Dreaming Against the Machine
Dreaming Against the Machine is a podcast hosted by astrophysicist and journalist Dr. Adam Becker. Each week, Adam and a guest explore ideas about how to envision better, realistic, and equitable futures. The show aims to find hope in the current political moment through earnest conversations about what a good future might look like, pushing back against tech oligarchs' power fantasies.
Episodes
Episode 27: Eugenics, with Brandon Ogbunu
This week, Adam talks with biologist Brandon Ogbunu about the horrifying history of genetics, what it means for working geneticists and evolutionary biologists, and how culture shapes science (and vice versa).Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram • Subscribe to the show wherever you get y
Episode 26: Space Ain't the Place (solo episode)
This week it's just Adam! Following up on the space colonization episode from a few weeks back, Adam talks about exactly how horrifying and difficult it would be to live permanently in deep space. He also answers a couple of listener questions, talks a bit about the show itself, and reveals a special surprise for our Patreon supporters.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.co
Episode 25: Transhumanism and Faith, with Meghan O'Gieblyn
This week, Adam talks with author and essayist Meghan O'Gieblyn. They discuss her remarkable book, God Human Animal Machine, which is one of Adam's favorites. They also talk about what it means to be in the world, and the awareness it takes to write good sentences.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagr
Episode 24: The Myth of AI Doom, with Cal Newport
This week, Adam talks with computer scientist and author Cal Newport about the resurgent claims of AI doom in the news, where these ideas come from, and what we can do to shift the narrative around AI. (Also, they meant to talk about Cal's book Deep Work, but ran out of time.)Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky
Episode 23: Language Models, with Emily M. Bender
This week, Adam talks with linguist and AI critic Emily M. Bender. They talk about large language models, Emily's origin story, and the importance of parrot emojis. Read Emily's book The AI Con and listen to her podcast Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram •
Episode 22: Balancing on the Abyss, with Dave Karpf
This week, Adam and returning guest Dave Karpf talk about what it's like to gaze into the abyss of politics and tech as part of their jobs, and how to find balance and maintain their sanity while doing that work. Dave also talks about his work with the Sierra Club, and reveals his obsession with sandwiches. Read Dave's newsletter and preorder his new book now.Messages: • Suppor
Sharing a new series from Future Hindsight, Occupy! An Unfinished Uprising.
Occupy Wall Street is the story of the improbable becoming possible. In 2008, millions of people were devastated by an economic crash caused by Wall Street greed, but it wasn’t until 2011 that there was a mass response from the Left. A call to protest went out, and thousands of people responded. They raged against a system that was rigged against them and tried to create their own anti-ca
Episode 21: The AI Bubble, with Matt Scherer
This week, Adam talks with Matt Scherer about the AI bubble: what it is, why it's a bubble, what might happen when it pops, and what we can all do to prevent a bailout when it does pop. They also talk about Star Trek, because of course they do.Matt's report is here: https://www.openmarketsinstitute.org/publications/no-bailouts-for-big-tech-billionaires-policies-for-when-the-ai-bubble-burs
Episode 20: Resisting AI Data Centers, with Alli Finn and Matt Rodriguez
This week is a little bit different. Adam talks with Alli Finn and Matt Rodriguez about a very specific kind of better future: one with way fewer AI data centers. Alli and Matt explain why we should fight AI data center construction, how to fight it, and what you can do if there's already one in your city.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine&nbs
Episode 19: Space Colonization, with Lucian Walkowicz and Erika Nesvold
It's a triple astrophysicist episode! This week, Adam talks with Lucian Walkowicz and Erika Nesvold about why space colonization is a terrible idea, and what would be a better idea for the future. They also talk about science fiction (of course) and the danger of miscalibrated bummer meters.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follo
Episode 18: Science Policy, with Alondra Nelson
This week, Adam talks with Alondra Nelson, sociologist and former head of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy under Joe Biden. They talk about the destruction of scientific research in the US under Trump 2.0, what we can be hopeful about for the future, and Star Trek.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us
Episode 17: Weapons of Math Destruction, with Cathy O’Neil
This week, Adam’s guest is mathematician, algorithmic auditor, and author Cathy O’Neil. They talk about the uses and misuses of math and computer science, and what led both of them away from academic STEM into the wilds of tech ethics.More about Cathy and her books here. Cathy’s podcast is AI Skeptics, her consulting firm is ORCAA , and her nonprofit is OCEAN .The Multitude listener surve
Episode 16: What is Elon Musk? With Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff
This week's guests are historian Quinn Slobodian and writer Ben Tarnoff, authors of the new book Muskism: A Guide for the Perplexed. Adam talks with them about what Musk is, how he gained so much power, and what we can do to stop him.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram • Subscribe to th
Episode 15: Hopeful Science Fiction, with Becky Chambers
This week, Adam fanboys at Becky Chambers, author of the Wayfarers series and one of his favorite science fiction writers. They talk about imagining cozy futures, hopepunk, why space ain't the place, and big trees. Pre-order As You Wake, Break the Shell here. Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram&nb
Episode 14: Psychological Warfare, with Annalee Newitz
This week's guest is author and journalist Annalee Newitz, whose most recent nonfiction book, Stories are Weapons, is about the history of psychological warfare. Adam and Annalee discuss psyops, science fiction, the origin of the term "banana republic," and many other things along the way.Buy Stories are Weapons here:https://bookshop.org/p/books/stories-are-weapons-psychological-warfare-a
