Best Machine Learning Street Talk Podcasts (2025)

1
Prof. Randall Balestriero - LLMs without pretraining and SSL 34:30

3d ago34:30

34:30

Randall Balestriero joins the show to discuss some counterintuitive findings in AI. He shares research showing that huge language models, even when started from scratch (randomly initialized) without massive pre-training, can learn specific tasks like sentiment analysis surprisingly well, train stably, and avoid severe overfitting, sometimes matchi…

1
The Surprising Science of Six-Figure Thinking 1:06:00

1h ago1:06:00

1:06:00

#602: Ever looked back at an old Facebook post and cringed? According to Olga Khazan, staff writer at The Atlantic, that discomfort is evidence of something powerful: your personality has changed, even if you didn't notice it happening. In our latest episode, Khazan, who recently wrote a book on the science of personality change, breaks down how ou…

1
Q&A: The Stock Market Sucks. Is Private Equity Any Better? 56:53

5d ago56:53

56:53

#601: Nick and his wife have $100,000 to invest, but they’re worried about the volatility of the current stock market. Should they look into alternative investments such as private equity? Even though Roth IRAs come with tax-free withdrawals in retirement, Josh is worried about his tax bracket going up and neutralizing the benefits. Is he right to …

1
Mini-Retirements Are the New Early Retirement – with Mom of Six, Jillian Johnsrud 1:43:09

8d ago1:43:09

1:43:09

#600: Jillian Johnsrud was falling apart. After suffering a miscarriage, she couldn't pull herself together to return to her job as a youth pastor in DC. She decided to take a month off. That unexpected break became Jillian's first "mini-retirement" — a deliberate step away from work for at least 30 days to focus on something meaningful. Today, Jil…

1
Q&A: Retirement Math That Actually Works; Cashing In on the World Cup; and Why Your Parents' Housing Advice Is Wrong 1:18:07

12d ago1:18:07

1:18:07

#599: Becky and her husband are about to semi-retire. But the four percent retirement withdrawal rule doesn’t make sense for them. Are there other financial frameworks they should explore? Kris is excited about a potential boost in local real estate values when the World Cup comes to town. Will this have any significant impacts on his property? Pey…

1
Tax Strategies You Might Be Missing, with Natalie Kolodij 1:31:42

14d ago1:31:42

1:31:42

#598: Tax day is approaching, and if you're like most people, you might be overlooking deductions that could save you money. In our latest podcast episode, tax strategist Natalie Kolodij joins us to reveal common tax misconceptions and share strategies that could potentially lower your tax bill. "The tax code is 70,000 pages," Natalie explains. "Th…

1
Are We Heading for a Recession?, with Bob Elliott, former Head of Ray Dalio’s Investment Team at World's Largest Hedge Fund 1:27:59

19d ago1:27:59

1:27:59

#597: A recession is coming, and it might be worse than most people expect. That's the sobering assessment from Bob Elliott, former Head of Ray Dalio's Investment Team at Bridgewater Associates, when he joins us on the podcast. Bob explains that several economic factors are converging to create challenging conditions. The combination of current tra…

1
How Machines Learn to Ignore the Noise (Kevin Ellis + Zenna Tavares) 1:16:55

18d ago1:16:55

1:16:55

Prof. Kevin Ellis and Dr. Zenna Tavares talk about making AI smarter, like humans. They want AI to learn from just a little bit of information by actively trying things out, not just by looking at tons of data. They discuss two main ways AI can "think": one way is like following specific rules or steps (like a computer program), and the other is mo…

1
First Friday: Tariffs Grab Headlines, But These Financial Changes Nobody Is Talking About Will Impact You Too 59:18

23d ago59:18

59:18

#596: Yesterday, the White House rolled out the biggest tariffs in a century, sending markets into their worst decline since the pandemic. While headlines focus on supply chains and inflation, there are important economic stories you're not hearing about. During the first half of this month's First Friday episode, we dig into what nobody's talking …

1
Eiso Kant (CTO poolside) - Superhuman Coding Is Coming! 1:36:28

24d ago1:36:28

1:36:28

Eiso Kant, CTO of poolside AI, discusses the company's approach to building frontier AI foundation models, particularly focused on software development. Their unique strategy is reinforcement learning from code execution feedback which is an important axis for scaling AI capabilities beyond just increasing model size or data volume. Kant predicts h…

