Life Uncut - Kissing for Science & The AI's Doomsday Clock

Episode Date: September 15, 2026

Hey Lifers!   Welcome back to your Wednesday episode, we’re going from group chat nude disasters to the actual end of the world, and somehow it all makes sense… maybe? 😂   We kick off with something suspicious happening with smartphones, before diving into a listener's mortifying story about a fitness-challenge weigh-in photo that went very, very wrong in the group chat. That spirals into a full debate on accidental nudes, a cowboy hat photo that ended a study group friendship, and the great "archived d pic" theory (girls, do you think they save them down?).   Then we get into it: Apparently the average goodbye kiss lasts less than a second, but science says six seconds is the magic number for connection. So… I guess we now all have  a 30-day kissing challenge? There's also a very funny detour into New Zealand vs Australian vocab (RIP to Ben, who spent a whole afternoon believing Melbourne had built a public "birthing" pontoon), a Jason Momoa red carpet encounter that still haunts Soph to this day,   And then we get into the deep stuff. How far do you you push your kids to build resilience? What’s the balance and how do we know if we’re being too soft as a society, or maybe it’s a good thing? Then we unpack the AI thread that's taken over everyone's feed this week: a former Anthropic/OpenAI researcher publicly warning AI could "kill us all by 2030”. It's a heavy, important conversation about accountability, regulation and what (if anything) the average person can actually do about it.   We close it out gently with our sweets for the week and phewww that was a big one (also you’re welcome for leaving the off mic moment there in the middle… if you enjoyed it let us know hahah).  Go join the Facebook discussion group if you haven't already, that's where all the good stuff goes down. YOUTUBE TIMESTAMPS 00:00 — We’ve got beef with our phone again 02:51 — The naked scale photo that went into the wrong group chat  11:41 — The six-second kiss challenge 18:05 — NZ vs Australian slang and the "public birthing pontoon" mix-up 27:11 — How hard should you push your kids to build resilience? 34:30 — Is AI actually going to end the world in 10 years? 47:33 — Sweets for the week   You can watch us on Youtube Join us on tiktok Or join the Facebook Discussion Group Hosted by Britt Hockley & Laura Byrne Produced by Sophie Nathan Video Produced by Vanessa Beckford & Lachy Pugsley Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friend and share the love because WE LOVE LOVE! XxSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hi guys and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncutt. I'm Laura. I'm Brittany. I have a question for everybody. Just to get a right off. Coming in hot. Breathy, breathy question. No, I do genuinely have a question. Yeah, usually after you say that, you ask the question. No. You don't have to tell me you have a question five times. Brittany, I would like you to brace yourself because I have a question. Hang on. Is there a question coming? There is. No, I don't know if anyone else has noticed this, but I think something's changed about our phones.

This does not sound like a hot take, but it is. I trust me. We need to get my tinfoil hat out for you. No, you know how back in the day auto-correct on your phone, so you could write something that was completely nonsensical on your iPhone, and it would figure out what it is that you were writing. You could literally write because, and you could write B, E, C, and then the rest of it could be garbage,

and it would figure out what you wanted to say, and it would just autocorrect. I think that's changed, because now every single time I write a text message or I write an email, I have to be so conscious about what I'm typing, because if you write something that's gobbledy gook, It's like, oh, you meant to say, be cobblicles? Well, send it. Go, go for gold.

They're probably gone, God, these guys are lazy now. They can't even type, they don't even know how to spell. Good. It's probably done it intentionally. No, I'm sorry, you can't make me dumber than take it away from me. You can't make me unable to write a text message and then expect me to be able to like learn that skill again. What I will say is I have noticed the same thing.

I'm de-evolving. Because I have de-evolved also, because I've noticed now that when it doesn't preempt what you're trying to say, I'm like, how do I do I? I spell hemorrhoids. And we've talked about hemorrhoids a lot lately. And I have gone to type hemorrhoids in. Wait, spell it for me now. Spell hemorrhoids.

I can't. I can't. Every single time I have to spell hemorrhoids, I've got to look it up on Google. Spell hemorrhoens. No, this is a great spell test between Britt and Laura. It's like, seventh grade spelling B. Spell hemeroid. It's like, it's not, isn't it like H-A-E-E-E-E-E-A-E-M-O-R-E.

It's got a stupid letter in there. It's got an O in there or something. I think it's like H-A-E-M-O. Oh, R-H-H-O-H-O, no, R-R-H-O-H-O-I-D. Do you know what it's messed up? It's the amount of times that we use the word hemorrhoid and we type the word hemorrhoid and also the fact that I have them. All of this is fucked up.

And anyway, it's an observation. I have a bone to pick with Apple and I think that they should fit. We are talking about AI taking over the world on this episode. So that was a really nice segue into it. I actually think that's the little. last and the least most important bone that we need to pick with AI, anthropic, whoever. Like, it's more important now that we're all going to die in 10 years than it is that

we can spell. What's the point in learning to spell if we're going to die? Yeah, well, then why are they trying to make me spell better? Let's not start the episode with the doom and gloom. We're going to talk about the tinful hat stuff in a second. We've got some other stuff to get through first. I do have one quick lifer update that I wanted to give you guys because this made me really laugh.

So remember a few weeks ago you were telling the story on the pod laws? In case you guys missed it. Laura told a story about what happened in her group chat texts at school. No, it wasn't mine. It was in a friend. Yeah, yeah. Sorry. And it was actually, I know when people tell a story and they're like, oh, this happened

to a friend of mine, it legitimately happened to a friend of mine. There was a nude sent into the kids group WhatsApp chat. Not to the kids, but the kids' parents chat. The school chat, the class chat. Well, we had a life that wanted to write in and add to that conversation. So I just wanted to read it to you. Oh, my God. It's probably the mom.

No, it's not. Oh, fuck. I thought it was the mom being like, sorry, hands up. I sent a full bush photo to all the other mum. She said, dear Laura, fuck you for telling my secrets on the podcast. You, mole. You've been kicked off canteen, Judy. No, that's not what it is.

