Invisible Machines podcast by UX Magazine

Ben Goertzel, the researcher who helped popularize the terms "AGI" and “singularity”, as one of the most influential modern champions and systematizers of AGI, returns to Invisible Machines to discuss the decentralization of AI and what's actually missing from today's most advanced systems with Robb Wilson and Josh Tyson.

As enterprises rush to deploy AI agents and LLMs reshape workflows, a critical question emerges: who controls the infrastructure? Goertzel argues that while big tech dominates model development, a tension is building between centralized hegemony and decentralized, open systems — the same dynamic that shaped the internet itself.

In this wide-ranging conversation, Goertzel discusses his current work on Hyperon (the successor to OpenCog) and the ASI Chain, systems designed to enable decentralized AGI development. He explains why the rapid cycles of AI hype and disappointment — the traditional "AI winters and summers" — no longer slow progress the way they once did. The speed of change has accelerated into what he calls a "mathematical singularity," where six-month cycles replace decades-long shifts.

---------- Support our show by supporting our sponsors!

This episode is supported by OneReach.ai
Forged over a decade of R&D and proven in 10,000+ deployments, OneReach.ai’s GSX is the first complete AI agent runtime environment (circa 2019) — a hardened AI agent architecture for enterprise control and scale.
Backed by UC Berkeley, recognized by Gartner, and trusted across highly regulated industries, including healthcare, finance, government and telecommunications.
A complete system for accelerating AI adoption — design, train, test, deploy, monitor, and orchestrate neurosymbolic applications (agents).
Use any AI models
Build and deploy intelligent agents fast
Create guardrails for organizational alignment
Enterprise-grade security and governance

Request free prototype:
https://onereach.ai/prototype/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_s7e1&utm_content=1

---------- The revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book about succeeding with AI agents, Age of Invisible Machines, is available everywhere: Amazon — https://bit.ly/4hwX0a5

#InvisibleMachines
#Podcast
#TechPodcast
#AIPodcast
#AI
#AGI
#ArtificialIntelligence
#AgenticAI
#DecentralizedAI
#AIInfrastructure
#AIAgents
#FutureOfAI
#Singularity

We’re in a moment when organizations are approaching agentic AI backwards, chasing flashy use cases instead of building the scaffolding that makes AI agents actually work at scale. Erika Flowers, who led NASA’s AI Readiness Initiative and has advised Meta, Google, Netflix, and Intuit, joins Robb and Josh for a frank and funny conversation about what's broken in enterprise AI adoption. She dismantles the myth of the "big sexy AI use case" and explains why most AI projects fail before they start. The trio makes the case that we're entering a post-software world, whether organizations are ready or not. Listen and learn why the scaffolding— or agent runtime — matters more than use cases, why organizational gaps kill AI projects, how to move projects from pilot to production, and what "post-software" actually means for enterprises.

Check out Erika’s podcast, “Flower Power Hour”: https://open.spotify.com/show/15BTSl9fWiH3QTmVAYj6Fd
Learn more about Erika at
www.helloerikaflowers.com/

0:09 - NASA AI Readiness Explained | Erica Flowers on Agentic AI & Runtimes
1:48 - Why the “Big Sexy AI Use Case” Is a Lie
2:42 - AI Didn’t Start with ChatGPT: What NASA Has Been Doing for 30 Years
4:24 - Why AI Runtimes Matter More Than Any Single Use Case
5:21 - The Hidden AI Problem: Legacy Data, Silos & Organizational Reality
7:13 - The Boring AI That Actually Works (And Why Enterprises Ignore It)
8:10 - The AI Arms Race Nobody Understands
9:22 - AI Scaffolding Explained: The Metaphor Every Leader Needs to Hear
12:12 - AI Readiness Is Cultural Change, Not Just Technology
14:38 - From Parking Lots to Companies: How Simple AI Agents Quietly Scale
17:01 - Why Most AI Features Feel Useless in Real Products
19:08 - Stop Automating Spreadsheets: Ask AI the Question Instead
25:06 - The Post-Software Era: Why Designers Aren’t Enough Anymore
28:33 - UI Is a Medium: How AI Will Absorb Interfaces Entirely
46:24 - Infinite Content, Human Creativity, and the Future After AI

---------- Support our show by supporting our sponsors!

