It's been a minute since we've had Nikolai Yakovenko on the podcast. Yakovenko is a former professional poker player ,and was a research scientist at Google, Twitter and Nvidia. With a decade in computer science , Yakovenko has been at the forefront of the large-language-model revolution that has driven to prominence companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, and DeepMind, and an ecosystem that has birthed hundreds of smaller startups. He is also the founder of DeepNewz , an AI-driven news startup. On th...
May 29, 2026•1 hr 20 min•Season 1Ep. 298
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Christopher Rufo . Rufo is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. A contributing editor at City Journal , author of the New York Times bestseller America's Cultural Revolution , and 2025 Bradley Prize recipient, he also serves as a New College of Florida board member and Distinguished Fellow at Hillsdale College. He is also co-host of the podcast Rufo and Lomez . Raised in Sacramento, California, Rufo graduated magn...
May 23, 2026•1 hr•Season 1Ep. 297
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning , Razib talks to physicist Gregory Cochran . Cochran is best known for his work in human evolution, often at the intersection of biology, anthropology, and history. Trained in physics, he later turned to population genetics and became widely known through collaborations with researchers like Henry Harpending , producing influential but controversial work on recent human evolution, including the idea that natural selection has accelerated in the Holocene. ...
May 16, 2026•2 hr 9 min•Season 1Ep. 296
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Russ Greene , who promoted the idea of " Total Boomer Luxury Communism ." Greene currently serves as the Executive Director of the Prime Mover Institute, a public interest organization and think tank he launched to advocate for American energy dominance. Previously, he was a Senior Fellow for the Economy at the Stand Together Trust. In this role, he managed a grantmaking portfolio centered on federal regulatory affairs and strategic litigat...
May 10, 2026•48 min•Season 1Ep. 295
The full episode is available here: https://www.razibkhan.com/p/10000-years-of-selection-in-western Despite the preprint being out for two years, Akbari et al.'s Ancient DNA reveals pervasive directional selection across West Eurasia publication in Nature this week has resulted in a massive media response. Though Razib has discussed this work before, he thought it would be useful to review it, and put it in context in a new monologue....
May 01, 2026•41 min•Season 1Ep. 294
Today Razib talks to Matthew Schmitz, a journalist who previously served as an editor at the religious journal First Things . He is the cofounder of the online magazine Compact , alongside Edwin Aponte and Sohrab Ahmari. He currently serves as editor of Compact , religion editor of Washington Post Opinions, and co-host of the podcast Against the Grain . Compact His essays on politics and culture have appeared in The New York Times , The Wall Street Journal , and The Claremont Review of Books . A...
Apr 28, 2026•1 hr 25 min•Season 1Ep. 293
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to returning guest Megan McArdle. She is the author of The Up Side of Down: Why Failing Well Is the Key to Success and a Washington Post columnist and op-ed board member. McArdle grew up in New York City and attended Riverdale Country School. She obtained an undergraduate degree in English from University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from the University of Chicago. McArdle's previous positions were at The Economist, The Atlantic and Newsweek. Sh...
Apr 25, 2026•1 hr 57 min•Season 1Ep. 292
You can find the complete monologue here: https://www.razibkhan.com/p/monologue-race-genetics-history-and This is where you will find all the podcasts from Razib Khan's Substack and original video content. On this episode, Razib talks about race, and how to think about this touchy subject.
Apr 23, 2026•34 min•Season 1Ep. 291
You can find the complete monologue here: https://www.razibkhan.com/p/monlogue-out-of-africa-is-not-dead On this episode Razib talks about where we are when it comes to "Out-of-Africa," Neanderthal origins and the broader state of understanding the dynamics of Homo evolution.
Apr 19, 2026•25 min•Season 1Ep. 290
Today Razib talks to Chris Bradley , a serial entrepreneur and the CEO and Co-Founder of Matter Bio , a company dedicated to preserving genome integrity and addressing the root causes of aging. With a multidisciplinary background spanning neuroscience, cell biology, and computer science, Bradley aims to translate early-stage biotech concepts into practical therapies that can extend human lifespan Matter Bio is focused on diagnosing, quantifying, and repairing the structural variations and mutati...
Apr 10, 2026•1 hr 6 min•Season 1Ep. 289
Today, Razib talks to Chris Masterjohn , a nutritional scientist and leading expert in mitochondrial biology who believes hidden energy bottlenecks underlie much of modern disease. After years of work as a professor and researcher, he founded Mitome , the first mitochondrial analysis designed for everyday health, and serves as its Scientific Director. His mission is to make mitochondrial testing accessible so people can identify and correct the specific energy limitations holding them back. Afte...