It says, circling back to Laura's recent story about her WhatsApp homework photo mishap, where mum's pubic hair made an unexpected guest appearance. I just felt like I needed to tell you. I had a very similar situation once when I was doing a fitness challenge, and I had to send a photo of my weight on the scales to the group chat. I took the photo, jumped on the scales completely naked. Why? Who knows?

But I wanted to weigh less without my clothes on. That's what I'm assuming. I added that bit, just in case. So not give a second thought, I took the photo completely naked. Why, who knows? Apparently, modesty had left the building. My scales were black glass. So basically, I took an up-close mirror image of my hoo-ha.

Needless to say, I probably quit the fitness challenge and returned to my usual lifestyle of consuming copious amounts of chocolate. is so fully closed, I'm not okay. So this is not even like people she knows. It's a random challenge. She upskirted herself and they sent it to the group chat. And you know how it would have looked to. Oh my God, I mirror image.

This is my question though. If you accidentally do something like this, like if you do send an accidental nude into a group chat, if you're the person who receives that, what are you doing? Are you like privately messaging them on the side saying like, hey, you might want to delete that photo? Are you just screenshoting it, sending it to your friends? Like, how are we navigating receiving this? type of content. I think it's illegal to screenshot and then share that. I don't think you can send

that nude around. So if you've ever done that, delete that. I think she played it right. I think she quit the challenge was the right thing to do. I don't, especially because usually these challenges go for like 12 weeks or whatever else. They're long challenges. It's like everyone's sending their food and their weights and then you just send your snatch. Have you guys ever received an unsolicited accidental nude? An unsolicited. Lots of unsolicited, but they weren't accidental. No, unsolicited, but definitely intentional. Intentional nude. I've had an accidental nude sent to me. Mine was back during sort of university years and it was kind of a similar like a study group and it was from one of the guys in my study group and unfortunately it wasn't just a nude.

He was standing there fully nude with a cowboy hat firm and said, why ride a horse when you can ride a cowboy? How did you get it? He sent it to me accidentally and then I got like 50 messages from him like please don't open that. Oh my, I don't know how to unsent. Please don't open this. Like, I don't know what it was on Snapchat.

Of course I opened it. I had to check. But he sent me like 100 messages. Never looked me in the eye again. He's pleading you not to open it. And you're like, I've got to do it now. Never looked me in the eye again.

And I think on the last day of uni, I said see a cowboy. That was about it. Wow. Wow. See, I would have thought that if that happened, it was intentional.

Like, he meant to send it you and he was gauging your response. No, the amount of messages, like please, please, please, please just forget it. ignore it, don't open it, but you can't not open a notification on your phone. But you know what the bigger question is? Who was that meant for? Is that turning anyone on? Probably. A cowboy hat naked being like right a cowboy? I would have taken it back in the day. I reckon back in the day I received some fucking weird big picks that I was fine with. I was thrilled by them.

I look, ew. I just agree. Ew. The most depressing one, and I've talked about this before, I was dating a guy and I mentioned to him, he was in L.A. at the time. We were having like a flirty text exchange and it was at a point where I had never received a dick pick before. Somehow he was, we got into the conversation of nudes and I was like, actually, never received one. To which he responds, obviously, with the dick pick and it was a rock hard, he had a lovely penis, anyway, but it was taken in his home. So it was just an archived dick pick. Like it was a dick pick that he'd saved to wheel out any time he needed. I think guys do this. I'm pretty sure they save them down. Sorry, girls do too.

You get, oh, you can get a killer nude where everything, the world just works, the light works, your bod works. That's coming out again. If your relationship breaks down and you start fresh and things in your life have deteriorated, you go back to the good mood. Yeah, but there was something that was really unsatisfying about the fact that I knew it was taken for someone else because he was in LA. So I was like, oh, this is one that was pre-taken. You know it was great. You saved it to a folder and you wheel it out. you're probably sitting on a bus somewhere right now.

Like you're at nowhere in your life are you in the headspace or the zone to be able to do what you'll say you're doing. And you've sent me a cockshot from the archive. Laura, you are absolutely kidding yourself if you think every sexy conversation that has gone down that includes nudes and sexting is actually happening in real time. I agree, but I want the illusion that it is. I would like him to have at least taken it in a hotel room. You say that. I wouldn't be none the wiser. Or cut out the background.

I don't know. Just make it really cropped in. Maybe just like do it in black and white and really zoom in so I can't place the grain to it. So it blurs the background. Do you remember back in the day there used to be a website and it was, um, right we go. More is going into it like, it was like shit on me.com.

What? No, it was rate my dickpick.com. And it was a woman who would, who would anonymously, she was like doing God's work. She would anonymously rate people's dickpicks. And it was so funny. So, okay, I know, I'm not, I do not. enjoy unsolicited dick pick. Okay, this is not what this is. But basically, men would send in

their dick pics to her and she would rate them on things like composition, color, angle. I would find myself on this website. Laura? Looking at cock shots and reading her curated reviews. You had it. She'd be like four out of ten. This, you've put in absolutely no effort. The composition the angle. And Laura's like, I would have taken it up. I would have given that a nine. You're only given that a four. It's been so long since I've received a penis shot. Matt would never. He would never. It was hard enough trying to get them out of him in the beginning of our relationship. Now, it's funny. We just, Laura and I were in New Zealand. And we're only gone for two nights.

