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Daily Tech News Show

6 Jul 2026 · 32m · 14 chapters

Episode artwork

Technical Tea - DTNS 5304 Experiment Week

In short

DTNS Experiment Week launches a new “Wen and Nikki Untitled Show” about science vs tech, digital detox nostalgia, and whether/how to use AI for learning (flowers/birding). It also discusses a promising multi-cancer blood test and reflects on purpose/craft in software as AI adoption grows.

Guests

Wen (software engineer; BS/MS computer electrical engineering, University of Maryland; ~18 years in tech; works in big tech; DTNS science/tech panelist). Nikki (biologist/neuroscientist; university professor teaching comparative neuroscience; DTNS science correspondent).

Key claims

Retro “digital detox” phones (e.g., Commodore flip phone) can reduce social media while keeping utility. Multi-cancer blood tests may detect cancer-linked DNA clusters; FDA approval is “on route.” AI should be used as a tool, but learning requires doing/remembering.

Notable examples

iNaturalist for flower ID; eBird/Merlin for bird sounds; mammograms as uncomfortable/invasive; poem “For a Student Who Used AI to Write a Paper.”

Written by AI. May contain mistakes.

Chapters

0:06

Meet Wen and Nikki

Wen and Nikki introduce themselves and discuss their backgrounds.

“Over 4 million businesses have skipped the line with Stamps.com.”
2:55

Meet Wen and Nikki

Wen and Nikki introduce themselves and discuss their backgrounds.

“Welcome to a special experimental episode for Experiment Week.”
4:26

The Challenge of Naming

Wen and Nikki discuss the difficulties in naming projects and shows.

“But I have to admit, like, I definitely am biased against tech.”
6:45

Goat Simulator Insights

Discussion about the humorous aspects of Goat Simulator and its cultural relevance.

“There are actually references to goats in the API.”
8:02

Exploring Retro Tech

A conversation about the appeal of retro tech and digital detox.

“I feel like this is maybe how you can tell I'm a self-hating tech person because I never find too many things about tech interesting these days.”
11:34

Tech and Nostalgia

Discussion on how nostalgia influences current tech trends and consumer choices.

“I've considered these because I feel like I'm on my phone too much and I can feel my dopamine like draining away while I'm scrolling.”
14:00

Digital Detox Strategies

Explore unconventional methods to unplug from technology.

“I know if I haven't heard a ding in like an hour, I didn't get any.”
14:58

Exciting Advances in Cancer Detection

Learn about a new blood test that can potentially detect multiple cancers.

“And so the first thing I usually say is like, hey, did you know that like thanks to the COVID vaccine, we figured out how to do a vaccine for breast cancer?”
17:01

The Importance of Non-Invasive Testing

Discuss the benefits of non-invasive cancer screening technologies.

“Yeah, and I have so many feelings, by the way.”
19:50

Ethics and AI in Everyday Life

Discuss the balance between using AI and learning skills in nature and technology.

“and I want to let you know that if you want the newest and hottest beauty products, you have to go to Sephora.”
Show all 14 chapters
22:22

The Role of Purpose in Technology Careers

Examine the existential thoughts around using AI in tech jobs.

“So it's like it's more like part of it was so disappointing because of the promise and this idea that, yeah, we could be doing better in health care and kind of like in terms of cost and accuracy and speed.”
28:00

The Role of AI in Learning and Craft

Explore the balance between using AI as a tool and the value of personal learning.

“And then there's also this feeling that also by doing craft that I'm just...”
31:02

The Joy of Discovery Through Effort

Understand why the process of learning and discovery can be more rewarding than the outcome.

“And you look at every bird and they all look exactly the same.”
36:21

The Joy of Discovery Through Effort

Understand why the process of learning and discovery can be more rewarding than the outcome.

“Over 4 million businesses have skipped the line with Stamps.com.”
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Transcript

Automatic transcript. May contain errors.

