Anatomy of Next

Latest Episodes:

Gabriel Licina // Biohackers Jan 09, 2019

Show notes

In this supplemental episode we sit back down with biologist Gabriel Licina, founder of Sci-House, a small nonprofit running community education, outreach, and research in synthetic biology. Gabriel unpacks the term "biohacker," and expands on both his work and some of the applications in synthetic biology we'll be using on Mars.

NEW WORLD #6 — Alien Ecology Jan 04, 2019

Show notes

Anatomy of Next returns, and we design the Martian forests and fields. We've built an atmosphere on Mars, warmed the planet, and jumpstarted it's hydrologic cycle — from a frozen, irradiated desert to thunderstorms on a warm equator. Now, what about life? How do you grow crops on sterile, toxic soil with limited carbon and nitrogen? We talk to experts in microbiology and genetic engineering, and we start our work on ecohacking the once red — now blue — Planet Mars.

Jamie Hyneman // Eureka deconstructed Oct 21, 2018

Show notes

Invention proceeds from ideation, but where do ideas come from? Jamie Hyneman is best known for his work on the Discovery Channel TV show Mythbusters, which he hosted for 14 and a half years. Prior to that he ran a special effects shop in San Francisco for decades, inventing work on over 800 commercials and dozens of feature films. He’s made a career of building new things. We talked about how.

Maisie Williams // Art, identity, and this is your brain on Twitter Oct 02, 2018

Show notes

Separate from the question of how to build a world is the question of what makes a world worth living in. Let’s talk about art. Maisie Williams is an actor most commonly known for her performance in Game of Thrones, and cofounder of a new startup called Daisie. She wants to help artists find each other and build careers. We talked about the changing nature of artistic collaboration, social media, fame, and identity.

Dan Kaminsky // Security Aug 29, 2018

Show notes

In an age of digital identity, how do we protect ourselves in an increasingly insecure world? In 2008, Dan Kaminsky identified a critical flaw in the internet’s Domain Name System (DNS) and led the largest synchronized fix to the internet’s infrastructure of all time. Today, he’s Chief Scientist and cofounder of White Ops. Topics include: the great cities of the world that were proven vulnerable, and burned to the ground, computer worms, why it’s easier than ever to hit the WHOLE world with an attack, crypto’s role in proliferating these attacks, evil hacking as a kind of mind control!, how – in the context of Mars – to start over and get security right, and building an elite team of security hackers dedicated to fighting crime and fixing bugs around the world.

Barbara Moreau // Raising astronauts Aug 13, 2018

Show notes

Nothing can be achieved without some convincing that it’s possible – we need to be inspired. Barbara Moreau was my third grade teacher, and one of the most decorated leaders of the Young Astronaut Council, a United States education initiative focused on fostering interest in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). Mrs. Moreau contextualized my early space traveling dreams in reality, and taught all of her students that the exploration and colonization of new worlds was not only possible but necessary. More than twenty years later, we talked about the program that changed my life, how teachers might inspire children toward great pursuits today, and what it was like watching the first moon landing.

Nick Bostrom // Superbrains and simulated worlds Jul 29, 2018

Show notes

What happens when the most intelligent being on earth is smarter than the average human by an order of magnitude? Dr. Nick Bostrom is Director of the University of Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute and author of Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies. We talked about the dramatic amplification of human, or machine intelligence – what that hypothetical superintelligence would look like, how we might build it, and what it could mean for the human race.

George Church // Genetically modified everything Jul 16, 2018

Show notes

Dr. George Church leads Synthetic Biology at Harvard’s Wyss Institute. Author of Regenesis: How Synthetic Biology Will Reinvent Nature and Ourselves, he is one of the foremost thinkers in biological self-determination. Could we take control of our genome, and direct its evolution? Should we? In our conversation we explored genetic engineering broadly, as “the nanotechnology that works,” the morality of this technology, and the future of the field.

Stuart Armstrong // Dyson swarms and death rays Jul 02, 2018

Show notes

Dr. Stuart Armstrong researches the potential for intelligent life across the universe. In this work, he’s speculated on the kinds of engineering we should expect from an advanced civilization, most commonly the Dyson structure. In our conversation we explored how a civilization might theoretically capture the entire energy output of a star, how we might build something like this ourselves, and how that energy might be used to warm – or vaporize – planetary objects in our solar system.

Chris McKay // What if there’s life on Mars? Jun 17, 2018

Show notes

Let’s talk about the ethics of terraforming. Dr. Chris McKay is a Senior Scientist at NASA Ames Research Center’s Planetary Systems Branch and is actively involved in the planning of future Mars missions. If we encounter alien life on another world, what is our moral responsibility to that life, and how do we balance this responsibility with exploration and colonization?

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