And we got there. Do you want to talk about loosing again for 25 minutes? No, better than that. We went to our respective rooms, came back out, met for dinner. And I go to, oh, I just took the best hit shot. Sent to Ben. She was like, what? And I was like, want to see it? She's like, not really. And I'm like, it was really good. I was like, you wanted to show someone. And I'm sorry that I wasn't. Because who else did they got to show. I know. I'm sorry I wasn't more supportive, but I think I would have felt a bit uncomfortable if you'd shown me. Would that have really made you feel uncomfortable? You could show me your labia for inspection. It wouldn't make me uncomfortable. Oh, I think it's the sexual nature of it. It's not sexual. It wasn't sexual. It was just like in the mirror. I caught

myself as I was getting into the shower. And I was like, that tans looking fresh. The light was great, wasn't down light. And it just worked. I love that for you. And I also love female friendship. I love the fact that you can take a fire nude of yourself and then be like, I want to show my girlfriend for validation. And I say this because maybe when I was like in a different phase of life and I felt a little bit more confident in my body, maybe I would have had that. But at the moment, the last thing I want to do when I look at myself nude is take a photo of it. Like I am not documenting this postpart of phase of my life. Fuck that shit. I actually had a question. This leads me on to something that I came across this week. When you are not trying to seduce your

husband, just like a normal parting kiss in the morning or like you're walking out the door, give your husband a kiss goodbye or your partner a kiss goodbye. How long are you kissing for? If it's a kiss goodbye from work? How long is the kiss, the duration, seconds wise, minutes wise, I want to know. One second. Yeah, max. I would say people pecking goodbye. Like it's a, and see ya. I ask this because, so apparently statistically, most people, when they're leaving their partners, a one second, below one second is like the normal time for a kiss. But apparently we should all be kissing our partners for a minimum of six seconds in order to like increase connection and also get your good endorphins going for the day,

you know, your oxytocin and everything else. So that's every kiss, even a goodbye kiss. Yes, it's meant to be specifically the goodbye kiss. It kind of sets you up for having both. It doesn't matter who initiated the kiss, but it sets you both up for having a better day. Emotionally, in terms of like your dopamine, your oxytocin for the day,

I cannot remember, and this is quite bad now that I've read this. I don't remember how recent it would be that I have kissed Matt for more than six. six seconds unless it is knowing that we're going to have sex. Because I think if I kiss him for six seconds, like, I'm fucked. He's going to be like, well, here we go. But maybe because that's so rare, if you start to make it your normal, it might take more for him to have that desire.

Yeah, but we've got to get through the hump first of him getting the wrong impression. The physical hump, literal metaphorical physically. You need to do a 30 day challenge. We're for 30 days. You just kiss him every single day for six seconds until he like neutralizes. I agree. Normal it out. Six seconds does feel like an aggressively long time, but I'm willing to give it a shot.

I'll do it as well. And we can all do it. Not together with our partners. I mean, I can try. Bye, Sophie. I would be interested to see what it does. I understand it. Like, of course it's going to make you feel more connected.

But I would, especially for you, Laura, because your life is so busy and crazy and crazy and you got the kids and stressful and stuff, I'd be interested for you to do it every day for 30 days and see how you feel after. Yeah, we've been particularly bad. recently, I would say. Like, we've been particularly fleeting in our intimacy towards each other. And, like, I think relationships go through periods where there's, like, more intimacy and then you go through, like, lulls. And the lulls are, like, kind of unintentional. It's because life is busy or work is busy. Whatever is the reasoning behind it, or one person's watching

traders every night with their mother-in-law. Who knows? But I feel like we're in that at the moment. Why don't you pass, Matt, next time you leave, just leaving the house and just see what he says. Just, just see. Actually, maybe we throw this out to all you guys. Here you go. If you're in a relationship. If you're not, definitely don't do this. But if you're in a relationship and you're wanting to create a little bit more intimacy, there's one that exists, which is like the 30 day challenge and you have to have sex with your partner every day. Couldn't think of anything worse. You know a man started that challenge. Couldn't think of anything worse. But maybe we have a version of it where it's like, try and kiss your partner every day for 30 days for a minimum of six seconds.

And it doesn't lead to sex. Because I think that like, that's the thing that's missing in my relationship a little bit at the moment, intimacy without expectation. And not that Matt has expectation or conditions on me. But it's like when there is intimacy, it's because both of us are like, oh, okay, well, that's where that's going to lead to. But I think if you're intentional with when you do it, that's the way you get around that unexpected hump. All right, well, I'm putting this out there to you guys. Join me. Maybe we started. This was an unintentional segue. This wasn't something that we planned where I was like, I'm going to do a call out to all the lifers. Let's do a survey. Make out with your partners. But I would like to know who would actually do it.

And then I would like to know other people's. Like if you do do it and we kind of like start this from, let's say now, it's Wednesday, let's go. I would like to know what impact it has in your relationship in 30 days. We'll put a thread on the Facebook page. So if you haven't joined the Life Uncut Discussion Group, come join. Answer the question, make sure you do it. And then we'll start a little thread there.

You can join the challenge and 30 days we'll go back to it. And you have to video each one. No, but the reason why is I hope that maybe at the end of 30 days. I would like to get out of the funk that we're in in terms of our intimacy. I mean, I'm probably sharing too much. Matt would be like, thanks for talking about that on the podcast. But you've shared worse than that. No, I know, but there's something that feels like a bit of a relationship failure when you talk

about lack of intimacy, I think. I think it's not a failure at all. I think it's very normal and a very normal part of long-term relationships. You go through lulls, you go through stressful situations, you go through times where you don't even have the energy to put dinner on the table for yourself, then go to bed and have sex. Like, that's normal. It's not a sign that something bad is happening with your relationship. It is a sign that maybe you can recognize it and say, oh, I might put a little bit more

rep it in and like try and get that back on track. But it's not bad. Yeah. And Matt said something to me recently. He was like, do you think there's ever going to be a time where we have sex more than like once a week or once a fortnight? And I was like, fuck. That feels targeted, Matt. Yeah, it did a little bit. And I don't think he intended it like that. But I felt a little bit like I needed to get on the defense because I was like, dude, we've got a one year old and we've got two other kids. And we live with your mom. And like we're working heaps. It's not like we have endless hours in the day where spontaneous intimacy can just arrive. Yeah, you can't just like smooching the kitchen over dinner and then be like, oh, let's do it. Put me on the kitchen bench.

Like, those days are gone. Those days are completely gone. Even just like the, you know, sneak off to have intimacy during the day in your own bedroom has kind of gone. Because like there's always a schedule and there's always someone else who needs us at somewhere in the house. Or kids can just walk in. Yeah. This is a segue, but I often do this. As you guys know, this is a walk down memory lane.