1
Q&A: The Scary Shift from Saving to — Gulp! — Actually Spending Your Money 1:05:06

26d ago1:05:06

1:05:06

#595: Eva is finally closing in on her financial independence goals, but she’s grappling with how to make a smooth transition from accumulation to decumulation. What should she consider? John has noticed a game-changing omission from recent discussions about traditional versus Roth IRAs. Is this as big of a deal as he thinks it is? An anonymous cal…

1
The Compendium - Connor Leahy and Gabriel Alfour 1:37:10

27d ago1:37:10

1:37:10

Connor Leahy and Gabriel Alfour, AI researchers from Conjecture and authors of "The Compendium," joinus for a critical discussion centered on Artificial Superintelligence (ASI) safety and governance. Drawing from their comprehensive analysis in "The Compendium," they articulate a stark warning about the existential risks inherent in uncontrolled AI…

1
How to Travel on $75 Per Day, with Nomadic Matt Kepnes 1:15:25

29d ago1:15:25

1:15:25

#594: Ever wonder if you could afford to travel for months at a time? According to Nomadic Matt, who's visited more than 100 countries over the last 19 years, you can see the world on just $75 a day. That's about $27,375 per year, less than many people's current cost of living. Matt Kepnes, better known as Nomadic Matt, joins us to challenge common…

1
Q&A: You Made a Money Mistake. Now What? 1:01:27

1M ago1:01:27

1:01:27

#593: An anonymous caller is brooding over a mistake he made in 2023 when he decided to contribute to his Roth instead of a pre-tax account. How does he get over this? June is annoyed that she triggered short-term capital gains and wash sales when she sold assets in her taxable brokerage last year. How does she avoid these issues in the future? Zer…

1
ARC Prize v2 Launch! (Francois Chollet and Mike Knoop) 54:15

1M ago54:15

54:15

We are joined by Francois Chollet and Mike Knoop, to launch the new version of the ARC prize! In version 2, the challenges have been calibrated with humans such that at least 2 humans could solve each task in a reasonable task, but also adversarially selected so that frontier reasoning models can't solve them. The best LLMs today get negligible per…

1
Test-Time Adaptation: the key to reasoning with DL (Mohamed Osman) 1:03:36

1M ago1:03:36

1:03:36

Mohamed Osman joins to discuss MindsAI's highest scoring entry to the ARC challenge 2024 and the paradigm of test-time fine-tuning. They explore how the team, now part of Tufa Labs in Zurich, achieved state-of-the-art results using a combination of pre-training techniques, a unique meta-learning strategy, and an ensemble voting mechanism. Mohamed e…

1
Why Your Brain Rewards You for Avoiding Your Boss, with Dr. Joel Salinas 1:28:41

1M ago1:28:41

1:28:41

#592: Ever wonder what's happening in your brain right before you knock on your boss's door to ask for a raise? Dr. Joel Salinas, neurologist and brain health expert, joins us to explain the neurology of negotiation. When you avoid difficult conversations, your brain actually rewards you with a small dopamine hit. That temporary relief feels good, …

1
GSMSymbolic paper - Iman Mirzadeh (Apple) 1:11:23

1M ago1:11:23

1:11:23

Iman Mirzadeh from Apple, who recently published the GSM-Symbolic paper discusses the crucial distinction between intelligence and achievement in AI systems. He critiques current AI research methodologies, highlighting the limitations of Large Language Models (LLMs) in reasoning and knowledge representation. SPONSOR MESSAGES: *** Tufa AI Labs is a …

1
Reasoning, Robustness, and Human Feedback in AI - Max Bartolo (Cohere) 1:23:11

1M ago1:23:11

1:23:11

Dr. Max Bartolo from Cohere discusses machine learning model development, evaluation, and robustness. Key topics include model reasoning, the DynaBench platform for dynamic benchmarking, data-centric AI development, model training challenges, and the limitations of human feedback mechanisms. The conversation also covers technical aspects like influ…

1
The Hidden Tax of Avoiding Tough Conversations, with Harvard Law Senior Fellow Bob Bordone 1:49:23

1M ago1:49:23

1:49:23

#591: Imagine you're about to ask your boss for a raise. Your stomach tightens. You've rehearsed what to say, but doubt creeps in. Should you be more assertive? More understanding of company constraints? Bob Bordone, who has taught negotiation for 25 years including 21 years at Harvard Law School, joins us to explain why you don't have to choose be…