0:00Still waiting in line? Again? That's time you'll never get back. Save time and money with Stamps.com. Over 4 million businesses have skipped the line with Stamps.com. Join them to save up to 90 % off carrier rates from your computer or phone right now. Print postage for certified mail, registered mail, and packages in seconds. Then schedule a pickup right from your home or office. For a limited time, go to Stamps.com and use code PODCAST for a free welcome gift. Taxes and fees apply. Your team just added its 67th AI tool and also your 67th security blind spot. The good news? The Vanta agent works like a GRC engineer in the background, finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk, and drafting fixes for you.

0:44Vanta is the platform used by over 16 ,000 fast-moving companies like Ramp, Cursor, and Harvey, who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk. Get started at Vanta.com. This episode is brought to you by Capital One. Capital One's tech team isn't just talking about multi-agentic AI. They already deployed one. It's called Chat Concierge, and it's simplifying car shopping. Using self-reflection and layered reasoning with live API checks, it doesn't just help buyers find a car they love. It helps schedule a test drive, get pre-approved for financing, and estimate trade-in value. Advanced, intuitive, and deployed.

1:23That's how they stack. That's technology at Capital One. When demand slowed for HydroJug, Amazon Ads rising star Hayden Wadsworth pivoted. When our bank account hit near zero, my brother Jake and I had one last shot to save HydroJug. So we engineered the Traveler, a leak-proof, coupler-friendly Tumblr. Amazon Ads enables a business to be able to expand their product shelf because of the visibility and the reach you can get. Each week, our new-to-brand customers make up about 95 % of all of our sales. Watch HydroJug's story at advertising.amazon.com slash rising-stars.

1:59hey everybody tom merit here it is experiment week on dtns this is a yearly tradition where we take the show down during one of the slower times of the year for tech news and we hand over the feed to folks to try out new podcast ideas you're going to get to hear the very first episode of what could go on to become the next tech john or behind the data We're also running a special promotion for Experiment Week this year. If you're not already a DTNS patron and you'd like to give a little value back for the value you get from us, use the code EXPERIMENT and you'll get 26 % off your first pledge, monthly or yearly.

2:37That's 26 % off for 2026. Just use the code EXPERIMENT at patreon.com slash DTNS. Now, on to today's experiment.

2:55Welcome to a special experimental episode for Experiment Week. This is the Wen and Nikki Untitled Show. And we're excited to be there. Hi, Wen. Hi, Nikki. Yeah, I had my notes as the Nikki and Wen show. I like that we both were so gracious as to put the other person first. Yeah, I guess we're a science and tech person. And we met very recently in person. I mean, we actually didn't meet before that, did we? Not even virtually. Not even virtually, because we both do DTNS, but you're the science correspondent, and I'm like the Thursday, Friday co-host. So it's like our voices have been in the same digital space frequently, but not our actual consciousness.

3:36There's not even been any virtual or real FaceTime. Exactly. And we met at Nerdtacular 2026. So if you were there or if you heard our science and tech science versus tech panel, we were on there together. And then we thought this was pretty cool and maybe we should make a show out of it. Yeah. Like about literally two weeks later. That's how excited we were about it. Just because I think it was funny because like like obviously the the theme of the panel was science versus tech. But even just chatting just as like two people and then being two panelists, I just instantly I think we instantly just kind of had like a lot of overlap or a lot of commonality in the things that we like about our respective jobs.

4:17Yeah. And I started out as team science and I left team tech. And I think you had the reverse. I had the opposite. I have to admit, like, I mean, you should definitely watch the panel because I think we have some really great like there's a lot of great things and a lot of good questions and discussions that we did. But I have to admit, like, I definitely am biased against tech. But I think I think even more, I feel, if anything, maybe I reclaimed tech as an identity, but then also really embraced the science part of it or like the science origins of tech or rather. I mean, they're super intertwined is basically what we ended up with.

4:51Yeah, totally. We're basically the same iterative, circular, figuring stuff out kind of people. Yeah. Yeah. Why don't we tell the listeners our qualifications? That sounds fancy, but just in case, why don't you start out? Okay, yeah, I am a software engineer. Your mind might vary on whether you consider that actual engineering, but I think to some extent I am. I have a BS and MS in computer electrical engineering, University of Maryland, go Terps, and I've been working in tech for like 18 years now. So from freelance to government work to now I work for big tech. So, yeah, that's me. And DTNS.