Episode 13: More Everything Forever, with Adam Becker
This week is a reversal: Adam is interviewed by Jack Stilgoe, professor of science and technology studies at University College London. Jack and his colleagues ask Adam about how he came to write his most recent book, what the process of writing it was like, and how things have changed since he wrote it.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine
Episode 12: The Cosmic Perspective, with Katie Mack
This week, Adam talks with Katie Mack, physicist and author, about feeling some type of way about the end of the universe. Along the way we also discuss illusions of control, entropy, and why it can be good to feel insignificant.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram • Subscribe to the sho
Episode 11: Reverse Centaurs and AI, with Cory Doctorow
This week, Adam talks with Cory Doctorow, author, blogger, and tech policy advocate. Cory explains why your boss wants to replace you with an AI, why that won't work, and why they're trying to do it anyhow -- and what you can do about it. Cory and Adam also talk about the AI bubble and how its myth of perpetual growth is fed by greed, along with some terrible misunderstandings of science
Episode 10: Better Off Regulated, with Ed Zitron
This week's guest is tech critic, podcaster, and professionally angry dude Ed Zitron. Adam asks Ed what things would have to happen for him to be less angry (mostly, regulating the tech industry). Along the way they also discuss the SpaceX IPO and why it's a scam, the absolute folly of data centers in space, and the bizarre financial vortex of Coreweave.Messages: • Support the
Episode 9: Algorithmic Bias, with Safiya Noble
This week, Adam talks with Safiya Noble, professor of social science at UCLA and author of Algorithms of Oppression. They talk about how algorithms reinscribe systemic biases, what a better tech industry might look like, and how we might get there.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram • S
Episode 8: Horrible Little Guys, with Isabel J. Kim and Amanda Silberling
This week is a ✨Very Special Episode✨, a crossover with the hosts of our fellow Multitude show Wow if True! Isabel J. Kim is an award-winning science fiction author, Amanda Silberling is a journalist at TechCrunch, and this week they're talking with Adam about horrible little guys on the internet and how they've seeped out into the real world. You can listen to Wow if True anywhere you ge
Episode 7: The History (and Future) of Technology, with Susannah Glickman
This week, Adam talks with historian Susannah Glickman about the recent history of how we think about the future of technology, and why we have more power over that future than we might think. Along the way, they talk about AI, Moore's Law, quantum computers, a rocket-ships-and-chrome vision of the future, the problems with the "Great Man" theory of history, the most important physicist y
Episode 6: Mythology, with Moiya McTier
This week, Adam talks with Moiya McTier about the power of myth in shaping our sense of the past and the future. They also talk about the nature of genius and inspiration, and why Dreaming Against the Machine itself is (partially) Moiya's fault.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram • Subs
Episode 5: Metaphors for AI, with Shannon Vallor
This week, Adam talks with Shannon Vallor, a philosopher of AI, about the metaphors we use to talk about AI and ourselves. They also dunk on libertarians and San Francisco billboards, and consider what kind of hope we can have for the future of technology.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine • Follow us on Bluesky and&n
Episode 4: Reactionary Futurism, with Dave Karpf
This week, Adam talks with political scientist and internet curmudgeon Dave Karpf about some really bad ideas about the future in two really bad books, why those books are bad, why Ezra Klein is too credulous about one of them, and whether Adam should organize an intervention for Dave to stop him from reading so many bad books in the first place.Messages: • Support the show at&
Episode 3: Science Fiction, with Kim Stanley Robinson
This week's guest is the legendary science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson, author of The Ministry for the Future, the Mars trilogy, and many other books. Adam asks him about the role of science fiction in shaping our ideas about the future, how his own ideas about the future have changed over the course of his long career, and what we should be hopeful about looking forward.Messages:
Episode 2: Star Trek, with Chanda Prescod-Weinstein
This week, Adam talks with Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, physicist and author of the new book The Edge of Spacetime, about their shared love of Star Trek and its vision of a hopeful future. They also talk about labor organizing, freaking out people at conventions, and how the real Star Trek is (literally, unironically) the friends we made along the way.Messages: • Support the show
Episode 1: Futurists, with Reo Eveleth
Welcome to our debut show! This week, Adam talks with Reo Eveleth, journalist and podcaster, about who gets to imagine the future, the power that comes with that role, and why certain visions of the future have endured in American culture. They also discuss problematic faves, radical almanacs, a hundred years of horrifying manifestos, and the virtues of being cheesy.Messages: •
Episode 0: Dreaming of a Better World
What would a good future look like? In this solo preview of the show, journalist and astrophysicist Adam Becker explains his struggles with this question, and how that led him to start this podcast. Along the way, he talks about the psychic toll of writing about terrible people, George Orwell, and the power of touching grass.Messages: • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingA
Trailer: Dreaming Against the Machine
What might a good future look like? Explore ideas about how to envision better, realistic, equitable futures with astrophysicist and journalist Dr. Adam Becker. Each week, Adam and a new guest will try to find hope in the darkness of the current political moment through earnest (and entertaining!) conversations about what such a future might look like. In a world where tech oligarchs and
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