1
Small Cap Showdown! Paul Merriman vs. Dr. Karsten Jeske Battle … with Millions Hanging in the Balance 1:55:42

1M ago1:55:42

1:55:42

#590: In the left corner, we have Paul Merriman, the seasoned finance veteran weighing in at 183 pounds. In the right corner, Dr. Karsten Jeske, the scrappy newcomer at 208 pounds. The bell rings, and the small cap value debate begins. This episode features a financial boxing match between two investment heavyweights with dramatically different per…

1
Tau Language: The Software Synthesis Future (sponsored) 1:41:19

1M ago1:41:19

1:41:19

This sponsored episode features mathematician Ohad Asor discussing logical approaches to AI, focusing on the limitations of machine learning and introducing the Tau language for software development and blockchain tech. Asor argues that machine learning cannot guarantee correctness. Tau allows logical specification of software requirements, automat…

1
Q&A: How Much Risk Should My Mom Take in Retirement? 56:13

2M ago56:13

56:13

#589: Kimmy is worried that her mom’s retirement portfolio is invested too conservatively. Is she right to advise her to take on more risk? Peyton has heard the financial advice about staying away from Whole Life Insurance as an investment, but what about as a savings account for children? Is there good a use case for this? Jeff and his wife are in…

1
John Palazza - Vice President of Global Sales @ CentML ( sponsored) 54:50

2M ago54:50

54:50

John Palazza from CentML joins us in this sponsored interview to discuss the critical importance of infrastructure optimization in the age of Large Language Models and Generative AI. We explore how enterprises can transition from the innovation phase to production and scale, highlighting the significance of efficient GPU utilization and cost manage…

1
Transformers Need Glasses! - Federico Barbero 1:00:54

2M ago1:00:54

1:00:54

Federico Barbero (DeepMind/Oxford) is the lead author of "Transformers Need Glasses!". Have you ever wondered why LLMs struggle with seemingly simple tasks like counting or copying long strings of text? We break down the theoretical reasons behind these failures, revealing architectural bottlenecks and the challenges of maintaining information fide…

1
First Friday: The Economic Maze We're Navigating Together 36:22

2M ago36:22

36:22

#588: Jobs are growing, interest rates are holding, and your student loan options just hit pause. Welcome to this month's economic rollercoaster. The economy is sending mixed messages this month. We added 151,000 new jobs in February, slightly better than January's 143,000. But unemployment ticked up to 4.1 percent. Health care is booming (52,000 n…

1
Q&A: Should You Cash Out Your ETFs? The Hidden Consequences of That Decision … 1:07:24

2M ago1:07:24

1:07:24

#587: Debi is stressed about saving a down payment to buy a house in her high-cost-of-living area. Should she cash out her brokerage account to speed up the process? Lucas and his wife are high earners, but they’re tired and ready for a change. What strategies can they use to maximize their investments and confidently step away from their jobs? Gra…

1
Sakana AI - Chris Lu, Robert Tjarko Lange, Cong Lu 1:37:54

2M ago1:37:54

1:37:54

We speak with Sakana AI, who are building nature-inspired methods that could fundamentally transform how we develop AI systems. The guests include Chris Lu, a researcher who recently completed his DPhil at Oxford University under Prof. Jakob Foerster's supervision, where he focused on meta-learning and multi-agent systems. Chris is the first author…

1
Money Doubles Every 10 Years (and Most People Never Notice!), with Scott Yamamura 1:15:44

2M ago1:15:44

1:15:44

#586: If you are a complete beginner at finances, or if you know someone who is, this episode is for you. The biggest hurdle for beginners? Money seems complex and intimidating. But Scott Yamamura, author of Financial Epiphany, explains personal finance doesn't have to be complicated. He breaks compound interest into three easy-to-grasp frameworks:…

1
Q&A: The Hidden Tax Drain in Your Investment Strategy 55:51

2M ago55:51

55:51

#585: Michael rebalances his portfolio every year. But he’s worried that triggering capital gains taxes on his brokerage account will cancel out the benefits of reallocation. Is there a better approach? Sam has an opportunity to switch jobs, but she’s confused about how an Employee Stock Ownership Plan stacks against her current employer’s 401(k). …