5:33That's true. That's true. I am a biologist and neuroscientist, I guess. I think all of my degrees are in biology, just general biology. And I'm a professor at a university now and I teach stuff like comparative neuroscience. And I'm the tech correspondent for DTNS, which is the only tech or no, I'm not the tech correspondent. I'm the science correspondent. Yeah. But for the tech show, and it's kind of the only tech connection that I do. But like we said, there's kind of a broader umbrella of tech and science. And we kind of – our idea for the show was to just like chat about the vibe in our respective fields, things that we're excited about, and just what we're thinking.

6:12I kind of keep it casual. We also don't have a name. So if you have suggestions for names, we will take them or at least take them into consideration. Is this a thing in science where I think, especially in engineering and especially in programming, software engineering, naming things is hard, whether that's just like a single like variable value in a program to like larger constructs. I feel like we naming is hard both to try to find something that is concise, that captures the meaning, but also that it's not too silly, but like the right amount of silly. yeah yeah and I know I've been told that some grants or some projects will get funded if they have a really cool acronym and like a logo and I'm always looking for the perfect one and I they're always bad like I can never find a good one but I have confidence that eventually for our show we'll figure something out oh I should have thought of this there there is a reference to because I know that you you are a goat behaviorist is that correct yeah there are references to goats in the Android, because I'm an Android developer.

7:12That's my day job. There are actually references to goats in the API. Actually, there's a very famous API method called an Easter egg. So it's in the user manager class and is user a goat? Nice. In earlier versions of Android, it would actually return true if the popular game goat simulator was installed on the device. You know, I need to do a live stream of me playing that game. That's in the works. Oh my god. That's amazing. Why wouldn't I? That one and the second one. I would love it also if you could commentate, because I think as someone who, as experts who like to watch, I presume, consume a pop culture that tries to represent our respective fields.

7:53I would love to hear your professional opinions on the Fidelity of Goat Simulator. Oh, yeah. I'm sure I'll have a lot. I love it. If you do a stream, I will totally be on the stream, either as like a friend, either as like the background friend, just like backseat driving or just like in the chat being like, oh, my God. It's a future Patreon episode. Oh, my God. That's amazing. Yeah. So, I mean, I can start. I feel like this is maybe how you can tell I'm a self-hating tech person because I never find too many things about tech interesting these days. We wanted to bring topics that we thought were fun or that interesting to you guys.

8:30Yeah. So one thing that I think is really interesting, and it's almost like, it's almost not regressive, but I think in the face of not necessarily even, you know, we'll probably end up saying AI more than we mean to. But, you know, in the current, you know, like, like kind of environment of the trends and technology is that I think there's always this like theme of people wanting or being nostalgic for different, you know, previous periods in life. There's like a 30 year cycle of pop culture, but that, that retro tech is always a thing. If you're a keyboard nerd, I forgot there's one IBM keyboard that like keyboard enthusiasts, uh, absolutely fetishize.

9:09And it, there's a, there's a really cool trend of retro consumer devices. And the one that I think is back, you know, yeah, the flip phone is back and actually Commodore. So there's layers to the retro of this. So Commodore and the Commodore was a little bit not to date myself specifically or not to make anyone feel feel too old. But the Commodore was a little bit before my time in terms of gaming. But Commodore. It's the OG though. It is the OG. Or was that the. No. Oh, was it the. Was he. One of them. One of them. Yeah, I don't. Yeah. But yeah. And it was. And basically Commodore has made a flip phone, like not just like a razor or something cool, but the old like oblong elliptical thing with a little.

9:52nubbins antenna with the front screen and you need the antenna that doesn't do anything and you need to hold it up in the air because that will help your reception but yeah they made a they made one of those flip phones and it's not it's it's like a digital detox phone but it's not the headline from wired is a digital detox phone that isn't dumb because it still does a lot of things that we expect a modern phone to do like it does have you can do Voice, it has like a front-facing camera so you can do selfies and FaceTime or I guess it's Androids, it wouldn't be FaceTime. But it actually blocks, I think it can block social media.

