How Do We Prevent Nuclear War? | Win-Win with Liv Boeree

[@mateuszpuczel4304]

Liv - I know that you just start your adventure with podcasts so just let me know that I listen to a lot of podcasts that have a form of interview and let me tell u, you're doing a fantastic job. I love the way you led the conversation and as a person who is also obsessed with numbers, it's pleasing to listen to your logical flow of conversation - it is so different than the other podcasts and it makes it truly unique. Also, I love to hear your guest's opinions on personal stuff (like the last episode). I have not listened to this episode yet but I am going to do it tmr - the guest looks super promising. Keep doing an amazing job!

[@johnhogan6588]

You nailed it

[@LivBoeree]

That is such a wonderful compliment! Thank you Mateusz❤

[@moralhazard1]

@@LivBoeree I agree! ...but is it possible to get an audio version? Would love to listen in my normal podcast app when on walks 🙏 thanks!

[@benlamprecht6414]

Thanks for yet another excellent video Liv. I would appreciate an in-depth discussion on the consequences of a full-scale Nuclear war, specifically including Nuclear Winter/Nuclear famine. Whilst no-one would start a full-scale war, the very short times to respond to data which may indicate that the other side has launched (15-30 minutes), makes it very difficult not to perform a "retaliatory" or "second-strike" launch.

[@seespacelabs6077]

Best new podcast. I was a fan of Liv's shorts and interviews in other places, but all the time I was thinking we needed... this!

[@blythebea808]

I've really been enjoying the eclectic mix of guests on the Win-Win Podcast! This one is superb.

[@xxpierrot]

Being a poker player and a podcast lover. You and your guest are a blessing in my life.

[@moralhazard1]

Would love an audio version of this show! Maybe it's just not in my app because it's newer, but if that's simple you should do that, I'm sure there'd be just as many "audio-only" listeners! Thank you Liv! 🙏

[@halcyon7005]

That Atari style intro-outro is pretty great. Well-spoken guest. Reasonable podcast length. Good shit

[@tristan7216]

If you're ever in Vegas, check out the Atomic Testing Museum on Flamingo road about a mile off the strip. They have an air dropped 9MT bomb (3MT for the clean version without the U238 jacket). The thing is huge and weighs several tons. W88 reentry vehicles (i think they have these at Udvar Hazy near Dulles, not sure) are MUCH more deliverable, you can put several on a single ICBM. I suppose they could have miniaturized the big one more, but the major targeting is missile silos, and we have accurate enought guidance that lots of megatons aren't needed. You can also see the nuclear tipped 1950s air to air missile at the AT museum, 0.7 KT, which is another example of the yield vs accuracy tradeoff; in the 50s we didn't have advanced microchip-based seeker guidance systems yet, but once we did nuclear tipped air to air missiles disappeared.

[@SoftwareSimian_]

When visiting, play the fallout 4 radio mix, it really sets the mood through the start of the museum tour route with all of the 1950s memorabilia. I was humming away when I got stopped by one of the employees. They got a good laugh when I told them what was playing, got a pseudo private tour and invited me back to see some of the collection not on display.

[@johnhogan6588]

I’m only 20 minutes into this and it’s a great conversation

[@Privacityuser]

USE 2X SPEED and safe brain energy pall

[@johnhogan6588]

Just did it

[@JT29501]

A nice conversation. Obviously you can't cover everything in an hour and a half, but in future I'd like it if you could go deeper into some of the more niche game theory aspects of nuclear conflicts - stuff like minimal credible deterrence/nuclear policies of smaller countries. Even a large nuclear strike on one major city is surely so much of a disaster that any country would try desperately to avoid it, so how many nuclear weapons do we really need? Surely it's only the amount that can guarantee a successful strike - this always used to be Chinese and Indian policy, for example, and de-facto (especially now we only have submarines) is British policy too really. There is also Israel and the "Samson option", although that is really just massive retaliation. Massive retaliation vs flexible response and the history of that is also a really interesting topic to explore. I.e. does massive retaliation actually potentially make war more likely, as if the opponent tries "salami tactics" against you, and the promised massive response never comes, you'll lose so much credibility direct conflict and escalation becomes much more likely? That is what the USA concluded in the 60s, but nowadays massive retaliation is back in vogue as the way to deal with e.g. North Korea. All of that has an interesting knock on effect on the counterforce/countervalue tactical debate which was briefly touched on - although submarines have rendered all that much less important (and since that is the case, why bother with land based missiles at all? "Use it or lose it" seems to be to be profoundly destabilising and potentially "nuclear spasm" inducing).