1
Sahil Bloom: Which of the Five Wealth Types Are You Neglecting? 1:22:47

2M ago1:22:47

1:22:47

#584: Think about how you spend an average day. Would the 10-year-old version of yourself be impressed? What about the 90-year-old version? These two powerful questions frame our conversation with Sahil Bloom, founder and managing partner of an early-stage venture fund with investments in over 60 startups and author of The Curiosity Chronicle, a ne…

1
Clement Bonnet - Can Latent Program Networks Solve Abstract Reasoning? 51:26

2M ago51:26

51:26

Clement Bonnet discusses his novel approach to the ARC (Abstraction and Reasoning Corpus) challenge. Unlike approaches that rely on fine-tuning LLMs or generating samples at inference time, Clement's method encodes input-output pairs into a latent space, optimizes this representation with a search algorithm, and decodes outputs for new inputs. This…

1
Prof. Jakob Foerster - ImageNet Moment for Reinforcement Learning? 53:31

2M ago53:31

53:31

Prof. Jakob Foerster, a leading AI researcher at Oxford University and Meta, and Chris Lu, a researcher at OpenAI -- they explain how AI is moving beyond just mimicking human behaviour to creating truly intelligent agents that can learn and solve problems on their own. Foerster champions open-source AI for responsible, decentralised development. He…

1
Q&A: Everyone Is Arguing About Roth IRAs And We Have Thoughts 1:07:50

2M ago1:07:50

1:07:50

#583: Contrary to recent discussions, Jesse has concluded that a traditional IRA is the smarter way to go for most people once marginal tax rates are factored in. Is he missing something? An anonymous caller is four years away from early retirement but she’s unsure if her portfolio allocations are in the right place. How and when should she start c…

1
The Marriage Contract You Never Saw (But Can't Escape), with Harvard Law Alum Aaron Thomas 1:33:52

2M ago1:33:52

1:33:52

#582: They had it all. Six thriving children. A 40-year marriage. A household income of $200,000. Then in her 60s, she discovered a shocking truth: he had gambled away their entire retirement savings in penny stocks. She had no access to their financial accounts during the marriage. After divorcing, she was left with nearly nothing. Today, she reli…

1
Daniel Franzen & Jan Disselhoff - ARC Prize 2024 winners 1:09:04

2M ago1:09:04

1:09:04

Daniel Franzen and Jan Disselhoff, the "ARChitects" are the official winners of the ARC Prize 2024. Filmed at Tufa Labs in Zurich - they revealed how they achieved a remarkable 53.5% accuracy by creatively utilising large language models (LLMs) in new ways. Discover their innovative techniques, including depth-first search for token selection, test…

1
Sepp Hochreiter - LSTM: The Comeback Story? 1:07:01

2M ago1:07:01

1:07:01

Sepp Hochreiter, the inventor of LSTM (Long Short-Term Memory) networks – a foundational technology in AI. Sepp discusses his journey, the origins of LSTM, and why he believes his latest work, XLSTM, could be the next big thing in AI, particularly for applications like robotics and industrial simulation. He also shares his controversial perspective…

1
When Disaster Hits Home – Literally 57:41

2M ago57:41

57:41

#581: Today's question is different. There's something special about it — and you'll understand why in a moment. An 84-year-old listener left us a voicemail about his struggle to break free from mortgage debt. He and his 83-year-old wife need to move from their two-story townhouse because they can’t climb the stairs any longer. They found a single-…

1
Want to Understand Neural Networks? Think Elastic Origami! - Prof. Randall Balestriero 1:18:10

3M ago1:18:10

1:18:10

Professor Randall Balestriero joins us to discuss neural network geometry, spline theory, and emerging phenomena in deep learning, based on research presented at ICML. Topics include the delayed emergence of adversarial robustness in neural networks ("grokking"), geometric interpretations of neural networks via spline theory, and challenges in reco…

1
Treasury Tantrums, Arctic Routes, and McKinley's Ghost 1:01:33

3M ago1:01:33

1:01:33

#580: "If you want to understand what's happening in the economy, look at bonds," begins today's episode, where we explore how the bond market acts as a crystal ball for economic trends. The bond market has been sending some clear signals lately. Interest rates remain elevated, with 10-year Treasury yields about 1 percent higher than their Septembe…

