Igor Novikov: Futurist, AI, No Terminator Scenario, Advising Zelensky, and Life Built on Logic | Be Yourself Podcast
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IgorNovikov

Futurist, Singularity University ambassador, former advisor to President Zelensky — on why there is no Terminator scenario, how AI will be rational, why information is the most disruptive force in the world, and how forecasting is pure logic, not magic

58 minutes
AI · Futurism · Technology · Public Speaking · Ukraine · Singularity
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About This Episode

What Does the Future Actually Look Like — and Why Is the Smartest Person in the Room Not Afraid of It?

Igor Novikov is one of those rare people who can make you think about the future without making you afraid of it. A futurist and Singularity University ambassador who has advised President Zelensky and represented Ukraine on American television, Igor brings a kind of clarity to the biggest questions of our time that is genuinely difficult to find anywhere else.

In this conversation with Serhii Beverly, Igor dismantles the myths that dominate the public conversation about technology: no, AI will not produce a Terminator scenario — because a rational system does not destroy the infrastructure it depends on. No, the Black Mirror series is not an accurate forecast — because it confuses dramatic storytelling with the actual direction of technological change. And no, forecasting is not magic or prediction — it is pure logic applied to observable trends.

But this episode is not only about the future of humanity. It is also about the life that shaped the person thinking about that future: growing up in Donetsk, studying in Kyiv and Great Britain, surviving the event that literally stopped his heart, discovering that public speaking and creativity can be made as logical as any other discipline, and accepting every speaking invitation for a month to make over $70,000 — and what that experiment taught him about the relationship between ambition and identity.

01
No Terminator scenario — why AI will be rational, not destructive
Igor explains precisely why the apocalyptic AI narrative is logically incoherent, and what the actual trajectory of artificial intelligence looks like when you apply forecasting rather than fear to the question.
02
Singularity University and the innovation ecosystem in Ukraine
What Singularity University actually is, why its values matter, and what it means to bring that framework to Ukraine — a country that needs innovation thinking more urgently than almost anywhere else right now.
03
Information as the most disruptive force in the world
Not AI, not energy, not weapons — information. Igor makes the case for why the ability to process, verify, and use information is the defining competitive advantage of our era, and what the democratization of lie detectors reveals about where we are headed.
04
Forecasting is pure logic — earlier predictions that came true today
Igor's predictions from years ago that have since materialized, and the framework he uses to make them. Forecasting has nothing to do with intuition or magic — it is a repeatable, learnable skill.
05
My heart stopped — the event that changed Igor's life
A rare personal moment in which Igor talks about the experience that fundamentally altered his relationship with time, risk, and what matters. The kind of story that changes how you think about urgency.
06
Public speaking, creativity, and how to quickly evaluate a startup
Why improvisation and creativity are logical disciplines, not talent — and a practical framework for evaluating whether a startup has any chance of success within minutes of hearing its pitch.

About the Guest

Igor Novikov — Futurist, Singularity University Ambassador, and One of the Smartest People You Will Hear on This Podcast

Igor Novikov is a futurist, public speaker, and Singularity University ambassador whose career has taken him from advising President Zelensky in his early years to representing Ukraine as a spokesperson on American television. He is one of the most sought-after voices on technology, AI, and the long-term trajectory of human civilisation — and he has the rare ability to make those subjects feel not only accessible but genuinely exciting.

What distinguishes Igor from most people who talk about the future is that he approaches forecasting as a discipline rather than a performance. His predictions are built from observable patterns and rigorous logic, not from speculation or drama. Several of the things he said years ago have since become today's reality — which is the only real test of whether a futurist is worth listening to.

His life story is as remarkable as his ideas: growing up in Donetsk, studying in Kyiv and Great Britain, surviving a cardiac event that stopped his heart, mastering public speaking as a logical craft, and building a career at the intersection of technology, communication, and national representation. Serhii Beverly describes Igor as one of the smartest people he has ever met — which, from someone who has spent years interviewing exceptional people, is not a phrase he uses lightly.