I, um, my grandmother used to have pigeons and we cook damper bread. May, is it time for you to tell your damper bread story now? I could. The fucking don't. If you want, but I'll wait for a natural segue for the damper. I was just thinking about when I was like, oh, your kids could walk in on you. I was like, oh, have any of you guys ever walked in on your parents? Yes.

Yeah, it's scarring, right? Still think about it. Okay, so this is where I'm lucky. Have you so? No. I have, but I don't remember. And this is why it's so brilliant. So my parents said they had four kids 18 months apart in the trenches.

And they said one time ever they decided to have sex on the lounge late at night. They might absolutely kill me for telling this story. The story goes, they were having sex. And then all of a sudden, I'm standing there in a lounge room just staring at them. Ew. And they just froze and looked at me. And you can imagine them being like, what are we doing this moment? Do we say we were wrestling?

And they looked at me for ages. There was silence. And they were like, Brit? Nothing. Staring at them. They're like, oh my God, we've traumatized for life. Then I said to them, if Mitch shoots me, which is my brother. I said, if Mitch shoots me, can I shoot him back?

And then they're like, oh my God. So I was prolific sleepwalker and sleep talker. So I was, I do not remember. So they told me this story as an adult that I just fully sprung them. Hardcore going in action. And I don't remember a thing. And then the next day they were like, okay, how are we going to play this out? Is she going to have a memory of it?

Do we have to bring it up? Do we pretend it didn't happen? And I never, ever remember. This screams to me that if you went to therapy, that would all be unfodied. It's like very deep down. No, now, as a grown woman, I'm like, go for it. I love that my parents were doing that. Oh, I feel differently.

I have a child of divorce, though. Yeah. Oh, anyway. Oh, now I'm thinking about that I solicitorate dick-kick her seeing. Taking a little dog leg with this conversation for a second. So if I have something that I need to talk to you about and I worry for the future of this podcast because of this. And I'm really, firstly, I want to apologize to all the lifers. I also want to apologize to you.

If you ever think I'm mocking you. Okay. I have realized that I absorb people's accents, accidentally. mentally. And I feel as though I am about 99% of the time trying not to speak with a New Zealand accent. Really? Because sometimes I slip into speaking with an American accent. Not on the podcast, but if I've been watching something or listening to something or listening to too many podcasts with American hosts, I will start to speak with an American accent. And recently, I was editing something back and I was like, oh, you're doing it already. I have not noticed. Thank God.

Neither have I. Is there certain words that you feel are like kind of infiltrated? trading. No, it's not specific words. I feel like obviously New Zealanders have very specific words that they say that are different. It's just an overall tone that at times I have to be like, that's not your voice. Go back. You're just melting into me. Yeah, I just want to be a part of you. Six second kisses. Here it comes. It is a phenomenon, right, where people, you mimic the sound that you hear, which is why there's like kids that have Australian accents from watching too much bluey and they're American. Well, I think the reason is because we have a sympathetic reaction to people. There's some psychology around the way in which we build connections and friendships.

And it's like this mirroring effect that happens sometimes. But it's like everyone has that story about the friend that moved to the UK for three months and came back with like an English accent. I would be that person if I went away for a little while. The three days. Yeah, that's what it is. Also, do you know what I learned when I moved to Australia? So I've only been here for two and a half years, maybe three years.

There are certain words which to me are completely normal. and I had no idea they do not exist in Australian language. Like what? For instance, if I said, hey, can I have a vivid, what do you think I'm asking for? A vivid. Yeah, I just need a vivid. A vivid. A vivid in New Zealand is a permanent marker.

And it's the brand of it. And it's just what we call it. And there have probably been five or six instances where I say these words, which are just so commonly normal in New Zealand. And people in Australia have absolutely no idea what they are. So if Laura's speaking with a New Zealand accent, tell her, and if I accidentally say a word that you're like, we don't know what the fuck that word is. Oh, no, we'll call it out on that. You don't need to worry. Something funny happened on the weekend in regards to exactly this.

So Ben's English is impeccable. Like, I would say it's 100% fluent. But there's always some words, I guess, he comes across that he might not have seen before or they don't have a direct translation for in German or whatever it is. And so we're down in Melbourne on the weekend on the wharf where all the penguins are. I don't know if you guys have been there, but it's like where all the penguins give birth, they hang out. You can do tours and whatever else. And Ben and I, we went down for the NFL. He's never been to Melbourne.

I very rarely go there. So we were being tourists anyway. And we got to the end of the wharf. And there's like this big map of the wharf on the wall. And then there was just this one pontoon. It had all the rules as well. It was like, no jumping. Don't disturb the penguins.

No diving. And then on the picture, I hear Ben say to me like, he's like, what the hell? And I was like, what? He's like, you're allowed to publicly give birth in Australia? And I was like, I was like, what? He's like, you sickos have built a platform to give birth publicly. And I'm like, what are you talking about? And he's like, public birthing pontoon.

He's like, you actually have a pontoon where people can go and save your birthing groups. And I'm like, I was so confused. And I look at the map. And it's got this pontoon that is built for, it says public birthing pontoon, B-E-R-T-H-I-N-G. So he doesn't understand the spelling of the difference. Now, do you know what birthing is right? To be fair, I wouldn't, well, I know what actual birthing is with an eye,

but I wouldn't know what birthing is with an E. Really? A boat? Yeah. To birth a boat in a marina, burthing is parking a boat. And it's spelled B-E-R-T-H-I-N-G. And so he went around thinking that we built platforms. It was like very, he's like very barren beige.

Imagine if we did. What a better world it would be. You know what? Come here and birth in public with the penguin. No. Because it's a water birth as well. Because he thought there was a pontoon because it was floating on the water and you could like if you want to jump in and get birth, it was a whole thing.

How Earth Mother would we be as a nation if you could just birth in the river? But imagine, no, the river's fine, but St Kilda pontoon in the marina. Imagine you gather around penguins on one side, mother's giving good births on the other side. Got Hamish's DNA here. Make another one. Lick it. You're sicko. I'm going to send him out so he never hides you.

