{"podcast":{"title":"The Metagame","slug":"the-metagame-5326696","podcast_index_feed_id":5326696,"rss_url":"https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/31504.rss","website_url":"https://themetagame.substack.com/podcast","image_url":"https://substackcdn.com/feed/podcast/31504/750c3b474839801e856a20b6acb97c29.jpg","author":"Daniel Kazandjian","episode_count":54,"summary":"Practical philosophy for playing with life.","last_synced_at":"2026-06-26T04:19:56.976017+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-metagame-5326696"},"episode":{"title":"#47 - Michael Smith | Hostile Telepaths: Why Your Brain Deceives Itself to Survive Social Reality","slug":"47-michael-smith-hostile-telepaths-why-your-brain-deceives-itself-to-survive-social-reality","published_at":"2026-04-14T16:32:04+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-metagame-5326696/47-michael-smith-hostile-telepaths-why-your-brain-deceives-itself-to-survive-social-reality","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-metagame-5326696","url":"https://themetagame.substack.com/p/47-michael-smith-hostile-telepaths","audio_url":"https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/194135117/bf7abb9c086a5c7cb2091b96727ba95d.mp3","summary":"Michael “Valentine” Smith is a co-founder of CFAR (the Center for Applied Rationality) and the author of influential LessWrong essays including The Hostile Telepaths Problem , Kenshō , and The Intelligent Social Web . He’s also been described as “one of the most powerful wizards in the Bay Area.” In this conversation, he explains why your brain creates fog and self-deception to survive social situations, what it actually takes to find clarity, and why \"working on yourself\" might be the wrong frame entirely. We also do a live coaching demo debugging my own procrastination. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themetagame.substack.com","meta_description":"Michael “Valentine” Smith is a co-founder of CFAR (the Center for Applied Rationality) and the author of influential LessWrong essays including The Hostil…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":6454,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-metagame-5326696/episodes/47-michael-smith-hostile-telepaths-why-your-brain-deceives-itself-to-survive-social-reality/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-metagame-5326696/47-michael-smith-hostile-telepaths-why-your-brain-deceives-itself-to-survive-social-reality.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}