10:32And it kind of focuses on the utility of the phone as we knew it back whenever this kind of like early, mid-2000s, I think, or mid-aughts or something of when this style of phone was. And I just really like the idea that I think tech always wants to push forward on a consumer level. There's like tech as in more like the science-y tech where we're kind of pushing bounds of like capabilities and processes and how can we do things more efficiently. And then there's like consumer tech where there's like this really interesting guessing game of like what do people want and how do we provide it? And then, you know, at the same time, people trying to leapfrog and be like, well, maybe people will want this thing that they don't currently have.

11:15So there's always this not dumb phone. Do you? This is and this is like going backwards. And I kind of do want it because it has so much. But, yeah, it's trying to focus on the things that I think that we definitely need while leaving room for, I don't know, a more analog experience. So anyway, yeah, that was the kind of thing. I've considered these because I feel like I'm on my phone too much and I can feel my dopamine like draining away while I'm scrolling. And I know it's happening and I'm like, but I don't want to do anything else. And so I'm like, OK, maybe I should just buy. OK, so there's a flip phone that's like Barbie branded.

11:50Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. But when I was when we were early iPhone era, I didn't have an iPhone because I was a broke student and I traveled a lot internationally. And so none of my apps worked abroad. And I'm a little traumatized from like not having Google Maps, not being able to like check into the museum because I can't download the thing on my phone. And like a lot of stuff now has functionality where you need a smartphone. And then I'm like, well, at that point, I might as well just block social media on my actual smartphone and keep all the functionality. So I mean, that's my excuse. So I don't know if I'd be convinced if someone sent me one, I would try it out.

12:26But I'm like, yeah, do I just am I just trying to buy an object to make myself feel better? that I'm trying to like consume my social media or can I just delete Instagram? I deleted TikTok. I feel like that's pretty good. That's actually a really huge step. I haven't been able to do that and I barely even use TikTok. No, I think it's an interesting point in that things have become so ingrained that whereas there's an easy solution to the problem, like you said, uninstall every social media app you have or just don't look at it that as human beings, we still need that kind of explicit step. Well, not even explicit step, explicit like guardrail.

13:01I need the Instagram app because like sometimes I use it to do some promotion for my like local sports team or like my lab. And so I'll just have to reinstall it again. And anyway, I have this whole narrative in my head. Right. But I guess I would maybe not use that phone as much as I thought I would. Yeah, I think there's a yearning, but there's a yearning. There's a yearning for it. And another one I kind of mentioned, like this is not a new thing, but there's a whole class of like retro cameras where they're not actual film cameras, which are coming back into style as well. but they're in between they're like digital cameras but they are nothing like you know whatever even sony point and shoots there they have like just the simple viewfinder so it's just a piece of plastic or glass that you look through and i think uh jason howell um one of our co-hosts on dtness um has one where you actually like a disposable camera had that wheel that made that really nice like mechanical like crunch crunch crunch crunch crunch um and you use that to go to the next page and there's an optional mode where you have to wait 24 hours to see the photos to kind of mimic that experience of like we're forcing ourselves into these boxes yeah it's it's it's that kind of we need to force ourselves into a different i kind of like it and i i've seen a tiktok trend when i had tiktok where people would like make their phone tethered so they like buy a case and like put a chain on it and chain it to the wall and have only this one chair that they could send in but it's a really uncomfortable chair and i was like i kind of like that vibe or just like put it in a certain box for a certain amount of hours i've actually turned my notification sound back on so that I'm not constantly checking whether I've gotten a message.