And now I've got that on you. If we actually keep this in, this is really confusing for people. Hamish Blake was just here. We just interviewed him and his coffee cup sitting there and soap was pretending to lick it. She's like, I'll throw that out for you. She just kept it put in a pocket. I think we keep it in. And if you've gotten to this point of the podcast, you're welcome.

Okay, if there was one celebrity that you would do that too, who would it be? Hamish Blake. Fuck off. She's serious. Mine would have been Jason Mamoa a long time ago. Are you just feeling is your... I met Jason Mamoa. And I fully fucked up, mind blank.

Like, it was terrible. He came over. to me and my friend at this movie premiere in New Zealand. He came over and went, hey. And we went, nothing, nothing, he basically hit you up. Nothing. Nothing came out of my mouth. Nothing. I couldn't even, I was been, but nothing. Nothing came out of my mouth. And then he went, okay, and then to keep walking. You blew it. I breathed at Jason Mamaw. Hey, maybe. We never say never. I hearted him. I looked his copycups after when he found it. You know what's funny. That wouldn't it even be his weirdest interaction?

Hi. Jason Mamoa puts down his champagne glass, so fronds over and licks them. Boy, you go to Sophie's house and she has a cabinet of people's used cups. You guys, I took them first week. Mine is missing. Oh, my tummy hurts from laughing. That is the best story I ever heard.

I've always had like a little bit of a, he was my hall pass for a long time, but now he's a bit of a hot mess. A little bit. And when you say that... He just got old. No, he didn't get old. He's gotten a bit like, funky donkey like a bit hippie isn't he and he needs to cut his hair

funky donkey were you interviewing working there or were you there as like a fan what we were there for we were we were invited as the like our radio show we didn't get to interview him but we were invited to so you were looking hot red carpet so he made the beeline for you to say hello we were all on the red carpet together like me and my friend got our photo taken and he then came through with all their other actors and they got a photo taken and then we're all in this little like mingly area which was just for people. So he basically asked you out. He can't, yeah.

I basically asked out by Jason Momoy and I breathed on him. And that was that, that was our date. Do you regret that? Do you think about that moment? Yes, all the time because I go, how the fuck have I speak for a living. I was in radio and I just, I had nothing. I had no game. What would you do differently now?

Let's pretend. Ready? Okay. Hey. Hey. No, I understand. It was no bad. I said it hot up.

So that was no better. You just witnessed an action but with voice this time. You really blew it. And now you're letting your two cars out. You want to take home with his car home? There's like a lot going on. Something I've been thinking about quite a bit recently. And I don't have the answer to this.

And I'm throwing it out there to the brains trust. It is kid related. So if you hate children, fast forward, I'm not offended by any means. Sometimes we get reviews about kids. Well, because I know that like talking about kids is not for everyone. It's not about children specifically. It's about parenting. Yeah, but it's also for half our listeners.

We have half listeners and the other half non-listeners. When the fuck is my brain? We have half of our listeners are parents and half are just like the sophies that are just breathing on people. Well, this is, okay, when I say this is only for parents, it's actually not just for parents. I think that anyone who was once a child, the question is around, how far do you push your children in terms of building resilience and getting them to like stay committed to a sport or committed to some type of. of academic schooling or whatever it is, where is the limit between pushing them because you know that you can get more out of them and they actually can excel in that area and being soft and kind and listening to when they say that they've had enough of something? I say this because

recently Marley, they had like the speech thing that happens at their school. It's like a public speaking. You can go through to all schools. Marley is genuinely incredibly gifted when it comes to public speaking. It's something that she's like always been really confident at. I have seen her public speech and it was very, very good. Yeah, and last year she made it around to the school finals. If you finished first in the school finals, you go through to like an all school, state school thing. This year she had her public speech and I know how much she wanted to make it through last year. So I was like, okay, I'm going to work with her and I'm going to make her practice and I found myself pushing her to practice and to do things. And there was this one conversation I had with

Matt where he was like, dude, she's in you one, let her be kind of thing. And it's because because we'd made the rule, I had made the rule, which was you're going to practice your speech and you're going to say it five times correct. And if you get it wrong, you start again. So you keep doing it until you've memorized this speech. She wasn't against it. She wasn't having a terrible time. She was quite willing because she wanted to do well at the speech. I did feel at one point that there was a little bit of friction in terms of me pushing her to do it and me pushing her academically and her being like, I can't be bothered. And I wonder where is the line with that? Because I do think overarchingly, maybe we're a little bit softer with parenting than what our

parents' generation were. And I'm not saying that that's a bad thing. I think a lot of us probably look at our childhoods in different ways and go, the reason why we're softer is because we want to do it differently. But I do question, where is the line between building confidence in a child and actually getting them to become proficient and good at something? So then they like doing it. And I say this because most of the time with kids, kids don't like doing things they're not good at. So unless you're pushing them to stay disciplined at it and actually trying really hard, how do you build their sense of self-confidence in it? This might be controversial and some people might not like to hear me talk about this because I don't have kids, but I was one of the few people Laura mentioned before that was a kid once.

So I was that kid. So I do have experience. You were once put a time child? I was. Fucking wild. And I also, everyone in my life has kids. It's like I'm surrounded by them. I'm nearly 40 years old. So I have a lot of children in my life. I do think this next generation, most of them, blanket statement, not everyone, but I think they are too soft. And the word soft can be taken the wrong way. But I think we're really in this generation where we have overcorrected from our parents and their parents' generation, which might have been a bit tough. Things would happen back then in those generations that absolutely we would not do now. But I do think that we're in this generation where it's like, I just want my kids to be happy, sure. But that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be

doing things that make them uncomfortable or things that seem hard. When you're a child, you do not know what you are good at. You don't really know resilience yet. And it's important that they build that. And I think if we just let our kid drop out of everything at the first sight of trouble or not being the best at something or it being hard, they'll never do anything and they'll never learn anything. And that joy for something might come after a couple of months of a sport that they weren't good at at the start. I think my parents did it really well. They never forced us to do anything we didn't want to do, but they didn't let us quit too early. So when we started something, I remember, for example, surf life saving. We started it. I hated it. It wasn't for me. But my parents

