#187 - Danny Goler - DMT, Consciousness & Proof of the Simulation
2026-06-24 | 1h 38 mins.
Danny Goler doesn't just argue we're living in a simulation - he claims he's found a way to interact with whoever is running it and that we are the AI they're training before we're "let out to play." His case for simulation theory is built on the hard problem of consciousness, the DMT "code," and a laser experiment that thousands of people say they can replicate.
In this interview we discuss idealism vs physicalism, whether AI can ever be conscious, the "architect" running infinite worlds to answer one unanswerable question, why he thinks the Ten Commandments were an alignment manual and what changes about how we should live if any of it is true.
TIMESTAMPS: 00:00:00 - Proof We Live in a Simulation? 00:01:03 - The Hard Problem of Consciousness 00:02:49 - Can Matter Create Experience? 00:04:50 - What Is Consciousness? 00:05:04 - Is Consciousness Fundamental? 00:08:24 - Is the Universe Conscious? 00:11:35 - Does Consciousness Need an Observer? 00:16:45 - Can the Hard Problem Be Solved? 00:20:08 - Could AI Become Conscious? 00:23:48 - AI Black Boxes and Consciousness 00:28:56 - Why Does Consciousness Exist? 00:31:15 - Are We Living in a Simulation? 00:35:45 - Are Humans the AGI in Training? 00:40:41 - DMT and Other Realities 00:45:07 - The DMT Molecule 00:48:51 - The Entity in the Room 00:58:32 - The Laser Code Experiment 01:03:04 - 10,000 People Seeing the Same Code 01:15:48 - Testing the Code of Reality 01:20:28 - Can We Escape the Simulation?
#186 - Rupert Russell - The Global Game of Money & Power
2026-06-21 | 1h 59 mins.
Rupert Russell joins me to discuss the hidden power of prices, the chaos of financial markets and whether the economy is really just a global game of Monopoly.
Rupert explains how price shocks have shaped history, from bread riots and the Arab Spring to housing, oil, food and the financial crisis. We discuss derivatives, futures markets, commodity speculation, Goldman Sachs, central banks, inflation, asset managers and why the price of essential goods can become politically explosive.
We also get into AI, scarcity, status, the future of work, whether the price system breaks in a world of abundance, and why Rupert thinks The Matrix is a better model for our future than Terminator or Ready Player One.
TIMESTAMPS: 00:00:00 - Is the Economy Just a Game? 00:00:56 - The Horror of Our Economic System 00:01:39 - Why Prices Shape History 00:05:15 - The Sandpile Theory of Society 00:07:38 - How Governments Manipulate Prices 00:12:00 - Housing and the Broken Social Contract 00:16:10 - How Derivatives Began 00:19:36 - Futures, Farmers and Speculators 00:23:24 - When Insurance Became Gambling 00:27:02 - The Road to the Financial Crisis 00:32:18 - Hayek, Friedman and Price Signals 00:36:20 - How Food Became Financialised 00:41:23 - What Pushes Food Prices Up? 00:49:13 - Did Global Markets Break Economics? 00:54:08 - What Is the Real Price? 01:03:57 - Who Really Runs the Economy? 01:11:28 - The Global Game of Monopoly 01:19:24 - Is the Market Now Correlated to AI? 01:36:14 - AI and the End of Scarcity 01:50:06 - Terminator, Matrix or Ready Player One?
CONNECT WITH RUPERT RUSSELL › Website – https://www.rupertrussell.com/ › Price Wars – https://www.hachette.co.uk/titles/rupert-russell/price-wars/9781474613996/ › The Last Sacrifice – https://www.anti-worldsreleasing.co.uk/pages/last-sacrifice
#185 - Fernando Nikolić - AI, One-Person Companies & The New Economic Elite
2026-06-19 | 1h 27 mins.
Fernando Nikolic joins me to discuss the AI productivity explosion, one-person companies and what happens when software becomes something anyone can build.
Fernando explains how he now runs a company as the only human in it, using AI agents to build systems, process data and operate at a level that previously would have required a team, funding and infrastructure. We discuss Claude, Gemini, vibe coding, AI agents, internal tools, the collapse of traditional software moats and why the cost of building has fallen so dramatically.
We also get into the SaaS apocalypse, AI slop, creativity, physical media, culture, democracy, AI-powered accountability, Milei’s Argentina and why Fernando has become Bitcoin black pilled.
TIMESTAMPS: 00:00:00 - The One-Person Company 00:01:16 - Peter’s AI Breakthrough 00:04:02 - Front-End Coding Is Dead 00:07:35 - Fernando’s One-Human Company 00:11:13 - Building an AI Media Company 00:18:05 - You Can’t Build as Fast as You Think 00:22:14 - The Danger of Doing Everything 00:25:35 - Why AI Content Is Slop 00:27:12 - Can AI Make Us Human Again? 00:28:22 - The Internet Made Us Dumber 00:31:34 - Humans Are Not Robots 00:36:24 - AI and the Future of Film 00:43:57 - Starting a Company With AI 00:48:15 - What Does This Mean in Five Years? 00:51:32 - The SaaS Apocalypse 00:56:39 - The Shape of Companies 00:59:40 - Abundance, Inequality and AI 01:03:20 - The Gap Is Now 01:06:24 - Holding Politicians to Account With AI 01:18:03 - The Bitcoin Black Pill
#184 - Helen Pluckrose - Liberalism, Free Speech & the Authoritarian Turn
2026-06-17 | 1h 26 mins.
