About this episode

Adam Becker interviews Alondra Nelson about the state of scientific research in the US and its future.

This week, Adam talks with Alondra Nelson, sociologist and former head of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy under Joe Biden. They talk about the destruction of scientific research in the US under Trump 2.0, what we can be hopeful about for the future, and Star Trek. Messages:   • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine   • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram   • Subscribe to the show wherever you get your podcasts!   • Check out other great podcasts from Multitude like This Guy Sucked About the show: Dreaming Against the Machine is a podcast about envisioning a realistic and hopeful future. Each week, the show’s host, journalist and astrophysicist Dr. Adam Becker, will have an earnest (and entertaining!) conversation with a guest about possible futures, seen through the lenses of history, science, and culture. In a world where tech oligarchs and their power fantasies are driving visions of the future, Dreaming Against the Machine aims to take back the terms of the public conversation about what our world can and should be. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at…

People in this episode

Host: Adam Becker

Guest: Alondra Nelson

Topics covered

• science policy
• sociology
• US politics
• scientific research
• future of science
• cultural commentary

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Joe Biden, Trump

Books & works: Star Trek

More episodes of Dreaming Against the Machine

• Episode 22: Balancing on the Abyss, with Dave Karpf · September 8, 2026 · 1h 5m
• Sharing a new series from Future Hindsight, Occupy! An Unfinished Uprising. · September 3, 2026 · 40 min
• Episode 21: The AI Bubble, with Matt Scherer · September 1, 2026 · 60 min
• Episode 20: Resisting AI Data Centers, with Alli Finn and Matt Rodriguez · August 25, 2026 · 54 min
• Episode 19: Space Colonization, with Lucian Walkowicz and Erika Nesvold · August 18, 2026 · 60 min
• Episode 17: Weapons of Math Destruction, with Cathy O’Neil · August 4, 2026 · 54 min

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