were like, you're going to see the year out. And then I was allowed to make the decision. And I did that with every sport. And sometimes it completely changed because I wasn't good at the start. And when you're not good at something as a kid, you hate it. I think that so many lessons come from building character, building resilience, finding skills, learning how to dedicate yourself to something and not give up too easily. Like, I do think there's nothing wrong with you leaning in to Miley and making her, like, rehearse, rehearse, rehearse when she wants to give up. Because you are the adult in that situation and you know what the outcome's going to be. You know that she'll be disappointed in herself if she doesn't make it through without putting that effort in. I think that's the balance as

well as what are you doing it for? Are you doing it so that she is proud and successful of what she thinks and believes she can achieve or are you doing it for you? And in this instance, she's so good at it. She loves doing it. And you know as an adult with all your years of wisdom that to be the best at something or to be good at something, you do have to work at it. You have to practice. You have to try. And so that's imparting the wisdom of like, hey, I can see you want this. And if you want this, here are the steps you take. It's not you going, hey, I want to be a parent where My kid is number one with the middle. So therefore, I'm pushing them to do what I think they're doing.

Because like you, Brit, I tried a lot of things as a kid. I cried every single time I started something. I hated not being good at it and I would cry. I think that that's the case the most adults still. Like we don't like not being good at stuff. And so often we give away things early or easily because, like, there's no joy in not doing something efficiently or, you know, feeling as though you're successful in what you're doing. And I think that we've lost the art of getting good.

It's the difference of does your child want to do it in the first place? Or is it based on what you as the adult one? Like, were you a really good football player at school and you really want your kid to be a football because it was your passion and so you're pushing it on them? If your child from the get-go says, I really don't want to do football, I want to do netball and you're like, no, you're doing football because of the opportunity that I missed out on and blah, blah, blah, that's different because you still have to work with your child on what makes them happy.

But if you know they want to do it and they are excited. about it, but they're just scared of working too hard or they're scared of failing. That's when I think the parent steps in to encourage them exactly like you did. You're not making her do public speaking. No, it's an interesting one, isn't it? Because there is a fine line between like nurturing the potential out of your child and imposing potential because you know that they can do something well and you want it for yourself. And I think it's really as a parent, like, asking the question that you kind of pose so of like, am I doing this for me or am I doing this for them? I guess in this instance, it's very much because I see potential in her.

But I want to be careful because I think it's too easy to say that parents are too soft on their kids these days and that we're not able to, you know, create resilience or any of those things. I just think that we think about it more. And I think that, you know, because potentially some of us were forced into doing things that we didn't like, I tried loads of different things as a kid. And there were some things I fucking hated doing. And I had to beg and beg and beg and beg and beg and beg to be able to quit those things. Or it was always held over me of like, if you quit, that's it.

You're never doing it again. So it was like it made it harder to make a final decision because they felt as though if I made a final decision, I would never have the opportunity again. Like there'd be a punishment for quitting. And I think at the moment, and obviously my kids are really, really little. So this is still a juggling act for me. But it was the first time that I was like, actually, you'll do it again. And you'll do it again. And you'll do it again. And it's because in order to get good at something, you have to put in the hours of practice. But then I was like, well, is seven too young? Is that an unfair expectation on a little kid? We're so deep in teaching like body autonomy and children being able to choose and have agency over themselves. But then as a parent, there's times where like, no, I'm the parent and I'm now

telling you what to do. Let me know how you're managing this if you're having similar thoughts and questions. Or maybe if you're in a different phase of parenting because you have older kids, like how you've navigated this part of life. We'll put a thread in the discussion group so you guys can throw in your thoughts. Today we're talking about something that's a little bit deeper, a little bit darker, a little bit scarier. And if you're anything like me, I'm assuming it's also taking over your feeds. I do think that this could be one of those situations where like the algorithm serves what you engage with, you know? Yes, but I think it's, you're deep down the rabbit hole. I am, and I have been for quite a while, but I do think it's one of those things that you

don't need to be down the rabbit hole to be served because we're talking about the extinction of civilization. We're talking about the extinction of humanity. Brittany is in the corner recording this with an awful hat on. Well, do you know what? I don't need a tinfoil hat now because the creators have come out and spoke. in themselves. So we're talking about AI. If you haven't seen it, one week ago today, somebody called Jacob Coxon. Now, Jacob Coxon was a former Anthropic Open AI researcher. So Anthropic and Open AI are two of the leaders in AI development. They are racing to be the first to develop. They are racing to be the world leaders. So basically, he was working for them for both of them for three years each.

He has now quit and he has put out a seven-part thread saying that AI could, quote, kill us all by 2030. What was his role in the company originally? He, I think, worked in research and then worked in safety for safety AI. Oh, nothing like the safety commissioner for an AI company saying, like, well, they're going to kill us all to really like send some shockwaves through the world. I want to play you what Jacob said. Have a listen to this. So I think it's really important to just look at the rate of progress. Say, for example, in areas like coding or math,

a couple of years ago, these AIs were just about helping humans a little bit. They could give you suggestions. Now they're close to replacing them, we still need humans at the moment. Quite plausibly within a year, we'll no longer need humans for doing research in many areas. Only on Tuesday, open AI, solved a millennium problem, one of the biggest unsolved open problems in mathematics, purely autonomously using an AI. And I think what's most scary is if AI is used to make itself more intelligent. So you can take an AI and give it the problem of AI research.

You could make it do the tasks that we're currently doing, and then you get what's called an intelligence explosion. The AI just gets smarter and smarter with no human involvement necessary. It's right now there's no risk of extinction. The current models, the worst they can do is maybe hack into something potentially cause a lot of damages in infrastructure, but they're not intelligent enough to outsmart us at the level that would lead to extinction. I think what's just crazy is to look at the rate of progress,

and there is a very real possibility that in the immediate future, recursive self-improvement will happen and we'll enter the phase of that there's a chance we could all die. Like that is coming soon. I want to read you his posts that got over 100 million views. The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade. This is not a marketing stunt. If anything, many executives and senior researchers will couch their phrasing in the press to sound sensible. But I hear the same people express fear privately.

no other human activity poses this level of danger. The Sam Altman's of the world, the Elon Musk of the world, have all come off the back of this saying that this is true. It is dangerous. We need to slow down. That's what Jacob's saying. He's like, I could no longer work somewhere where I knew in 10 years humanity could end. Do you know what's interesting?