Mar 30, 2026•1 hr 37 min•Season 1Ep. 288
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning, Razib talks to Mike White , a Genetics professor at the Washington University in St. Louis. White has a position at the School of Medicine in St. Louis, where he leads a research team focused on understanding the biophysical architecture of regulatory DNA. He earned a B.A. in music before pivoting to the sciences, receiving his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of Rochester in 2006 and completing a postdoctoral fellowship at Wash U under Dr. Bara...
Mar 23, 2026•1 hr 8 min•Season 1Ep. 287
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Aaron Renn . Renn is a writer , consultant, and urban analyst known for his work on the challenges facing American cities and religious institutions in the 21st century. He is a contributor to The American Reformer and the author of Life in the Negative World , a book exploring the cultural shifts regarding Christianity in America. Renn previously served as a Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute for five years and as a contributing edit...
Mar 05, 2026•1 hr 35 min•Season 1Ep. 286
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Daniel Tabin , a 5th-year Ph.D. student in David Reich's lab in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology. His research focuses on using ancient and modern DNA to answer questions about human history. Tabin completed a degree in Computer Science and Math and Master's in Computer Science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He Ph.D. project involves the population genetic history of Central and East Asia. First, Razib and Tabin discuss ...
Feb 28, 2026•1 hr 15 min•Season 1Ep. 285
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Peter Nimitz about the rise of the Slavs . His Substack, titled Nemets , explores world history through the lenses of archaeology, paleogenetics, and historical processes. His writing focuses on "deep history," such as the Bronze Age Collapse and the migration of Indo-European peoples, while connecting these ancient shifts to broader patterns of civilizational rise and fall. Nimitz often integrates technical data from genetics and climate s...
Feb 12, 2026•1 hr 28 min•Season 1Ep. 284
On this episode Razib talks to Jesse Arm , VP of external affairs at the Manhattan Institute. His writing and commentary have appeared in the New York Times , Wall Street Journal , The Atlantic , New York Post , Fox News, City Journal and Jerusalem Post . Arm graduated with honors from the University of Michigan, where he majored in international political economy, and studied language and international affairs at Tel Aviv University. He has also worked for Senator Tom Cotton and Representative ...
Feb 06, 2026•1 hr•Season 1Ep. 284
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning , Razib talks to Davide Piffer , whose Substack examines genetic differences between populations. Piffer has been publishing on human genetic variation for a decade, and recently started a Substack, Piffer Pilfer , exploring similar issues in detail over a series of posts. Razib asks Piffer about the difficulties in analyzing polygenic scores from quantitative traits in ancient DNA samples. How does he do in technical terms, from genome quality to imputat...
Jan 30, 2026•52 min•Season 1Ep. 282
Today Razib talks to Aneil Mallavarapu , a scientist and technology leader based in Austin, Texas, whose career bridges the fields of biochemistry, systems biology, and software engineering. He earned his doctorate in Biochemistry and Cell Biology from the University of California, and has held academic positions at Harvard Medical School, where he contributed to the Department of Systems Biology and developed the "Little b" programming language. Mallavarapu has transitioned from academic resear...
Jan 23, 2026•1 hr 14 min•Season 1Ep. 281
On this episode Razib, talks to Richard Hanania , a returning guest to the podcast . Hanania holds a Ph.D. from UCLA, a J.D. from the University of Chicago, and an undergraduate degree from CU Boulder in linguistics. He is a regular contributor to the Boston Globe and UnHerd , and has his own newsletter . Hanania is also the author of The Origins of Woke: Civil Rights Law, Corporate America, and the Triumph of Identity Politics . Razib and Hanania talk about his new book Kakistocracy: Why Populi...
Jan 16, 2026•1 hr 27 min•Season 1Ep. 280
On this episode, Razib talks to returning guest , Francis Young , a historian who teaches at Oxford. Young specialises in the history of religion and belief from ancient times to the present day, and provides expert indexes for academic books and translates medieval and early modern Latin. He holds a PhD from Cambridge University and is the author, editor or co-author of over 20 books . On his last visit to the podcast , he discussed his book Pagans in the Early Modern Baltic , an account of the...