Who He Is
Futurist, Singularity University ambassador, former advisor to President Zelensky, and spokesperson for Ukraine on American television. One of the most respected voices on AI and the long-term future of technology.
Where He Came From
Donetsk, Ukraine — then Kyiv, then Great Britain. His education and early life span three very different environments, each of which shaped the way he thinks about systems, people, and change.
His Approach
Forecasting as pure logic. Igor does not predict the future through intuition — he applies systematic thinking to observable trends, which is why his earlier forecasts have proven accurate in ways that matter.
The Experiment
For one month, Igor accepted every speaking invitation he received. The result: over $70,000 earned and a permanent shift in how he thinks about opportunity, output, and the relationship between saying yes and building momentum.

Episode Chapters

0:00 Intro 2:12 Singularity University 3:36 Always Double-Check 4:12 Innovation in Ukraine & Singularity University 7:17 The Values the Singularity University Holds Onto 9:11 How to Bring Ideas to Life 11:45 Technologies and Adaptation to the Changes, Democratization of the Lie Detectors 15:27 Humans Survive Because of the Adaptability 15:54 The Black Mirror Series is NOT an Accurate Representation of the Potential Future 15:44 No Terminator Scenario, the AI Will Be Rational 18:36 Chat GPT Can Know Your Location, Cyber Security 20:08 What We Should Focus on Right Now to Secure our Future 21:29 Realistic Scenario for Humanity, Earlier Predictions that Came True Today 22:42 Quick Note for The Viewer 23:17 Forecasting is not a Prediction or Magic, it's a Pure Logic 25:01 How Your Early Life and Education Influenced you, Life in Donetsk, Kyiv, Great Britain 27:02 My Heart Stopped, The Event that Changed My Life 29:30 Public Speaking, Improvisation, and Creativity can also Be Logical 31:28 I Accepted Every Presentation for a Month and Made Over $70k 32:05 We Adapted to the Information Overflow 34:12 The Most Disruptive Thing in the World is Information 35:45 How Do We Learn to Be Sharp Thinkers 38:10 How to Quickly Evaluate if The Startup Will be Successful 40:43 How to be a Successful Influencer in the Competitive World 45:40 Creativity, Finding Balance, and Avoiding Sacrifice of Aspects of Life 49:00 Spending a Day with an Oscar-winning Director 52:46 Living in The Simulation 55:11 What Do You Think About Elon Musk, Freedom of Speech 57:43 Last Word

Key Quotes

"
technology affects us not when it's invented and not even when it goes to Market it's when it starts breaking down all behavioral patterns and starts kind of creating new ones
Igor Novikov
"
forecasting is not you know prediction it's not you know some form of like magic I'm not a sear don't have a crystal ball you know I I can it's nothing but applied logic so if you have enough information and you can if you pigeon hold it correctly then you can work out the more likely and the less likely scenarios
Igor Novikov
"
I kind of I decided that whatever life throws at me in the future uh I am going to take it and make sure that next time you know I in existential D danger as you know a meat sack with bacterium i e me um I am going to have something flash I'm GNA have memories I'm going to create them
Igor Novikov