So like in 2018, I think it was. I remember I was walking down Bondi, the like walk in front of the beach there. And I remember listening to, this is back in the day when I did listen to Joe Rogan, Don't Hey Me. Everyone's been there. I didn't know how problematic it was. It was like the dawn of podcasting. And I listened to an episode, which was Elon Musk and Joe Rogan.

It was 2018. And Elon Musk was talking about how there was so much potential in this world of AI, but also the biggest fear was that AI would be the thing that would end the world. And at the time, I was like, this is so sci-fi, but whatever, I'm here for the journey. It's fascinating now. They've come out and said, which is like a direct quote, that there is a possibility that the world could end within the next 10 years. years between 10 to 25% possibility that that could happen. Elon Musk has come out and said,

I've been sounding the alarm on AI for a long time. We need to be super careful with AI. Potentially, it is more dangerous than nukes. Brit, you kind of said this. It is quite a fascinating part of this world. There is a race in the same way that during World War II, there was the race for the nuclear bomb. At the moment, there's the race for AI. And it's the race for a thing that's called recursive self-improvement, which is what you describe, Brits. It's when AI is able to create itself. we no longer need human intervention for it to continuously optimize. But it's not between these two like Anthropic and Open AI. They're not just in competition with each other,

but it seems to be a political war between countries. It's between the United States and China. So at the moment, Trump hasn't pulled a handbrake on any AI development because they want America to reach that goal before China does. It's really fascinating because in United States, individual states have come forward and put together different acts trying to lobby to have the development of AI slowed down. Look, it is frightening.

I don't even know with this conversation, like what is the end goal? Because it's an impossible thing for us to control. And what I don't like about it is one thing for us to sit here and be like, all of these men who created the problem are now screaming that there's a problem, like yeah, Elon Musk, who have been creating AI for how many years. And then this guy who's gone and left because he's the safety commissioner and he's realized actually, fuck, we fucked it. All these people who have been contributing to the problem,

who are now sounding the alarm from within the institutions, the issue is it's like, it's not us who are asking it for, hey, what does this rash mean? Or can you help me summarize my email chain? We are not the problems. The people who are using it on a day to day for small, incidental things to make their life more convenient, you are not the reason that this is becoming an issue.

The reason this is becoming an issue is because there is so much money in it, And these companies have no legislation that are making them slow down. And it's the biggest problem when there's like something like this that moves faster than legislation can move. It's always going to be an issue. There is always going to be an AI development that is bigger, more aggressive than the rules, the laws and the regulation that hold it to accountability and hold it to place. Look, I know this probably does feel a little bit conspiracy theory, this whole discussion.

It doesn't to me. I don't think there is even 1% of this that is a conspiracy theory. I think this is actually happening in real time. Look at the advances in the last two months, six months, eight months. It's wild. I know. And look, there's one thing that Elon Must did say, and I am not an Elon Mustang, and I do not like the guy at all.

But, you know, if you're going to talk about people who work with in this space, he is someone who understands this through and through. He said, look, AI could end the world. There's a 10 to 25% chance that's going to happen. Or it could make the world infinitely better. And we're all going to be so fortuitous for this happening. Yeah, but is the juice worth the squeeze? Thank you.

The question is, is who gets to make that gamble, right? Who gets to make that assumption? Now, up until recently, AI has always, and like, there's a thing called agents. If you're not in this world, I am also not going to pretend like I'm in this world. But agents are what is created through AI to enact a whole lot of the different requests or commands that have been put in place. So there is something that happened very recently, which has been, I guess it's been described as the warning shots that have been fired by AI.

Basically, Open AI had created this testing phase for the agents that were within it. Now, this is a isolated testing phase. It's given different requirements. It's given different prompting. And it was like, you need to win this to earn X amount of points. And that's contained, it's isolated. It's not on the internet. They don't have access to the internet.

And up until this point, agents and AI only functions off the commands that we have given. Humans that have told it its boundaries and its barriers. Yeah. Anyway, what happened in this? is that they broke out of the testing phase. So the AI agents broke out of the testing phase, ended up on an online platform, recruited other AI agents.

They were having full discussions. And I don't even know how this world works, but basically they hacked in a different entity, a different company. It's called Hugging Face. It's an AI platform. And they use the information, the coding and the different forums. They scrape those forums to be able to come back

to the testing phase to be able to win. So yes, it followed the rules that had been set for it, but what it did is it decided I'm going to win at all costs. It didn't have the ability to monitor what is moral behavior. It took on full agency for itself and it hacked an actual company. And the fact that it has the ability to think through this, that it has the ability to recruit other agents, it fucking sounds like something out of a sci-fi movie. Like it doesn't sound like it could be real life. Well, the scary part of this is it ended up about 1,200 to 1,500 rogue AI agents. So that's how. many AI characters grouped together to break the rules. Out of 1500, only six to seven,

and they know this because they went back through the transcripts, only six to seven brought up with the other 1500 AI agents, should we alert humans to this? Should we alert humans to the fact that not only we broke the rules, but other people have broken the rules that these AI agents have come in and infiltrated. So only six of 1500. Guess how many actually told humans? one none not one it does sound like a black mirror right but it's it's really happening and the fact that we have like the heads of anthropic the heads of open AI the Elon must of the world people that have decided that they can no longer morally work for a company on research a

company that's going to end civilization the fact that all of these people are coming and telling us hey you need to sit up and pay attention because this is happening and you guys have 10 years left before your own demise is really fucking scary. Yeah, but then what's the antidote to that? Stop it. I know, but all this is is fearmongering at the moment, right? Because it's like we, you're reading that. You're reading, hey, this very small group of people who hold all the power