1
Q&A: Two Weeks Until My Tenants Move In And I Have Nowhere to Go 1:04:02

3M ago1:04:02

1:04:02

#579: Todd is in a real estate bind. He found out six days before closing on a new home that it wasn’t legally sellable. And renters are moving into his current home in two weeks. What should he do? Anonymous is excited about expanding her real estate portfolio. Should she sell her $2.5 million rental property in the Bay Area to do this, or can she…

1
The Hidden Cost of Playing It Safe With Money, with Dr. Margie Warrell 1:16:01

3M ago1:16:01

1:16:01

#578: Fear blocks smart money moves. Ask Harvard Business Review advisor Dr. Margie Warrell, who guides Fortune 500 companies through strategic risk-taking. Her client roster includes NASA, Morgan Stanley, and Google. Her understanding of courage started at home. Her 13-year-old daughter landed an Australian TV role. She flew to LA for acting class…

1
Q&A: The Efficient Frontier Was Perfect Until HR Got Involved 1:03:15

3M ago1:03:15

1:03:15

#577: Kelsey is excited about investing along the efficient frontier, but it feels impossible with the lack of fund options in her employer-sponsored 401k. What’s the best way to deal with this problem? Molly discovered that her rollover from a 401k to a traditional IRA hadn’t been invested in mutual funds and was still in a money market fund. Manu…

1
Nicholas Carlini (Google DeepMind) 1:21:15

3M ago1:21:15

1:21:15

Nicholas Carlini from Google DeepMind offers his view of AI security, emergent LLM capabilities, and his groundbreaking model-stealing research. He reveals how LLMs can unexpectedly excel at tasks like chess and discusses the security pitfalls of LLM-generated code. SPONSOR MESSAGES: *** CentML offers competitive pricing for GenAI model deployment,…

1
The World's Richest People Are Weird by Design, with William Green 1:25:26

3M ago1:25:26

1:25:26

#576: The world's greatest investors have a secret: they're weird. When one young fund manager met Bill Miller for the first time, he refused to shake hands. Instead, he locked eyes and declared: "I'm going to beat you, man." William Green joins us to share what he's learned from decades of conversations with investing legends — from the hyper-comp…

1
Subbarao Kambhampati - Do o1 models search? 1:32:13

3M ago1:32:13

1:32:13

Join Prof. Subbarao Kambhampati and host Tim Scarfe for a deep dive into OpenAI's O1 model and the future of AI reasoning systems. * How O1 likely uses reinforcement learning similar to AlphaGo, with hidden reasoning tokens that users pay for but never see * The evolution from traditional Large Language Models to more sophisticated reasoning system…

1
Q&A: The Roth Decision at Every Income Level (And Why It Matters Now!) 1:19:12

3M ago1:19:12

1:19:12

#575: Apar’s income has more than doubled after he started his own business. His advisor recommends Roth contributions but he’s skeptical due to his high income. Who’s right? Keith is frustrated by the conflicting advice he’s heard about Roth conversions. Is it better to do it while he’s young and earning a lower income, or should he wait until clo…

1
How Do AI Models Actually Think? - Laura Ruis 1:18:01

3M ago1:18:01

1:18:01

Laura Ruis, a PhD student at University College London and researcher at Cohere, explains her groundbreaking research into how large language models (LLMs) perform reasoning tasks, the fundamental mechanisms underlying LLM reasoning capabilities, and whether these models primarily rely on retrieval or develop procedural knowledge. SPONSOR MESSAGES:…

1
The Hidden Psychology of Financial Pressure, with Dr. Sunita Sah 1:31:22

3M ago1:31:22

1:31:22

#574: What would you do if someone in authority told you to do something that felt wrong? Most of us like to think we'd speak up, push back, stand our ground. But research tells a very different story. In fact, when Yale researchers conducted a famous experiment in the 1960s, they found that 65% of people would administer what they believed to be d…

1
Jurgen Schmidhuber on Humans co-existing with AIs 1:12:50

3M ago1:12:50

1:12:50

Jürgen Schmidhuber, the father of generative AI, challenges current AI narratives, revealing that early deep learning work is in his opinion misattributed, where it actually originated in Ukraine and Japan. He discusses his early work on linear transformers and artificial curiosity which preceded modern developments, shares his expansive vision of …

Podcasts Worth a Listen

Machine Learning Street Talk Podcasts

Podcasts Worth a Listen