Is this the year of agentic AI?
In this week's episode of Modem Future Sean Leahy and I dive into a bunch of AI-related stuff, starting with Sam Altman's start-of-the-year reflections on AGI, AI agents, and "superintelligence"
For the last few episodes of Modem Futura, Sean Leahy and I have had the pleasure of hosting a series of fantastic guests. But for the first show that we recorded in 2025 we were back in the recording studio with just the two of us. And it felt good (as you can probably tell from the cold-open banter).
This episode airs today, and in it we go wide and deep in our discussion on AI, sparked by Sam Altman’s reflections for the new year.
If you’re a regular listener to the podcast you’ll be used to our often-serendipitous conversations that go in unexpected and intriguing directions. And this week’s episode is no exception.
Kicking off with Altman’s reflection, the conversations wends round AGI, AI agents, digital personas, synthetic people, the “dead internet,” and much more — touching on “superintelligence” along the way (somehow we get into talking about Facebook at one point!).
I hope you can join us — this was an enjoyable episode to record, and as always I felt like I came away with my brain sparkling with new ideas and insights as a result.1
As usual you can catch the full episode above, or wherever you get your podcasts (including, of course, Apple Podcasts).
And as with other episodes, you can also see as well as listen to us over on over the Modem Futura YouTube channel:
If you’re enjoying these conversations on Modem Futura, please don’t forget to subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts so you get new episodes delivered as they’re released.
And, of course, every rating or review helps us get better at what we’re doing — thanks in advance 😊
Through much of my career as an academic, one of the most important sources of ideas and insights has been in-person conversations with colleagues. This is where stuff that’s been swirling around my head begins to crystallize as I talk it through with others, and their perspectives and insights begin to mingle with and influence my own. And the best conversations are those that are playful and speculative, while being grounded in a solid and serious foundation of understanding. This very much describes the conversations Sean and I (and our guests) have when recording Modem Futura — it’s just that others get to listen in and, hopefully, get the same feelings of ideas crystallizing and evolving as they do. And there’s something special to me in this.