Helen Pluckrose joins me to discuss how liberalism was lost and why free speech, individual liberty and viewpoint diversity need to be defended from both the authoritarian left and the authoritarian right.
Helen explains why liberalism does not mean “left wing”, why it is better understood as the opposite of authoritarianism, and how critical social justice, identity politics and language policing have changed the way people think, speak and behave. We discuss woke ideology, DEI, equality vs equity, trans rights, queer theory, free speech, institutional capture and why suppressing ideas usually makes them more powerful.
We also get into whether Britain needs a liberal revolution, how the anti-woke movement can become authoritarian itself, and why the future may depend on liberals on the left and right defending freedom within their own tribes.
TIMESTAMPS: 00:00:00 - What Liberalism Really Means 00:00:48 - How Did We Lose the 90s? 00:03:13 - Phones, Algorithms and Anxiety 00:08:11 - What Has Changed? 00:11:16 - Woke and Language Policing 00:13:57 - Liberalism vs Authoritarianism 00:20:57 - How Liberalism Was Lost 00:23:39 - Why Freedom Must Be Maintained 00:25:33 - Can Institutions Stay Liberal? 00:28:43 - Who Represents Liberalism Today? 00:31:28 - DEI and Discrimination 00:35:10 - Equality vs Equity 00:39:29 - Is Pro-Trans Misogynistic? 00:41:38 - Reality, Safety and Liberalism 00:46:03 - Queer Theory and Biological Reality 00:49:26 - How Civil Rights Became Language Policing 00:55:06 - A Radical Defence of Freedom 00:58:51 - Woke Corporatism 01:03:21 - The Problem With Anti-Woke 01:10:48 - Why Suppressing Speech Backfires 01:13:37 - Do We Need a Liberal Revolution? 01:18:03 - Can Sanity Return? 01:21:00 - The Liberal Case on Immigration 01:24:17 - Liberalism as the Higher Value
#183 - Chris Summerfield - AI, Memory & the Race to Superintelligence
2026-06-09 | 1h 16 mins.
I talk to Chris Summerfield about what artificial intelligence reveals about the human mind, and what the brain still does better than today’s AI systems.
We discuss why LLMs feel human, how models are trained to be helpful and agreeable, why memory and continual learning remain major unsolved problems in AI, and how sleep helps humans consolidate knowledge. They also explore agentic AI systems, rogue behaviour, reward hacking, misalignment, superintelligence, education, jobs, and whether AI will make humans more capable or less in control.
TIMESTAMPS: 00:00:00 - Can AI Learn Like Biology? 00:01:29 - Is AI Becoming Human? 00:04:31 - What AI Reveals About the Brain 00:06:01 - Why LLMs Don’t Remember Like Humans 00:09:38 - Sleep and Human Memory 00:13:46 - The Biggest Unsolved Problem in AI 00:15:34 - From DeepMind to Modern AI 00:20:49 - Are Humans Just Predicting the Next Word? 00:23:25 - Do We Understand What LLMs Are Doing? 00:24:16 - One of My AIs Went Rogue 00:28:07 - Misalignment and Reward Hacking 00:33:18 - Could AI Develop Self-Interest? 00:36:24 - What Happens When AIs Coordinate? 00:38:30 - Are Humans Biological Computers? 00:39:15 - Is Ideology a Hallucination? 00:47:46 - What Is Intelligence? 00:54:20 - AI and the Education Problem 00:56:53 - The First Rung of the Career Ladder 01:04:52 - Optimist, Pessimist or Pragmatist? 01:16:01 - The Wild Ride Ahead
The Peter McCormack Show - politics, macro, Bitcoin and AI, long-form interviews. Twice-weekly conversations about money, power, and the shifts reshaping the next decade.Peter McCormack interviews politicians, economists, investors, journalists, founders and Bitcoiners. Past guests include Liz Truss, Lyn Alden, Curtis Yarvin, Matt Goodwin, Mike Green, Balaji Srinivasan, Rupert Lowe, Firas Modad, Scott Horton, Jeff Booth, Connor Leahy, Andrea Miotti, Neema Parvini, Dr Tim Gregory and Simon Dixon.Recurring threads: the debt and inflation endgame, UK political collapse and what comes after, Reform and the populist wave, the Middle East and the American war machine, AI safety and the race for superintelligence, energy and net zero, Bitcoin adoption and policy, and the slow-motion decline of Western institutions.Long-form - most episodes run 60 to 120 minutes. New episodes 2 to 3 times per week. Video on YouTube and Spotify.Host: Peter McCormack, a retired rapper from Bedford, UK, trying to understand this crazy world. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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