14:34I know if I haven't heard a ding in like an hour, I didn't get any. Also, I made my ding into the sound of a frog and it makes me way happier. So those are my tips for unplugging. Well, on that note, the Commodore, I think, does have like some old like 8-bit music cues. So there seems to be like a definite commonality in how we all are trying to digital detox in certain ways regardless of whether i guess our our nostalgia fits like the mid-2000s versus i mean what i guess whatever that tipping point yeah i can bring my good vibe story also to the table i actually heard this on the radio speaking of uh you know not digital news but uh there is a new form of blood test that came out that uh can detect multiple types of cancer um and i find that really exciting whenever people usually and this happens to you and I, too, when we start talking science, we eventually close the loop where we start getting really depressed.

15:35Yeah. And so the first thing I usually say is like, hey, did you know that like thanks to the COVID vaccine, we figured out how to do a vaccine for breast cancer? And this is my new next thing is like, did you know we've got blood tests for cancer now? Now they are on route to FDA approval, but it detects like four or five different types of cancer potentially. Why it's taken this long, it's because of our knowledge of genetics. So I think the way it works is it can detect certain gene sequences and lengths and quantities within your blood. And based on the match of certain cancers and how that would look if it mutates, they're able to detect that.

16:14And I will say, I think in our DTNS like future prediction episode, maybe last year, the year before, I talked about blood tests getting better because in my field, people have been working on Alzheimer's blood test detection that uses a similar technique. It's more RNA than DNA. But that is where it's not great right now. But you can tell that like it's gonna be good. Like once the technology catches up and it's non-invasive, like before to screen for, you know, breast cancer, colon cancer, you have to get an exam, the mammogram or CT. Like that's pretty invasive. It costs money and a blood test would be amazing.

16:51You could just do it annually and scan for all these. I think it's pancreatic, breast, colon and maybe lung cancer. I should have read the article. Yeah, I find that really exciting. So great news. Yeah, and I have so many feelings, by the way. This is a good reminder to me because I am two years late on getting my mammogram. But as you said, they're actually pretty invasive. My sister and I were talking about it. She's in the age range, but she just had a baby in the last year, so she's still breastfeeding. So mammograms aren't probably great. Can I say lactating on this show? It's a women's show.

17:30I guess so, yeah. That's not a censor. We were joking. menopause and periods okay continue uh no absolutely no sorry i should i should be fearless about this but um yeah maybe doing a mammogram where i suppose if you're not a woman and you haven't had a mammogram yet it is squeezing the breast tissue like it it is it's not it doesn't quite it didn't hurt me but it was uncomfortable so imagine that and that's a very small in a way barrier to like making you know the yourself diagnosis free but it's kind of the same thing as going to the dentist you're kind of like oh yeah schedule that appointment and that's why It's been two years and imagine.

18:05And I think that's just so important. It feels like also that there could be something here with like costs because we live in the U.S. Yeah. And thinking about getting these blood tests covered by government health care. So I mean, it would save the whole world so much money because, you know.

18:22Your team just added its 67th AI tool and also your 67th security blind spot. The good news? The Vanta agent works like a GRC engineer in the background, finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk, and drafting fixes for you. Vanta is the platform used by over 16 ,000 fast-moving companies like Ramp, Cursor, and Harvey, who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk. Get started at Vanta.com. Still waiting in line? Again? That's time you'll never get back. Save time and money with Stamps.com. Over 4 million businesses have skipped the line with Stamps.com. Join them to save up to 90 % off carrier rates from your computer or phone right now.

19:06Print postage for certified mail, registered mail, and packages in seconds. Then schedule a pickup right from your home or office. For a limited time, go to Stamps.com and use code PODCAST for a free welcome gift. Taxes and fees apply. This episode is brought to you by Capital One. Capital One's tech team isn't just talking about multi-agentic AI. They already deployed one. It's called Chat Concierge and it's simplifying car shopping. Using self-reflection and layered reasoning with live API checks, it doesn't just help buyers find a car they love. It helps schedule a test drive, get pre-approved for financing, and estimate trade-in value.

