Intro

Should we push AI forward as fast as possible, or be more careful about how it develops? 

Two competing views are emerging: 

• e/acc (effective accelerationism): go faster, progress is the only path forward
• d/acc (defensive / decentralized acceleration): accelerate, but carefully, or risk losing control

In this episode of the a16z crypto show, Vitalik Buterin (Ethereum founder) and Guillaume Verdon aka "Beff Jezos" (Extropic founder & CEO,) join Eddy Lazzarin (a16z crypto CTO) and Shaw Walters (Eliza Labs founder) for a deep debate about these two perspectives and what they mean for AI, crypto, and the future. 

They discuss: 

• Whether acceleration is something we can control
• The biggest risks of AI, from surveillance to concentration of power
• Why open source and decentralization may shape who benefits
• Whether slowing down AI is realistic or even desirable
• How humans stay relevant in a world of increasingly powerful systems
• What the next 10, 100, and 1,000 years might look like
• At its core, this episode asks: Can acceleration be steered, or is that beyond our control?

Highlights: 

00:00 Opening 

07:02 Thermodynamics and first principles 

16:04 Acceleration, entropy, and civilization 

28:29 The core disagreement 

32:42 Comparing and contrasting e/acc and d/acc 

36:20 Open source, open hardware, and local intelligence 

54:18 Should AI be slowed down? 

1:02:35 Autonomous agents and artificial life 

1:21:07 Crypto as the trust layer between humans and AI 

1:35:37 Closing arguments 

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