, and Medical Interpret…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks about religion with Ryan Burge, professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University, and author of The Nones: Where They Came From, Who They Are, and Where They Are Going and 20 Myths About Religion and Politics in America. Burge also has a Substack, Graphs about Religion, where he post…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib discusses the idea of “lost civilizations,” the possibility that there were complex societies during the Pleistocene Ice Age. This topic recently rose to salience after a dialogue between writer Graham Hancock and archaeologist Flint Dibble on Joe Rogan’s podcast. Hancock is a longtime guest on Rogan’s…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Akshar Patel of The Emissary about his recent sojourn in India. Patel began The Emissary because he felt there were many gaps in the media representation of India. Razib asks whether The New York Times’ claim that Modi is a strongman is correct, and whether India is an illiberal democracy. Pat…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Jeremy Carl, Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute, where he focuses on immigration, multiculturalism, and nationalism in America. Previously, Carl was a Research Fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institute where he analyzed and wrote about energy policy. He has BA with distinction from Yale Univ…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks about the April 2024 preprint The Genetic Origin of the Indo-Europeans. This blockbuster publication introduces nearly 300 new ancient DNA samples, uncovers the origins of the Yamnaya, and delves into how they transformed the genetic and cultural landscape of Eurasia ~5,000 years ago. Razib addre…

On this unusual “from the vault” episode of Unsupervised Learning, Razib talks to John Massey, a retired Australian engineer who has been a long-time correspondent. Massey and Razib recorded this podcast in the spring of 2021, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. At that time, Australia and China were enacting strict lockdowns to halt the spread…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Colin Wright, a returning guest, host of the Reality’s Last Stand Substack and a fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Before digging deep into the biology of sex and the cultural politics of gender ideology, Razib and Wright touch on what’s been happening to Jonathan Pruitt, Wright’s erstwhile a…

In this episode, we discuss how to facilitate discussions about reproductive choices. In this conversation, we are joined by Genetic Counsellor from The University of Cape Town, Tina Wessels, Director of ARC (Antenatal Results and Choices), Jane Fisher, and Emilia Bijsma from Leiden University Medical Centre.…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to George Washington University archaeologist Eric Cline. The author of 1177 B.C. - The Year Civilization Collapsed, Cline has a new book out, After 1177 B.C. - The Survival of Civilizations. While 1177 B.C. closed with the end of the first global civilization, that of the Eastern Mediterranean a…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Kristian Kristiansen, an archaeologist at the University of Gothenburg and affiliate professor at the Lundbech Center for Geogenetics, Copenhagen University. A past guest on this podcast, Kristiansen has recently contributed to an astonishing lineup of landmark papers published in Nature just …

Today on Unsupervised Learning, Razib talks to long-time podcast favorite Samo Burja. Burja is the founder of Bismarck Analysis and Bismarck Brief, a Research Fellow at the Long Now Foundation and The Foresight Institute. He is also now the chair of the editorial board of Palladium Magazine. Already a four-time guest on Unsupervised Learning (he ha…

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Steve Hsu, physicist, entrepreneur and public intellectual. Hsu is an Iowan who earned his undergraduate degree from Caltech and his Ph.D. from Berkeley. Later he was a Harvard Junior Fellow, before moving on to professorships at Yale and the University of Oregon, and finally settling down at …

In this episode, we discuss migration and how it influences our practice. In this conversation, we are joined by Genetic Counsellor and researcher, Milena Paneque, Adjunct Assistant Lecturer at University Hospital Linköping, Rebeka Pestoff, and Umut Fahrioglu, Director and Genetic counsellor at Agiomix.…

Today Razib talks to Murtaza Hussain about the social, cultural and political context of recent fissures in the US around the conflict in Israel and Gaza. Hussain is a reporter at The Intercept and has his own Substack. They begin their conversation talking about Hussain’s response to the 10/7 Hamas attacks on Israel, and Israel’s subsequent invasi…