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21:00So I guess in general, is it for all these different cancers? Is it literally just understanding? And is it just that we just have had needed time and resources to put into that understanding? I think it's the precision of the instruments also is a big deal. So like genetic detecting right now where we're at, we're at the point where we can do single cell genetics. But it's and we've been able to do that for a little bit. But but first of all, it costs a lot of money. Like if I want to go send my goat samples to do single cell, it's like ten thousand dollars a sample. But I don't know because I don't actually do this blood work.

21:37But I'm assuming that we finally got into a point where we have enough precision and we can streamline it enough and do like loads of samples at once. that this now is becoming relevant for patients. And I just think it's really exciting. Like by the time I start getting really old, I can get this test. So I think it would be pretty cool. Not to, I don't want to make it a downer, but this is actually quite positive because I think in the tech world, obviously one of the unfortunate stories in the last like 20 years has been Theranos, which as I understand it, I thought about Theranos too. I was like, let's hope it's not a Theranos situation.

22:12No, but if this is true, But I think that what was so disappointing was the hope that, you know, we could do things like this and the promise of it. So it's like it's more like part of it was so disappointing because of the promise and this idea that, yeah, we could be doing better in health care and kind of like in terms of cost and accuracy and speed. And so I think if anything, this is like a positive note. It wasn't just a pipe dream that someone that was just a scam that will never happen, kind of like other things in the tech space and fail tech companies, but that it just needed more time and resourcing.

22:48Yeah, and it's not – they're not promising like, well, solve all your problems. It's like this is a very specific test. They're targeting specific DNA clusters. And that to me makes sense. And it's similar to – I do some work like this in my goats actually and you do it clinically where you look for certain biomarkers. So you look for certain proteins. If you have, if you're familiar with anyone who has Alzheimer's, you're looking for amyloid beta. And if it gets more and more and more in the blood, that means you already have a lot in the brain. So it's like a logical sequence of events. It's, we're not saying like, oh, I can detect that in 10 years, your legs are going to fall off.

23:21Like, you know, so, and I, you know, I, I didn't use the AI overview of this paper. I read the NPR piece. I didn't read the publication, but just, just to be sure. um and speaking of ar overviews uh we got a listener question for a show that it's the first episode of the show so i feel like we're on a good path i know and um this question is related to nerdtacular so uh during the kind of tms meetups if you haven't been to one i as the biologist i do a nature walk every year with people or at least for the last three years and so this year we went out uh outside of salt lake and i brought uh one of our hopefully listeners or potential or future listeners.

24:02We're time traveling in this episode. Cap, and so Cap submitted a question related to the nature walk and to tech. And he says that he noticed several times wondering what kind of flower we were looking at while we were doing our nature walk. And he almost pulled out his phone a couple of times to ask GPT to identify, but then he said he really just wanted to live in the moment and take some pics and just remember this moment. So his questions are, what are the ethics of using AI? And he kind of wanted an answer that was more like power usage and pollution and so on. But I don't know about that.

24:32And I'm not an expert about that. And the thing that came to me that I wanted to answer, so sorry, Cap, I'm twisting your question entirely, but is more about like, what if I wanted to learn how to identify flowers? Should I use AI? How should I go about this? So I have an answer in mind. When do you want to give me your idea first? Or how do you want to do it? Yeah. So I thought about this a lot. And there were a couple things that I thought of. And I don't mean to be so negative, but also I think it's also the value of learning. You can be negative because I have a positive. Okay, great. So I read a couple articles this week, which I thought were kind of speaking to me because as an engineer, especially as a software engineer, I've been having an existential crisis about what is it.

25:17And it's not even I can pinpoint it other than like specific things that are more, you know, the ethics of particular businesses or like kind of like if you want to talk about the economics of whether we whether whether we are not an AI bubble, put all that aside. Do you mean like AI and software ethical? Yeah. Or more like what is, it's not even like ethics, but more just like an existential crisis about what am I doing here and what is my job? And I think there is a sense of like, not quite ethics, but it's not even morality, but this feeling of loss of craft and of responsibility to my job.

