this post was submitted on 15 Jun 2025
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Hopefully this is not off-topic. If it is, please remove it.

Terence Tao one of the greatest mathematicians of all time, who normally never does podcasts, recently did a podcast on Lex Fridman's Podcast.

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[–] ultimate_worrier@lemmy.dbzer0.com 12 points 18 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago) (2 children)

It’s embarrassing to see more people in the science world caught up in Lex’s grift. OP should look into Lex’s ties with the intellectual dark web and his actual track record of taking a one-off course at MIT then calling himself an “MIT AI researcher”. He is a laughing stock among AI researchers. His assessment of Tesla’s autopilot used incredibly biased methodologies and was essentially 100% debunked by his “peers”. He is 100% likely to be funded by Elon Musk and probably Peter Thiel to be a funnel that draws innocent STEM people into the libertarian intellectual dark web….and it’s clearly working. He is Joe Rogan for STEM people, boosting Jordan Peterson’s neckbeard pseudo-science to unwitting dupes.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35308178

https://youtu.be/m0-ArxdcPTo

Edit: OP knows about Lex’s grift but decided to ignore it because they’re such a big fan of the guest. THIS IS THE GRIFT. It’s called the “libertarian funnel”. Watch even a second of this on your YouTube account and you’ll be inundated with military industrial complex propaganda disguised as engineering videos.

[–] nothrone@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 17 hours ago

I know all about that. Trust me, I hate the guy. His podcast with Zelensky was pathetic. So were his remarks in the podcast episode next to that one.

Having said that: I dont have idols, but if I had, Terence Tao would be one of them. I will listen to the podcast regardless of Lex.

[–] Libra@lemmy.ml 1 points 15 hours ago

This seems rather alarmist, especially the youtube part. I've watched a few full length episodes and don't have any of that shit in my recommended videos.

[–] vuptm@mander.xyz 5 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

Disappointing that he would cozy up to the right wing like this. There are many other places where he could spread the same ideas without implicitly endorsing fascist ideologues.

[–] Libra@lemmy.ml 1 points 15 hours ago

Do your think he knows? I think folks like him just get podcast invites and do minimal research on the host.