Full Transcript

BTW: This episode of the Be Yourself Podcast is produced by Beverly Media. Want a podcast that looks and sounds this good? Check out Beverly Production →
0:00 Intro
Serhiy today I have a long anticipated guest in Iger novikov Eiger is a change maker he's a transformational leader he is an ambassador of Singularity University in Ukraine uh is actually a former advisor to president zansi
Igor thank you for inviting me and by the way I really hate those like introductions because like I I don't see myself having accomplished that much
Serhiy so one of people go he's like a transformational leader well maybe need we need some kind of an introduction so definitely sometimes yeah those titles might I try and keep them modest but it's like when whenever people going after everything that you've done and you just like think of yourself like no I haven't done that much so well okay well I I'll I'll take this we'll we'll jump into different sides of uh of your occupations different side that you're involved with in to start with I would would like to ask you about the singularity University because the things the things that you guys doing there are nothing short of impressive I would want to know what is the mission of Singularity University um as a whole and specifically in Ukraine
2:12 Singularity University
Igor well first of all I mean the uh Singularity university has been evolving so it's not what it used to be at the moment uh but the whole mission behind this kind of a think tank an institution a community whatever you want to call it is to uh prepare and educate as many leaders of tomorrow as possible because uh um basically it it started right after the aad talk that Peter diamandes and Ray kural gave and they kind of met backstage and came to a very interesting conclusion that there isn't an in single institution in the world that actually studies change and we're living in a time of change of like major change um I I I would say like existential change kind of that level so um yeah they set up SU I think it was back in 2008 or 2009 I'm dyslexic so I can get the numbers wrong so always double check after me
3:36 Always Double-Check
Igor in fact always double check ad that's one one one of the thing rules of thumb for today and tomorrow
Serhiy I was G to ask you about the for like some habits and double or triple check right one of them yeah always check the information especially in the age of AI and the abundance overabundance of information I would say
Igor and you know in the age of disinformation hybrid Wars and everything so like always check always check always have your own opinion never trust anyone uh blindly so that's kind of that that would be one of the main rules that I try and follow and I encourage everyone to as well so yeah they set up suu suu initially was very interesting Community uh now it's kind of is Branched off into communities and you know corporate education but uh Singularity University KF chapter always was a community project
4:12 Innovation in Ukraine & Singularity University
Igor so we um we kind of set it up to be you know this like gravitational point for Ukrainian Innovation because like it was all over the place and in fact Ukraine is uh it's a very interesting country it's like one of the uh top countries in the world as far as Innovations are concerned so all the financial Tech is you know blossoming here on one hand on the other hand we uh we're always shy of how good we are so we we kind of we prefer to uh sell our brains by a kilo uh so Outsource everything and there aren't that many like product and service companies in Ukraine so all all all the great minds either leave the country or they're basically just drawing Outsource companies that you know do other people's projects and that was always a big problem plus you know as far as government and our so-called leads are concerned you know um obviously you know that weren't helping either so we kind of set up as you put it out there with a brand that's backed by the likes of Google and NASA and everyone and it's attracted a lot of attention and we had two missions One mission was to educate people and give them enough information about what's really happening in the world so that they can you know catch up with the west and all the other competing countries second our second mission was to build a community around joint you know common values and around you know collaboration uh in that Innovation field so um we kind of we set it up back in what 2016 so this year we turn seven and although Singularity University in uh the US and globally is evolving more towards corporate education in Ukraine especially you know given the current situation we you know stick to what we believe in and kind of Follow That Community model still and we had some interesting people uh go through our programs and Keynotes and everything so one of those being president zalinsky and the majority of his past and present team in some shape and form went through our programs uh but you have to remember one thing because like that's a question I get asked a lot is if he knows everything that we know um why some things you know happening the way they are um we're not a school we're not a university per say we don't give diplomas we have you know information and knowledge that we share but what to do with that is you know up to a person so I can't really force you to uh be an a Agent of Change I can only encourage you to
Serhiy yeah well you know when you noted mentioned common values what are those transparency assume and desire to flexible look at the world
7:17 The Values the Singularity University Holds Onto