25:54And not to say that if you use AI that you're not being responsible because plenty of people are. But that I think that there's something about when, especially it comes also to like the driving force behind the job is like, why do people become software engineers? Definitely in the top three is money because we're overpaid. But I found this really great article by this gentleman who said part of it has been a lot of it is like mission, which is kind of reflecting, I think, what we talked about on our panel. is like a lot of times I think I feel like I am so inclined to the way that science and how I presume research and academics work because I feel like there's a mission and something that you're going towards that will better things on a wide scale.

26:37Maybe it's not like as pragmatic and like short term, but it feels like, I don't know, the world is slightly better. That's a tough one. I mean, is it a tough one? Yeah. You could tell that to yourself. I don't think that's exactly what's happening. Okay. I mean, you know, I studied goat headbutting. Will that eventually better the world like maybe in a hundred years but certainly not during my lifetime you know i mean sometimes we're finding out stuff for the sake of finding out stuff and like i can't always say that i'm going to cure cancer like these people did with the well and i mean i work i i work on smartphone apps um i used to tell people back in the day like i i value anybody else because in my industry the one like the the million dollar app ideas was the fart was the fart app you know what I mean?

27:20And we were all wondering, why didn't I think of the fart app? You're like, why am I doing fart apps? But yeah, this is also a cultural thing, because I feel like a lot of us got sold on the mission of whatever our company is, not necessarily a fart app company, but, you know, just like different companies. I think I found our episode title. Fart apps. Fart apps save the world. But that also like craft. And I think that there's like a sense of responsibility. I mean, you can kind of see it more in things like civil engineering and things where maybe, you know, safety and compliance and things like that, where there is an ethical moral responsibility to do your craft at a high level because it directly affects people, not just their lives, but their safety.

28:02And then there's also this feeling that also by doing craft that I'm just... Are you thinking that, like, because AI can do some of the parts of your job, that that's what's bringing in the question of, like, well... what do I do now? What do I do now? Yeah. What is my purpose? Or would you recommend that like people who want to do this job should use AI, should not use AI, should try and learn without it? Yeah, it's learning. That's the part that's really gotten me is, and what I've tried to emphasize is that it's a really great tool and it is best wielded right now. Maybe this will change. Yeah, I will.

28:38By a human with knowledge, but that also learning why something works and why something doesn't work. is feels just so incredibly valuable still. And also part of why I like my job. Yeah, it's like puzzle solving. I think a lot of us like puzzle solving in science and technology, like we like solving problems and solving puzzles. And so it feels like the joy comes out a little bit when, you know, when we either from incentive or just from the mechanics of how this is all being adopted. We are disincentivized from learning. And we're just focusing on outputs. And I'll bring that back to the listener's question.

29:21And that's exactly the answer that I was going to say. Yes, you could ask AI to identify the flower, but wouldn't it be so much more rewarding if you put in the work to figure out what it was? I'm not saying you can't use certain tools, and I'll give a good list of what I would recommend. So let's say the first time you see this like uh what is it in shrek blue flower red thorns and you want to find out what it is you can look up like what's a blue flower with red thorns and now you know that it's the blue flower red thorn shrub but but then like you make the effort to memorize it and then next time you see it you're like oh i know this flower i know that it grows in like rocky outcrops and in california or whatever um and then doing that additively is yourself like growing the knowledge So I actually wanted to ask you how this works, but I really like iNaturalist for this.

30:12So you can take a picture of your flower plant, whatever, and it will give you the best guess of a match. I think we said that that's not it's not a generative. It's probably machine. It's probably computer vision. Computer vision. So is that like a pattern matching type? Yeah, I I'm less computer. Yeah, computer vision. yeah is more is it is like a distinct type of artificial intelligence but yeah it's like interpreting visual information and there's input from users i know that like correct as well so i really like that app and that one i feel like okay the first time you do it you're like okay i know what this flower is and then you would when you go out next time like try yourself to remember okay what are the characteristics like it has four petals you know it's in this certain area and like doing that brain work is the reward even though it's hard like the hard part is the reward also because i'm a bird watcher i have to recommend things that work similarly ebird and merlin merlin does the sound id it works really well but always rely on your own learning of the sounds and i will say like as a birder the first time during covid that i went bird watching i got the book uh the sibling bird guide and you open it up it's a thick book and you're like um that's a lot of birds.

