A former Anthropic researcher recently went on CNN and made a startling claim: AI could pose an existential threat to humanity within the next few years.

I’m not an AI researcher, and I’m not here to tell you whether that prediction is right.

What interests me is the much older—and much more human—problem underneath it:

Human beings have a habit of developing power before developing the wisdom necessary to wield it.

We did it with nuclear weapons. We’ve done it with countless technologies throughout history. And now, perhaps, we’re doing it again with artificial intelligence.

In this Stoic reaction, I explore the race for AI power, why intelligence and wisdom are not the same thing, why AI doesn’t need to be “evil” to become dangerous, and a question that increasingly matters for all of us:

At what point does AI assistance become human abdication?

Maybe the greatest danger isn’t that artificial intelligence becomes too intelligent—but that our power develops faster than our wisdom can catch up.

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CNN Video: https://youtu.be/i30jVPqQeOM?si=ph27XqHlzSaSTE61

Ryan Holiday has introduced millions of people to Stoicism. But is what he teaches about success actually consistent with what the ancient Stoics taught?

In this episode, I take a closer look at several of Holiday’s claims about success—not to tear him down, but to test those ideas against the philosophy itself.

We explore why Stoic success cannot be measured purely by outcomes, what the Stoics actually meant by preferred indifferents, why making more money isn’t necessarily the Stoic choice, and a revealing passage from Seneca’s Letter 95that raises a larger problem with the way Stoicism is sometimes presented today.

Because Stoicism isn’t fundamentally about becoming more effective at getting what you want.

It asks a much harder question:

Is what you want actually worth wanting?

Ryan Holiday gets some things right. Other ideas, I argue, are incomplete. And in at least one case, returning to the original Stoic text tells a very different story.

A successful life and a good life are not necessarily the same thing.

The Stoics were concerned with the latter.

If someone could hear your thoughts for a week, who would they expect you to become?

Marcus Aurelius wrote that “the soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.” But not every thought stains us. An unwanted impulse is not character. The danger lies in the thoughts we repeatedly entertain, rehearse, defend, and eventually act upon.

In Episode 429, Brandon explores how thoughts become words, words become actions, actions become habits, and habits become character. He examines why our speech reveals what the mind has been soaking in, how our closest relationships influence our inner lives, and where we can intervene before a passing impression becomes a permanent way of seeing the world.

You cannot always control the first thought that enters your mind. You can decide whether to give it a room, a voice, and a place in your future.

In this episode:

• Why Marcus Aurelius emphasized habitual thoughts
• The difference between an impulse and a rehearsed judgment
• How thoughts become character one small decision at a time
• Why your speech reveals the “color of the dye”
• How gossip, resentment, and excuses train the mind
• The influence of your environment and closest friends
• How to interrupt a destructive thought before it becomes destiny