Razib Khan's Unsupervised Learning

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to economist Sam Hammond.  Canadian-born Hammond serves as the Senior Economist at the Foundation for American Innovation. His work primarily focuses on innovation and science policy, with particular attention to the societal and institutional impacts of disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence. Before his role at FAI, Hammond was Director of Poverty and Welfare Policy at the Niskanen Center. Hammond also held a research fellowship at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, focusing on policy issues related to technology and regulation. He holds a BA in Economics from Saint Mary’s University and MA's in Economics from George Mason University and Carleton University. After a quick discussion about Canadian housing, Razib and Hammond consider his piece 95 theses about AI. Hammond’s contention is that AI might prove as impactful as the printing press, or, at the outer edge equivalent to photosynthesis. Nearly two years into the current “AI hype cycle” we still haven’t found the “killer app” of AI, but thinkers like Hammond are getting ahead of the likely inevitable societal changes. He believes that change is inevitable, and the details that need to be worked out are how we as a species adapt and evolve in response to our technology. Hammond contends that the AI-revolution is likely to produce changes in the next generation analogous to industrial transformations of the late 19th centuries and early 20th centuries, when cars, electrification and airplanes transformed civilization.    For early access, feel free to explore it there. https://www.razibkhan.com/p/sam-hammond-i-for-one-welcome-our   

    The full episode is available on: https://www.razibkhan.com/p/14000-years-of-natural-selection On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks about what we have learned from a blockbuster new preprint, Pervasive findings of directional selection realize the promise of ancient DNA to elucidate human adaptation. Synchronously released was the Ancient Genome Selection browser, which allows you to trace the allele frequency of variants of interest over the last 10,000 years. Razib covers: The relationship of selection to adaptation and the Darwinian understanding of evolution Non-genetic selection Types of biological selection like positive, negative, background and balancing selection Hard vs. soft sweeps and their relevance to detecting selection in the genome Older forms of natural selection detection between species (dN/dS, Tajima’s D) Newer forms of selection detection within species with haplotype structure, outlier SNP analysis and site frequency spectra The Generalized Linear Mixed Model used to model allele frequency change over time, and estimates of selection in cases where population structure and drift are not sufficient Specific examples of SNPs whose variation can be examined in the browser and are clearly cases of selection Survey of traits that were revealed under selection, including blood groups, pigmentation and intelligence Critiques of the methods due to not accounting for drift or population structure, and its limitations in relation to the ability to port across populations due to LD structure

On this week’s episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib discusses the genetic and archaeological history of Europe from the arrival of modern humans (permanently) 45,000 years ago, to the end of the Bronze Age in the decades after 1200 BC. He covers these time periods: Pre-Aurignacian (before 43 kya)  Aurignacian (43-26 kya)  Gravettian (33-21 kya)  Solutrean (22-17 kya)  Magdalenian (17-12 kya)  Epigravettian (21-10 kya)  Mesolithic (12-7 kya)  Neolithic (9-5 kya)  Bronze Age (5-3 kya) The full episode is available for paid subscribers on: https://www.razibkhan.com/p/europe-40000-bc-to-1200-bc Relevant papers: Reconstructing contact and a potential interbreeding geographical zone between Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans The Persian plateau served as hub for Homo sapiens after the main out of Africa dispersal A genome sequence from a modern human skull over 45,000 years old from Zlatý kůň in Czechia An early modern human from Romania with a recent Neanderthal ancestor Palaeogenomics of Upper Palaeolithic to Neolithic European hunter-gatherers Survival of Late Pleistocene Hunter-Gatherer Ancestry in the Iberian Peninsula A 23,000-year-old southern Iberian individual links human groups that lived in Western Europe before and after the Last Glacial Maximum Population genomics of Mesolithic Scandinavia: Investigating early postglacial migration routes and high-latitude adaptation Late Pleistocene human genome suggests a local origin for the first farmers of central Anatolia Genomic Evidence Establishes Anatolia as the Source of the European Neolithic Gene Pool ​​Massive migration from the steppe was a source for Indo-European languages in Europe The genomic ancestry of the Scandinavian Battle Axe Culture people and their relation to the broader Corded Ware horizon The genomic history of the Iberian Peninsula over the past 8000 years Steppe Ancestry in western Eurasia and the spread of the Germanic Languages

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Misha Saul, the host of the Kvetch Substack. Saul is a first-generation Jewish Australian, born in Georgia (former Soviet republic), who grew up in Adelaide and now lives in Sydney. He graduated from the University of Adelaide with degrees in commerce and law. His day job is in finance, but the Kvetch highlights his interests in history and Jewish culture. Razib and Saul discuss extensively the differences and similarities between the US and Australia, and how each relates to other Anglophone nations like Canada, New Zealand and of course the UK. Saul asserts though Australia leans into its frontier reputation, in reality it is much more of a bureaucratic-ruled nation than the US, albeit with more of a Scots-Irish flavor than comparatively middle-class New Zealand. He also contrasts the relatively generous welfare-state of Australia and America’s inequality, which he describes by analogy to the film 2013 Elysium, with its contrast between an earth dominated by favelas and a well-manicured low-earth orbit utopia for the super rich. They also discuss the geographical and cultural coherency of a vast nation like Australia, which has a desert at its center. Saul mentions it is often actually cheaper to fly to and vacation in Bali or another Asian locale than going to Perth from Sydney. Despite the reality that Australia has exotic fauna, it is notably an overwhelmingly urban society, where few have any interaction with the “bush.” Though Australians appreciate archetypes like “Crocodile Dundee,” Saul paints a picture of a much more urbane reality. Razib asks about the phenomenon of “white-presenting” Aboriginals, and Saul argues all societies look somewhat crazy from the outside because of their shibboleths, and the debates around Aboriginality are Australia’s. As an immigrant and first-generation Australian, Saul also discusses Australia’s immigration system, which strictly controls and regulates migration. Saul argues that because of the high educational and skill qualifications most Australian immigrants assimilate well, and he contends that there is a broad consensus to maintain strict limits on inflows. He argues that the Anglo-Australian identity is strong enough that the assimilative process continues to work even with the large number of Asians from China and India, who have triggered nativist worries and political activism.