Igor like look no um I I wouldn't characterize those values as you know um some form of like a futuristic Visionary UHS I would say it's more to do with the ethics of it so uh unfortunately for a number of reasons we uh we've taken a couple of long terms over the last 20 30 years when that Tech exponential Tech started you know breaking down the old macro behavioral patterns around the world and they setting up this like new instability that is turning into new stability so um we kind of in our community we just encourage like basic you know basic ethical things so you know not U competing fairly uh not stealing ideas uh you know but like in in some shape and form you know the basic human values are all over the place you know be that religion science or just you know uh big operations it's just you kind of treat people the way that you want to be treated and you know the another iteration of this rule treat people the way they want to be treated I really like this one um uh yeah that that also works but it's like uh the common values are people are over exaggerating when we think they think that we like some sort of like you know secret Community or like in bunch of but but bunch of like co-conspirators that are ruling the world you know the global government or something no it's just a community with just a bunch of values and not not that different from you know all the other you know decent communities
Serhiy I think it's Neil degrass Tyson who said he told the story about his father and his father was also a scientist as far as I remember he said that it's not enough to be right it's also important to somehow drive real change put things into action so is is there some kind of um hardship in this in this realm if if if people have these ideas how difficult it is to actually put them in fruition or implement them
9:11 How to Bring Ideas to Life
Igor well um like look first of all you know an idea is worthless uh unless you do something with it on one hand on the other hand um once you have that idea that's like your halfway there already so uh like there's no simple answer to this question um as far as technology is concerned you know um I would probably agree with Peter deam mantis here I would say that like we're living in you know the Golden Era of uh entrepreneurship so you know the money is out there you know the smart people there are happy to join you out there you know all the ideas are out there as well so you know if you set your mind to something you know whatever that may be you know the new Chad GPT or the new drone or even like you know reversing aging uh that can be done and all the resources are available that's on one hand on the other hand um like we as human beings and let me give you a small disclaimer here so Singularity uh University communities like you know it's basically we have groups of people who are interested in certain Technologies and they have their like own field of interest and study and hobby and you know business projects so some people can follow the AI Branch some people go into blockchain some people go into like virtual reality or something I'm more of a humanist in the sense that you know this community I'm more interested in you know people who are dealing with technology rather than you know technology itself because you know it's at least until and if um AGI is possible so General artificial intelligence um unless and until that is possible you know it's the human beings that are creating technology not the other way so um and Technology only affects us actually technology affects us not when it's invented and not even when it goes to Market it's when it starts breaking down all behavioral patterns and starts kind of creating new ones
11:45 Technologies and Adaptation to the Changes, Democratization of the Lie Detectors
Igor so for example you know iPhone wasn't the first smartphone out there per se um and yet it's that mass adoption LEDs to a macro behavioral change so you started buying music differently you started kind of treating people differently communicating with them differently and that changed the world not the actual Gadget so I'm interested in the human side of things and I can tell you this I'm really worried about the future because I think we we still haven't learned on a macro scale to adapt to all the uh tsunamis of change that that are coming so because you know the tech uh that's coming to Market that's already come to Market and that will be available to us like in the next 5 to 10 years um will change everything we'll turn everything upside down and you know we'll have to rethink you know the very basic institutional things that we're so used to so you know the employment and the distribution of wealth in the world our health our um you know safety um our environment our business models our politics you name it I mean all of that is going to change like even like you know social in in institutes like marriage for example I mean that that's already being majorly disrupted by all the tech that's out there because you know when marriage first appeared you know within our society you know first of all the reason for that social Institute was different but secondly you know there weren't any like you know pornh hubs or you know tenders and you know you name it like flights and you know the life expectancy was different as well it was you know 25 years if I'm not mistaken so you know love Till Death part that was like in a literal so um and you know the mar the social Institute of Marriage is kind of you know going through a bit of turbulence now uh and it's only going to get worse just just kind of I Selen is mail one of our lecturers is uh is actually given a very good example of that he he said like well imagine what's going to happen to the you know to the social Institute of Marriage with a widely available light detector in your smartphone light detector you oh my God what's that yeah what's that what's it going to do to marriage what's that going to do to politics to marketing to everything and like if you think about that I mean that attack is not widely available yet and it's incredibly disruptive but if you know enough basic stuff about new attack that's available to us um it's doable you know it's it's just a mix of you know sensors Ai and factchecking and access to information that's it