31:27I don't think I'll ever know them. This is really daunting. And you look at every bird and they all look exactly the same. And then you learn one. And then next time you go, you know, two of them and it becomes a hobby that's interesting because you put in the effort to learn it. That doesn't mean you can't go use a reference or a tool, but if you rely on it every single time, you probably won't retain that information. So we both approach that from a completely opposite angle. But I think we came back to the same consensus, which is like the questioning and you know putting in the work is the fun part and you can use it as a tool if you want but um on on this i i found this actually really inspiring it's gonna be it's gonna be a hard article to get access to because i think it's i triple e maybe it's not but there was this article because i think actually at our panel someone brought up a really great advancement i think in combinatorial geometry i don't even know for you for reminding that i just remember it was a math question and yeah it was like a pretty impressive um i think it was cool Yeah.

32:22And so there's this whole article from IEEE, which is the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. I spent a lot of my undergrad reading articles from IEEE. But the title of it was what it means to be a mathematician when AI does the math. And it's very much in this, it's basically the same thing that this other article that I talked about with a software engineer, where a lot of it is people, a lot of people in the mathematics field apparently just enjoy the long drawn out process of figuring out something like doing it like figuring like the step by step, and sometimes years long process of understanding or proving something.

33:02And there's a really great quote by Jeremy, I'm going to pronounce this family name incorrectly, Carnegie Mellon University mathematician, Jeremy Avogat. And he says, quote, sometimes understanding just strikes you as being very beautiful. Sometimes it's a feeling of accomplishment, like completing a marathon. But it's not quite either of those. It's just a wonderful feeling when you've been thinking long and hard about something complex, difficult, and all of a sudden it just comes together. And I feel like that is like. And I also had a quote to close out. Oh, I love it. See, this is why we want to do a show together.

33:34Yes. Okay. So this is a poem by Joseph Fasano, and it's called For a Student Who Used AI to Write a Paper. I have this on my door, my work. And it says, now I let it fall back in the grasses. I hear you. I know this life is hard now. I know your days are precious on this earth, but what are you trying to be free of? The living, the miraculous task of it. Love is for the ones who love the work. I think that summarizes what we're trying to say. I think so, too. And there's not to say there's anything wrong with maybe an output focused way of doing things, but that doing something in and of itself is absolutely beautiful.

34:10Enjoy the process. Yeah. Yes. Enjoy the process. Much better way of phrasing it. So, yeah, I think we'll just call it. I think that's that's that's our time for this. We hit our time perfectly. We did. Absolutely. So I would say if give us feedback, but be nice. and you can give us feedback at DTNS or on our, we'll plug our socials and you can give us that. And then also give us a Q &A, you know, listener question for next episode, which might be in a month if you liked our show. So when, where can people find you? You can find me. I'm going back on social media. I was inspired by Nerdtacular because just like learning is the beautiful aspect of life, so is community.

34:49And so I'm trying to reach back out partly by doing, you know, things like this show uh but yeah um blue sky queencodemonkey.dev and on instagram queencodemonkey i have a very long very very long handle um very long also randomly typing.com is my personal website so awesome i'm over at nicoleackermans.com that's with an s uh that's my website and that's where my research stuff is but i have the same handle on blue sky and that's where i post dumb stuff um and you can also get a message to us at the dtns uh socials that's daily tech news no dtns show on blue sky instagram and dtns.com i think dailytechnewsshow.com yeah and x and threads and other places yeah there we go thank you it's easy to mask it on yeah and with that i think thanks for listening and happy experiment week i hope tom has a great vacation Me too.

35:44And yeah, again, let us go. Bye. Bye.

35:58The DTNS family of podcasts, helping each other understand. Diamond Club hopes you have enjoyed this program.

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Huyen and Niki talk tech and science. Discussing their favorite news this month and interrogate AI's place in learning.


Starring Dr. Niki Ackermans, Huyen Tue Dao 

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