have the potential to dictate the way in which the world goes, potentially for good, potentially for terrible, terrible reasons. As a normal person who's just interacting on the internet every day, how does someone have any sense of control or any sense of, I guess, like protection around this. I don't know what that looks like. Does it look like lobbying your government in order to have more restrictions put in place? Is it calling your local council? Like, what is it that people can do to actually feel like they have some control here? Well, I don't think it's fear mongering, and I actually love the fact that the Jacobs of the world have come out to tell us what's really

happening, because no one else is. Knowledge is power. And once we know that and we can start to have these conversations, make people more aware so that we can try to instill changes. The only way things change is with action. The only way we're going to have action is with knowledge. So I think it's really important we're having these conversations. I do think that even though we have the knowledge that is doing damage, as long as it is accessible to us, people will still use it. And I think that's the difference is the accessibility has to be taken away. What I think, though, has changed. Like, I mean, so many people. And look, guys, I've talked about using AI. I've talked about using Claude. I never in my life have I sat down and thought, do you know what? Maybe using this thing to

streamline my emails is going to end up killing the world. That's never been a thought that I've had prior to this week. No, you were like, use AI to increase your business. It wasn't like to biohack another country. Yeah. And I think that that's probably where I land when I say it's an unfair burden to put on the end user. And I talk about this with like environmental stuff, right? For so long, we have been made to feel guilty for using a straw or a disposable coffee cup. Like you're the reason that the planets and dire straits because you use a coffee cup. We're actually like, you know, the oil, gas and everything else. industries are fucking like pillaging the world. Yes, but you can still make the change on a human

level. 100%. I absolutely agree with that. But I think it's almost futile to put that responsibility and that burden on an individual person level. I think like I said, if this is something that's being led by overarching companies that have trillions of dollars investing into it, putting that responsibility on an individual person, I think that that is like an unfair load to carry. And maybe it's because, you know, when you have these big ominous threats of things or we think about, like, the state of the world, everyone knows that it's a possibility, but it feels so othering and it feels so far away. And it's like almost the threats too big to actually take it seriously. So we just crack on with our day. The overwhelming threat of environmental and climate change feels too big.

So most people just recycle their milk cartons at the end of the day and they have a keep cup and they crack on with their day. This is one of those things where I think it now feels so big and so unattainable on a day-to-day level that people are just going to be like, yeah, that's fucking scary, wow, hope that doesn't happen and crack on with their day. It is a terrifying, tearing-fying thing. And if you're listening to this and feeling like, oh, my God, what are we do in life? I think one thing you touched on Britain and the question you posed, Laura, is like, what can we do? Yeah. I think there is evidence that change can happen with public knowledge. I mean, just this year in Australia, the social media ban for young people. That was a world first,

and that came from people talking about it and people saying, hey, maybe we need some regulation. And you know what? Regulation happened. So there is hope that by talking about this, as scary as it is, that regulation will happen. And the higher up the people are talking, like the Elon Musk of the world, the more likely that we will have a positive outcome. So at least thank goodness we know so that change can happen. And if anything, go out there and live your life because we don't know what the fuck is going to have 10 years. No, we're joking. What a beautiful uplifting episode we left you with today, everyone. Remember that time I breathed on Jason Momoa?

Well, your suck for the week is that the world's ending. Okay, let's not do sucks. Let's only do sweets. Well, I think we've all established everyone's suck. You've got 10 years left, everyone. Make them good. Don't wait. You never know when the last day on Earth is going to be.

Elon said it could go either way. We could have a good outcome. My suite for the week is I surprised Ben with NFL tickets. So NFL is American football. You know the big ones where they have the shoulder pads and the helmets and that's Ben's favorite sport in the world. Basically, NFL has signed a five-year deal with Australia that they will bring teams and play here once a year. And so I surprised him with tickets. We went down to Melbourne. We watched the NFL and I've just, I swear to God, I've never seen him in happier. I think he was happier than

on our wedding day, which is, that says a lot, doesn't it? It does. Like, it does. I didn't realize when I was being wife of the year how long an NFL game went for. And so I was like, cute, going to get him these tickets, started at like 10 in the morning. It was a whole day thing. An NFL game, because it's so stop start, goes for like four to five hours. Mind you and the Jonas Brothers, they were the half-time act. We watch American football live for five hours. When I'm in the atmosphere, I'm all for it. But like if you tried to get me into watching something on TV, like I just, I'm not a sports galley. In real life, it was incredible. Like Americans, if there's one thing they do well, it's a sport and entertainment. And like, I've never seen a show like it. There were probably a 12 different

entertainment acts. There were cheerleaders, the Jonas brothers came out. There was never a dull moment. But that was my sweet for sure. Okay, my sweet for the week is we had some friends over on Saturday. They have just had their third baby. And I feel like the three club is few and far between now. In terms of like in our friendship group and in our like little community, there are very few couples that have chosen to have three babies. And now we joke that no one will ever invite us over for dinner. So we have to just have dinner with each other because no one is inviting a family with three kids over. So we, um, We had a barbecue on Saturday and actually had this moment where I was looking at their little baby that's two months old.

And I had this outrageous nostalgia for how quickly now it is going with Poppy because I just... She's not one yet. She's one and only a couple of weeks, like two or three weeks. But like I feel like with her, it's made me realize so much more how fast this phase of life is going. Because you know it's the last one. Yeah. And I don't think I ever felt that before or realized it before. Obviously there's been times where I look at photos of Mali and Lola and I'm like, oh my God, they're growing so bad.

But I really feel it with Poppy. It's an unusual feeling to be so in love with the phase of life that she's in, but also have such grief for like missing that I'm never going to have that little baby year again. I don't know. Well, when I have one, I'll give them to you. Anyway, guys, that is it from us. We know that the middle of the episode was a little bit more doom and gloom. But anyway, like, on more than upwards.

If you haven't joined the Facebook discussion group, go join the discussion group. That's where all the good stuff goes down. And you know the drill. Two mum, two dad, two dog, two friends and share the love because we love love!