Serhiy yeah it's matter of what will be adopted once that your life is not going to be the same yeah and I'm kind of frightened when I when you hear when I hear you speak for some reason it doesn't instill a lot of Hope because people are curious you know and the I I think you once said at one of your lectures that we survived because of the adaptability a lot of not the strongest survives survives the one that adapts better right that's why human beings survived everyone
Igor but mean this is scary well it wasn't me it it wasn't me who said it it was Dar it was dar
15:27 Humans Survive Because of the Adaptability
Serhiy you were quoting darving yeah yeah but let's hope for the best maybe those light detectors won't be heavily adopted by by people for
Igor I remember Black Mirror one one of the episodes of Black Mirror you remember where he in he put in a chip yeah
15:54 The Black Mirror Series is NOT an Accurate Representation of the Potential Future
Serhiy I I don't I don't
Igor like Black Mirror is like I always get asked like if futurism like film or if if there's one series or film uh that people should watch that resembles the future as far as as I know it it's actually the um I think it was BBC's years and years uh series that resembles the future that we're kind of seeing you know come come to fruition at the moment not black Mir yeah all right and L not Terminator I mean like one of the funniest discussions that I usually have with my students is uh everyone um and there's a good reason for it everyone seems to be afraid of um a hypothetical uh AGI General artificial intelligence um and there's a good reason for that because it was Hollywood that kind of sold us on that idea that you know robots are sooner or later going to take over the world but um that kind of that distorts people understanding of technology so people are worried uh and are afraid of Skynet and Terminators but to be honest I mean the main reason to fear General artificial intelligence would be its rationality and you know it doesn't need to launch nuclear codes uh nuclear missiles and it won't launch nuclear missiles because it needs to survive as well what it can do it can you know provoke non-nuclear conflicts it can suggest um formulas for the new drugs that you know will seem good on paper but in reality will kill off most of the human population it will it can destroy our global economy it can do anything it likes and you know it doesn't involve like skeleton looking Terminators and um and nuclear weapons I mean that that kind of um apocalyptic events involving AGI will look nothing like Hollywood what shows us like seriously I mean you know all AGI needs to do to make you jump off the window out of the window is just kind of talk to you and just disrupt your life to a point of depression yeah and they would know when you're at your lowest point somehow and it would it would know everything
18:36 Chat GPT Can Know Your Location, Cyber Security
Igor like you know there was a huge Scandal about a month ago about privacy um in chat jpt because that thing actually can figure out your personal data I your location for example not based off your IP or something else but based on the context of things you discuss with it so there was one guy there was one guy from Melbourne who used um certain you know Australian slang and was describing a certain uh Road juncture without naming it uh in its conversation with chpt and chpt actually figured out where the guy lives yeah you know not having access to any like geodata or anything like that and you know it doesn't surprise me at all because you know whenever I do lectures about cyber security um I I always say that you know it's not the hackers you know the the it hackers that we should be afraid of it's the behavioral hackers because you know I can break into iPhone way quick quier easier as a social scientist uh than if I were a hacker like the typical hacker in front of a computer screen you'll give me your phone you unlock it yourself and you'll thank me for it so and you know that's that's a side of potential AGI that we need to fear
Serhiy so what's the solution should we work more on yeah what should we work more on you said that you're more people Centric typee of futurist right should we invest more into psychological safety and stuff of this
20:08 What We Should Focus on Right Now to Secure our Future
Igor no there's one uh there's one sphere that we need to focus on and prioritize like globally and that sphere is education but un yeah but unfortunately you know knowing what I know about sociology and about you know history in politics and you know the whole track record of the human race I'm I want to remain an optimist but you know I have to be realistic about what's going to happen it's not going to be an easy process and like look the best hypothetical scenario for us would be to kind of press pause on uh on on the evolution of our technology and focus on our society and ourselves and then kind of figure out that new stability and then continue developing new technology but you know one thing you can be certain of as far as the humans are concerned if there's a shiny button that we can press without thinking we'll press it sooner or later so um so yeah I'm I'm not an optimist and U unfortunately if you can if you if you go through my early Keynotes in like 2016 2017 I actually openly said that like between 2020 and 2025 you know we're going to have pandemics we're going to have wars we're going to have this like major period of global instability and then by mid 2025 we're going to see you know the first glimpses
