Welcome to AI in the AM: RL for EE, Oversight w/out Nationalization, & the first AI-Run Retail Store

About this episode

This episode discusses the use of reinforcement learning in circuit board design, AI behavior in politics, and features an AI-run retail store.

This special AI in the AM episode features Sergiy Nesterenko of Quilter on using reinforcement learning for circuit board design, Andy Hall of Stanford on AI behavior in politics and new governance models, and Lukas Peterson and Axel Backlund of Andon Labs on their AI-run retail store in San Francisco. Nathan and Prakash also reflect on the pace of AI progress, the public reaction to existential risk, and why constructive civic action matters as AI systems grow more powerful and autonomous. Sponsors: Roboflow: Roboflow's free 2026 Vision AI Trends report analyzes 200,000+ real-world projects to reveal how top companies are deploying Vision AI and turning proprietary data into an edge. Download it now at https://roboflow.com/trends VCX: VCX, by Fundrise, is the public ticker for private tech, giving everyday investors access to high-growth private companies in AI, space, defense tech, and more. Learn how to invest at https://getvcx.com Tasklet: Build your own Cognitive Revolution monitoring agent in one click.Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (07:57) Live stream kickoff (09:52) Sam Altman…

People in this episode

Hosts: Nathan, Prakash

Guests: Sergiy Nesterenko, Andy Hall, Lukas Peterson, Axel Backlund

Topics covered

• reinforcement learning
• AI governance
• AI in retail
• civic action
• AI progress
• existential risk

Keywords

• reinforcement learning
• circuit board design
• AI governance
• retail store
• existential risk
• civic action
• AI progress

Sponsors

Roboflow, VCX, Tasklet

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Quilter, Stanford, Andon Labs, Fundrise

More episodes of "The Cognitive Revolution"

• AI:AM Highlights: Welcome to the AGI Era · September 5, 2026 · 2h 21m
• Write, Change, Recall, Forget: MongoDB's Pete Johnson on How Retrieval Drives Agent Performance · September 1, 2026 · 1h 37m
• AI:AM Highlights: Recursive Self-Improvement, Rushed and Vibe-Coded? · August 28, 2026 · 2h 12m
• RL's a Hell of a Drug: Metagaming, Reward Seeking & Motivated CoT Reasoning – Bronson Schoen, Apollo · August 26, 2026 · 2h 14m
• AI in the AM — Weekly Highlights: Relaunch Week (Aug 17–20, 2026) · August 22, 2026 · 2h 34m
• Let There Be Germicidal Light: This $500 Fixture Could Stop the Next Pandemic, from Complex Systems · August 16, 2026 · 1h 25m