This episode is supported by OneReach.ai
Forged over a decade of R&D and proven in 10,000+ deployments, OneReach.ai’s GSX is the first complete AI agent runtime environment (circa 2019) — a hardened AI agent architecture for enterprise control and scale.
Backed by UC Berkeley, recognized by Gartner, and trusted across highly regulated industries, including healthcare, finance, government and telecommunications.
A complete system for accelerating AI adoption - design, train, test, deploy, monitor, and orchestrate neurosymbolic applications (agents).
Use any AI models
Build and deploy intelligent agents fast
Create guardrails for organizational alignment
Enterprise-grade security and governance
Request free prototype:

https://onereach.ai/prototype/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_s6e12&utm_content=1
---------- The revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book about succeeding with AI agents, Age of Invisible Machines, is available everywhere: Amazon — https://bit.ly/4hwX0a5

#InvisibleMachines
#Podcast
#TechPodcast
#AIPodcast
#AI
#AgenticAI
#AIAgents
#DigitalTransformation
#AIReadiness
#AIDeployment
#AISoftware
#AITransformation
#AIAdoption
#AIProjects
#NASA
#AgentRuntime
#Innovation
#AIUseCase

As 2025 draws to a close, Robb and Josh look back on some of the conversations they had this year both on the podcast and advising major enterprises and government leaders to offer their predictions for agentic AI in 2026. With major disruptive forces like outbound AI in the hands of consumers and agent runtime environments allowing organizations to create scalable infrastructure for AI agents, next year could see seismic changes in the way investors look at companies, and the ways companies look at themselves. Featuring a look at the components of an agent runtime, as well as previews of upcoming episodes with returning guest Ben Goertzel of SingularityNET and Joshua Gans, co-author of Prediction Machines, this episode is required viewing for anyone charged with finding ROI with agentic AI.

00:00 – Introduction to 2026 Agentic AI Predictions
01:12 – Outbound AI Arrives
02:30 – Scaling vs. Inventing AI
04:55 – Ben Goertzel Preview
06:45 – Scrappy Innovation in AI
08:20 – Invisible Work Explained
10:00 – Agents Job-Hunting for You
11:15 – Bottom-Up AI Adoption
13:10 – Layoffs, Knowledge Loss & AI
15:00 – The “Fake AI Expert” Problem
16:25 – Why Runtimes Matter
18:00 – What IDWs Actually Do
20:00 – Canonical Knowledge for Agents
28:20 – Invisible Work Demo
37:10 – Simulation Becomes the Next Frontier
---------- Support our show by supporting our sponsors!

This episode is supported by OneReach.ai
Forged over a decade and proven in 10,000+ deployments, OneReach.ai’s GSX is the first complete AI agent runtime environment (circa 2019) — a hardened AI agent architecture for enterprise control and scale.

Backed by UC Berkeley, recognized by Gartner, and trusted across highly regulated industries, including healthcare, finance, government and telecommunications.
A complete system for accelerating AI adoption - design, train, test, deploy, monitor, and orchestrate neurosymbolic applications (agents).
Use any AI models
Build and deploy intelligent agents fast
Create guardrails for organizational alignment
Enterprise-grade security and governance

Request free prototype:
https://onereach.ai/prototype/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_s6e11&utm_content=1

---------- The revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book about succeeding with AI agents, Age of Invisible Machines, is available everywhere: Amazon — https://bit.ly/4hwX0a5

#InvisibleMachines
#Podcast
#TechPodcast
#AIPodcast
#AI
#AgenticAI
#AIAgents
#DigitalTransformation
#AI2026
#2026Predictions
#ArtificialIntelligence
#FutureOfWork
#AITrends
#AIRuntime
#IntelligentDigitalWorkers
#AIInvestment
#EnterprisAI
#AIStrategy
#AIROIStrategy
#AITransformation
#InvisibleMachines
#AIRuntime

How did a Dutch company most people haven’t heard of come to hold the fate of AI? Marc Hijink, author of Focus — The ASML Way joins Josh and Robb to explore the insatiably precise process of producing the chips that power GPUs, and with them the AI taking shape all around us. Marc is a financial reporter and technology columnist for the Dutch daily newspaper NRC, and Focus is the result of decades of uncompromising, embedded reporting on ASML, which produces 90% of all chips worldwide.

Operating out of a quiet town in the Netherlands, their extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines produce a steady stream of chips working with an accuracy of within a few atoms. The trio explores how the EUV process is as much probabilistic as it is deterministic, as well as the impact that different cultures have on ASML’s partnerships and pipeline. Relying on lenses that have to be grown from crystals, lithography is a high-stakes endeavor that requires a delicate balance of tooling and advanced engineering. We need it to power everything from smartphones to washing machines to traffic lights. With China looking for inroads into this foundational technology that has been controlled by the western world, this conversation is as timely as it is fascinating.