[@RiyaanMoosa]

Awesome work Liv, loving the podcasts

[@systermatikpodden3804]

Thank you so much for this podcast Liv, you give me hope! 🌻

[@xenolithis]

This is quickly becoming a favorite podcast. Awesome content so far!

[@eckligt]

Just finished listening to the whole thing, and it's a very interesting conversation. There were a few other things I would have liked to hear your guest's opinions on, though. Firstly, in an alternate history, would it maybe have been more feasible back in the early atomic age to have an agreement between the US and the USSR that no nukes should have a yield larger than a certain value -- effectively banning strategic but allowing tactical/battlefield nukes -- which would then, as other countries also join the agreement, lead to a world without the taboo against nuclear use that we know today, but instead a taboo against city-levelling weapons? I can well imagine that in a conventional, asymmetric war like the US/western war against Al Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan, when bin Laden was almost cornered in Bora Bora, the tactically correct choice -- geostrategic problems and presedence aside -- could well have been nuclear bunker busters against the cave complex which Al Qaida was using. The taboo against nuclear use is such a binary thing, while the uses for nuclear weapons have a lot of variation. At the same time, urging/coercing countries that might feel under threat from great powers or angry neighbours to abstain totally from nukes is a hard sell. Might it have been more realistic, and therefore more to everyone's benefit if the taboo were against strategic nukes, while battlefield nukes could be viewed as a relatively normal extension of the toolkit that militaries use? Another thing I perhaps had wanted some comments on from your expert is the new delivery systems that Russia has been developing in recent years. Two in particular: The Poseidon nuclear mega-torpedo, which is essentially designed to destroy port cities with something the size of the Tsar Bomba exploding in their harbours, and the nuclear cruise missile Redrod/Burevestnik. Both of these are nuclear powered as well as nuclear armed, giving them essentially infite range. I would have thought that these are also very much yanking us out of equilibrium, and may very well be designed to do just that, in particular by being very difficult to intercept. And as a side note, what does that indicate about the strategic preferences of the current Russian leadership and president in particular? I have understood that the USSR and later Russia with its "escalate to de-escalate" doctrine is more risk-happy than the west, in some sense at least, but I was not around for enough of the Cold War to gauge whether they seem more reckless now than then, or if things have just reverted to how they were. A third thing, which you almost touched on, is the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), which was this anti-missile system (partially space-based) that the US started developing in the 1980's. I have heard experts opine in the past that the SDI really is a major reason the USSR collapsed and we could enjoy these three decades of relative peace, because the USSR's economy could not sustain the R&D effort to counter the SDI. I think clearly the SDI yanked us out of equilibrium at the time, but this move really worked out well in this particular case, if you agree that it contributed to the collapse of the USSR. It then becomes an interesting data point because it means the difficult power balance of M.A.D. can be overturned not only by arms control, but also by out-manoeuvring your opponent. PS: I enjoyed that you pushed back on your guest's views on WMD's in Iraq. I followed politics pretty closely in the 1990's, and can remember the UN arms inspection programme in Iraq during that time. It was pretty obvious to any neutral observer, just going on media reports alone, that whatever nuclear programme had been in place in 1991 had been successfully uncovered and dismantled during the 1990's. We shouldn't beat around the bush: The Iraq war was based on a lie, not an honest mistake. People lower down in the intelligence establishment knew this at the time, but ideologues like Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld in the DoD and incompetents like George Tenet in the CIA, along with VP Cheney and of course President Bush himself, really wanted to go to war. It was famously viewed by US conservatives as "unfinished business" from the 1991 war that Saddam was still in power.

[@theAftEffect]

Thought provoking conversation

[@shoppster300]

What an excellent podcast.