Jan 12, 2026•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 279
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning, Razib again talks to George Washington University archaeologist Eric Cline . The author of 1177 B.C. - The Year Civilization Collapsed and After 1177 B.C. - The Survival of Civilizations , Cline has a new book out, Love, War, and Diplomacy: The Discovery of the Amarna Letters and the Bronze Age World They Revealed . While 1177 B.C. closed with the end of the first global civilization, that of the Eastern Mediterranean at the end of the Bronze Age, and Af...
Jan 09, 2026•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 278
On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks again with Washington Post columnist and repeat guest Shadi Hamid (listen to previous episodes ). A native Pennsylvanian of Egyptian ethnic background and Islamic faith, Hamid completed his Ph.D. in politics at Oxford University. He is co-host of the Wisdom of Crowds podcast and website with Damir Marusic , and now the author of his own Substack and a recent book, The Case For American Power . Hamid is also the author of The Problem of Democra...
Dec 26, 2025•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 277
On this episode, Razib talks to Vishal Ganesan and Anang Mittal , two Indian-American Hindus who have been thinking about the role of their faith in the present, and past, of the American social landscape. Ganesan is a California-based attorney and writer who focuses on the history, identity, and representation of the Hindu diaspora in the United States. He is best known for his project "Hindoo History" and his writing on the "Frontier Dharma" platform, which attempts to conceptualize what an Am...
Dec 22, 2025•1 hr 57 min•Season 1Ep. 276
On this very special episode, Razib talks to paleoanthroplogists John Hawks and Chris Stringer. Hawks is a paleoanthropologist who has been a researcher and commentator in human evolutionary biology and paleoanthropology for over two decades. With a widely read weblog (now on Substack), a book on Homo naledi , and highly cited scientific papers , Hawks is an essential voice in understanding the origins of our species. He graduated from Kansas State University in 1994 with degrees in French, Engl...
Dec 17, 2025•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 275
Today Razib talks to Sean Trende . He is a prominent American political analyst who currently serves as the Senior Elections Analyst for RealClearPolitics , a position he has held since 2010. He is also a Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and a lecturer at The Ohio State University, where he earned his Ph.D. in political science in 2023. Before transitioning to full-time political analysis, Trende practiced law for eight years at firms including Kirkland & Ellis LLP and Hunto...
Dec 14, 2025•1 hr 4 min•Season 1Ep. 274
This week on the Unsupervised Learning Podcast , Razib talks to r eturning guest Alex Young of UCLA and Herasight . Trained originally as a mathematician, Young studied statistics and computational biology at the University of Cambridge before doing a doctorate in genomic medicine and statistics at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, University of Oxford, under Peter Donnelly. He also worked at deCODE Genetics in Reykjavik and at Oxford with Augustine Kong, developing methods in quanti...
Dec 09, 2025•1 hr 14 min•Season 1Ep. 273
Today on Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Zineb Riboua , a research fellow and program manager of Hudson Institute's Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East. She specializes in Chinese and Russian involvement in the Middle East, the Sahel, and North Africa, great power competition in the region, and Israeli-Arab relations. Riboua's pieces and commentary have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Foreign Policy , the National Interest , the Jerusalem Post and Tablet among other outlet...
Dec 02, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 272
Today Razib talks to Ed West, a British journalist and author. He has served as deputy editor of UnHerd and The Catholic Herald , and has written columns for The Spectator and The Daily Telegraph . He runs the Substack newsletter Wrong Side of History , where he explores culture, politics, and the longue durée of Western history. West is the author of books including Small Men on the Wrong Side of History and The Diversity Illusion , as well as popular-history titles such as 1066 and Before All ...
Nov 22, 2025•1 hr 27 min•Season 1Ep. 271
Today Razib talks to Noah Smith , an American economist-turned-blogger known for his commentary on economics and public policy. His blog, Noahpinion , is one of the most popular on Substack. He earned a PhD in economics at University of Michigan and served as an assistant professor of finance at Stony Brook University before leaving academia to become a full-time writer. He wrote a column for Bloomberg until 2021, when he turned his focus entirely to independent writing and his Substack newslett...
Nov 18, 2025•1 hr 41 min•Season 1Ep. 270
Today, Razib talks to Coltan Scrivner , a behavioral scientist, horror entertainment producer, and author, whose work centers on the psychological and evolutionary roots of our fascination with darkness, horror, and true crime. He is affiliated with the Department of Psychology at Arizona State University. Scrivner also serves as the executive director of the Nightmare in the Ozarks Film Festival and founded the Eureka Springs Zombie Crawl. He has been featured in The New York Times , CNN , The ...
Nov 12, 2025•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 269