Chapters -
00:00 - Inside ASML
01:12 - How ASML Makes the World’s Chips
03:20 - Chip Supply Chain Fragility
04:55 - Marc Hijink’s ASML Reporting
07:00 - The Hidden Hardware Layer
08:20 - Chips & Geopolitics
11:00 - Chips Are Physical Matter
12:40 - Error Correction & Precision
14:30 - ASML x TSMC Partnership
16:45 - ASML’s Chaos Culture
19:40 - Dutch vs. German Engineering
28:20 - Moore’s Law Goes 3D
32:10 - ASML + Mistral AI
40:00 - Why ASML Can’t Be Copied
49:00 - How ASML Prioritizes Orders
55:10 - Agentic AI & Complexity
1:02:00 - Humans Adapting to AI

---------- Support our show by supporting our sponsors!

This episode is supported by OneReach.ai — creators of Generative Studio X (GSX), the first complete AI Agent Runtime Environment (V1 circa 2019).
Forged over a decade of R&D and proven in 10,000+ deployments, GSX lets enterprises design, build, and orchestrate secure, scalable AI agents and systems. Trusted across healthcare, finance, government, and telecom.
Use any AI models
Build and deploy intelligent agents fast
Create guardrails for organizational alignment
Enterprise-grade security and governance
Avoid vendor lock-in.

Backed by UC Berkeley and recognized by Gartner.
Before you build or buy another AI solution, think about getting an AI system.

Book a Demo:
https://onereach.ai/book-a-demo/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_s6e9&utm_content=1

---------- The revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book about succeeding with AI agents, Age of Invisible Machines, is available everywhere: Amazon — https://bit.ly/4hwX0a5

#InvisibleMachines
#Podcast
#TechPodcast
#AIPodcast
#AI
#AgenticAI
#AIAgents
#DigitalTransformation
#Cybersecurity
#AIInfrastructure
#AIOrchestration
#AIManagement
#TechLeadership
#Innovation
#ResponsibleAI
#AIStandards
#OpenAI
#Technology

Omar Santos is a Distinguished Engineer directing AI Security at Cisco. He’s here for a frank conversation about the realities of security in the agentic era. As more software is created on-the-fly by AI agents at the request of humans, security has to become an ever-present layer. Security will be built into complete agent runtime environments and will require constant human oversight and intervention, augmented by the ability to simulate outcomes to avoid risk.

Omar is also the Co-Chair of the Coalition for Secure AI, and these are the things he’s thinking about on a daily basis. He sits down with Robb and Josh at the end of a travel blitz that included work surrounding OpenAI’s Stargate Project, a four-year $500b plan for new AI infrastructure in the United States. The trio discuss how the ongoing training of models and the rising demand for inference continue to push the demand for security across burgeoning technology ecosystems.

---------- Support our show by supporting our sponsors!

This episode is supported by OneReach.ai — creators of Generative Studio X (GSX), the first complete AI Agent Runtime Environment (V1 circa 2019).
Forged over a decade of R&D and proven in 10,000+ deployments, GSX lets enterprises design, build, and orchestrate secure, scalable AI agents and systems. Trusted across healthcare, finance, government, and telecom.
Use any AI models
Build and deploy intelligent agents fast
Create guardrails for organizational alignment
Enterprise-grade security and governance
Avoid vendor lock-in.

Backed by UC Berkeley and recognized by Gartner.
Before you build or buy another AI solution, think about getting an AI system.

Book a Demo: https://onereach.ai/book-a-demo/?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast_s6e9&utm_content=1

---------- The revised and significantly updated second edition of our bestselling book about succeeding with AI agents, Age of Invisible Machines, is available everywhere: Amazon — https://bit.ly/4hwX0a5

Chapters -
00:00 - Intro and episode setup
00:33 - Meet Omar Santos and his role in AI security
01:00 - Security as the new programming
02:20 - Coalition for Secure AI and security as a new language
04:45 - Identity, access, and AI agents
06:09 - Scaling models and mega data centers
09:04 - Training vs inference and the compute explosion
12:54 - Budgets, compute, and hybrid human–AI security teams
15:16 - Checklists, guardrails, and spec-driven development
20:00 - From IDEs to agent swarms and background agents
25:19 - CodeGuard, rules for coding agents, and secure SDLC
32:00 - Why doing nothing is the biggest AI security risk
39:30 - Validating AI, AI safety levels, and open source dilemmas
46:00 - Private networks, insider AI agents, and embedded security
51:00 - Simulation, digital twins, and business-wide risk modeling

#InvisibleMachines
#Podcast
#TechPodcast
#AIPodcast
#AI
#AgenticAI
#AIAgents
#DigitalTransformation
#Cybersecurity
#AIInfrastructure
#AIOrchestration
#AIManagement
#TechLeadership
#Innovation
#ResponsibleAI
#AIStandards
#Cisco
#OpenAI
#StargateProject
#AISecurity
#Technology