[@zulqadarrrashid6201]

Excellent presentation 👏 A different view From Pakistan 🇵🇰

[@noaboa23]

You should bring Carl back on the show! Seems like a good guy

[@donbarile8916]

Rogan got nuthin' on this girl.

[@michaell1578]

I feel like Ukraine should have been used as the example of a country that gave up its nuclear weapons. In any case, good interview Liv!

[@aerobique]

UKr never had those weapons. Just one of the many "misunderstandings" circulating about that (utterly abused) place and people.. Just for the record- Not your fault.

[@mysteriousGiada]

Good job Liv ❤

[@robertbrenton6833]

I think that the solution to the Nuclear Dilemma must come with a change in our sense of self. My right hand is never a threat to my left hand because my sense of self extends to both - equally. If we begin to see other humans as 'cells in the same body', then we can begin to approach each other with more love and respect. The US needs Russia and China, and they need us. We are different organs on the same body of this planet. They are 'part of me' in different bodies. We should not be enemies or threats, any more than our hands are threats to our feet. All the games and equilibriums are meaningless once you get the proper context and sense of self.

[@packardsonic]

IMPORTANT: the only way out of this predicament is to accept that we must care for EVERYONE, not just for the people we deem worthy. Caring for people means ensuring their needs are met. This requires us to let go of ideology of whether people deserve things or not and simply work to satisfy EVERYBODY'S needs nevertheless. It hurts our ego to do this. We are concerned of people not contributing if taken care of universally, we are also concerned of people becoming dependent, but the challenge of inspiring people to contribute and become capable members of society is surmountable and less of a danger than mutually assured destruction. When humans became the ultimate predator, our population was no longer kept in balance by predators, so we were forced to go against our symbiotic nature and adopt a culture of predation upon ourselves, dog eat dog, "man is wolf to man" said the romans. Now that we have automation and family planning we can produce enough for all and can return to our symbiotic nature. The only way to do this is NOT by demanding government to take control of production but by teaching ourselves to cultivate a culture of meeting EVERYONE'S needs UNCONDITIONALLY with decentralized citizen led Free Collaboration Networks like gift networks, resource banks, public toolsheds, carpooling, safe hitchhiking, repair parties, food sharing, etc. It is incumbent upon us all to do this and anyone who chooses to seriously work to convince everyone in their city to join sharebay .org, olio app, compartir .org, trustroots .org, and others will radically improve their city. All we need is a few celebrities such as Liv to advocate this idea and method and the paradigm shift will take off suddenly. And if celebrities don't have the courage to do so, us regular people will. All it takes is convincing 100 people in your city to join sharebay. org and it will start to function organically on its own. We do this with great results. You can too. Let's go! Enjoy a shared world!

[@danilostevanovic]

I think you are talking about utopia and they are discussing real life solutions...

[@packardsonic]

@@danilostevanovic claiming it is impossible to meet everyone's needs is a cop out. Meeting EVERYONE'S needs is the only obvious goal for any rational human mind.

[@johnhogan6588]

I would like to see a interview with quantum computing if you know anyone that is working with it.

[@user-iv8vi3gz6c]

Liv it’s not a conflict, it’s a war.

[@donbarile8916]

it's not a war, it's genocide

[@hotmultimedia]

Good stuff

[@JIFUSASA]

you should put the name of the interviewee/other person in the title

[@davwunderbrrd6944]

i know its like so not the point but i literally adore the themesong

[@LivBoeree]

Right?? Isn’t it great

[@iffy1533]

liv i'm waiting for the new episode!!

[@Fallingmonsters]

Simple distillation: if Rus uses tactical low-yield nuke, they lose China. The thing that scares me, is the possibility that a low-yield weapon could be used, but the stories of whether it is "nuclear" will differ. The US would pick up initial data but Russia could simply deny. This to me seems the most likely scenario, opening up the horrific -- though I feel, inevitable -- game of nuclear-use denial.

[@brendonhulett7545]

The guy seems to be in love with his own voice. Personally, I obtained nothing from him; however, metaphysically speaking "Moloch" as far as nuclear war. It seems to me that nuclear bunkers gives the greatest incentives to push the button. Think about it, if the people in power with the ability to push the button, know they will be safe, and have the evil will to do so. What is the incentives not to? Especially if said evil people know they are cornered and will likely be destroyed, they will have every incentive to flee underground and deal with the aftermath later.

[@packardsonic]

Please Liv. If you decide to have someone on to talk about meeting EVERYONE'S needs UNCONDITIONALLY, don't just have on someone to discuss UBI just because it is more known. UBI has many flaws, mostly that it is a centralized concentration of dependency and it is only aimed at individual countries. Instead, have the Prosocialise Foundation on. Just because we aren't famous yet doesn't mean we don't deserve to be. We have a very effective method to create a win-win world.

[@digitaldave1576]

Yay All Hail Win Win. ❤❤❤

[@michaelsbeverly]

_Nuclear war is arguably the ultimate lose-lose game._ AGI, since it could use nukes (or disable them) trumps nuclear threat or use. Nukes cannot self-direct, a human in the loop is needed. _But how plausible is it in this day and age, and what have we learned from living the last ~70 years under the nuclear shadow?_ Humans haven't "learned" much, that is self-evident. Most of us listening to a podcast like this and understanding it are living lives so alien to most of the world, we're so much richer, have so much more wealth, opportunity, etc. etc., that we can't really put ourselves in the shoes of most of the world and this seems to indicate, at least to me, that we haven't learned much since the dark ages. We're just better at marketing to ourselves comforting lies so that we don't have to deal with the guilt and shame we'd have to face if we actually faced the reality that we've created. _Is there a way to permanently escape it?_ Yes, everyone so far ends up in the grave. That's the escape from human irrationality. The other chance we have is if AGI doesn't extinct us but instead takes over with benevolent designs on our lives. This could go well for some and not for others. I think that's the path we're on, either extinction or pets. Another path might exist, but it's gonna be a super low percentage of happening. We don't have much evidence in human history of humans cooperating for the best of all.

[@VickiNikolaidis]

Russia is not losing. How odd to hear. President Putin made very clear the only reason Russia would use nuclear weapons. Why not quote Pres. Putin.

[@tzimiable]

I feel like one of the problems we face is politics. How do we change politicians? They need to be smarter people, with different motivations. Politicians not understanding AI doesnt surprise me in the least, and they need to understand it. At least on a philosophical level. Also, its so damn hard to do something globally. It doesnt help if France or the USA or whatever does what they should with AI if everyone else doesnt.

[@Dr.Im-All-In]

My Love ❤❤❤

[@andydo6271]

It seems pretty remarkable that one can talk for almost two hours about the virtues of arm reduction and nuclear non-proliferation without ever mentioning the infamous Budapest Memorandum or the real-life consequences for a country like Ukraine, after it decided (under tremendous pressure from the US) to give up its nuclear arsenal

[@Dom-qm8fg]

Discussing the important game theory surrounding weapons of mass destruction is cool and all but can we discuss the logo being a butt? Can’t unsee that.

[@heidi22209]

Haha.

[@myfootballjesus]

Ask CARL if the UN had this non proliferation treaty why was india pakistan and isreal allowed or condoned to have nuclear weopons

[@faraday7428]

Reupload?

[@LivBoeree]

yup had sound issues on first upload

[@FirstName-zt2my]

North Korea is a movie set 😂. Only those who know will get this

[@Danteslyons]

Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our.....

[@bocckoka]

He's not even 40, and spent 25 years of his carrier on something?

[@christiansmith-of7dt]

Breathing room

[@rvx4645]

why are you not succeeding on your youtube channel!!

[@pingnick]

☢️🙃

[@PlanetTwilow]

No 'chips' were made in Jhina. Taiwan is not Jhina.

[@1sanremy]

The good news is thtat ALIENS can neutralised NUCLEAR weapons, as they demonstrated on American and french ICBM bases. The potential existence of spiritual aliens or god is a very powerfull idea to bring peace of mind to the believers : it is a matter of FAITH. Peace & love

[@verschlusssache6283]

4:00 the guy needs to look up US protocol. It's already clear that this is a propaganda show.

[@mcduffxyz]

Absolute Bullshit! Why don't you interview an Artist Liv?

[@matthewsemenuk8953]

Bacon