21:29 Realistic Scenario for Humanity, Earlier Predictions that Came True Today
Igor of a new stability but you know that doesn't mean that the crap's going to go away but in instead we will either see that we're going towards the world of you know technological abundance that people like Peter the amantis hope for or we're going down that uh anti-utopian hell hole that and plus there are many potential um apocalyptic Bell holes you know you name in Hollywood's kind of already said everything about it so we can go the route of the day after tomorrow we can go the route of Mad Max we can go the route of the well Terminator is the least likely one because it's like it's it's it's a funny film but you know the real destruction of the human race will look way more boring
22:42 Quick Note for The Viewer
Serhiy quick note guys as you are watching this episode and I hope hope you're enjoying it I'm trying to grow my channel and I can see that up to 70% of people who watch this channel remain unsubscribed if you would like to see more impressive guests and more profound conversations Please Subscribe or hit a like button I'm incredibly incredibly grateful for your support and enjoy the show further
23:17 Forecasting is not a Prediction or Magic, it's a Pure Logic
Serhiy watch your T talk at 20 2016 I guess and yeah you told about the abundance phenomenon and these and the possible scenarios and I think that in a way it was prophecy some kind of because we're already in have you been called a prophet
Igor that's one thing like uh actually two funny things well first of all a serious one don't have a crystal ball and like um forecasting is not you know prediction it's not you know some form of like magic I'm not a sear don't have a crystal ball you know I I can it's nothing but applied logic so if you have enough information and you can if you pigeon hold it correctly then you can work out the more likely and the less likely scenarios but that's not magic but what's really funny you told me that you know prophecy um you know the fact that I study human nature and human psychology and human behavior the fact that um I'm married to one of the best sociologists in the world and the fact that I with the landc I worked a lot on information and disinformation in theory if I want to start the cult I have all the ingredients ready and you know I I I I I could start like you know the new cult like Global cult but no I we don't have time for that because I have kids and like I want them to grow up in the world where they have a chance of not you know seeing firsthand what Hollywood has predicted like many years ago
25:01 How Your Early Life and Education Influenced you, Life in Donetsk, Kyiv, Great Britain
Serhiy well I I've always been a follower of people who you know when they can when they speak and I listen you are one of those people you're a prolific speaker and I want to know what are what are the roots of that you said maybe we can back back a little bit to your biography you were born in theet uh so and tell tell us about a little bit about how you were growing up and how how the life there shaped you to be the person you are today or maybe something influenced how you are today for me there's a certain event that there was a before and then after
Igor but like in fact my life was interesting because yeah I was born in Don but you know all together I think I lived there for like 3 years out of 40 uh and like a long time time ago I grew up in Kev then I um my parents can Shi me off to Britain uh so I can to finish school in uh leer year and then I went to London School Comics uh in so all together I think I lived in Britain for like 10 years I also finished economic facy
Serhiy so we're both no no no
Igor I I I'm actually a lawyer I have two majors so at the LC I started international law and uh at lfs film directing so um I kind of one was for me one was for like you know the future that our my parents well our parents see the future similar they extrapolate from their experience and you know the the greater the change in the world the more wrong they are about you know what they see the future of the kids looking like and the advice that they give but never mind so I've spent some time in Moscow before everything started happening so that was 20072 2008 um I lived in Athens for a bit so like I've been all over the place um but one event that kind of shaped me when I was I think like 13 or 14 so I was already studying at uppingham school in Britain I came uh to Kia to see my parents for the holidays and I got a really bad case of like it was either it was food poisoning mixed with an allergic reaction so my heart actually stopped in an ambulance and they had to use a defibrillator on me
27:02 My Heart Stopped, The Event that Changed My Life
Igor and yeah I remember like you know uh those I think like 10 days in the hospital or something like that I couldn't sleep because it happened at night and so I was like you know I was psychologically shaken and you know how they say like when you're about to die your whole life flashes in front of your eyes I was a teenager so yeah I can't imag understand the background you know and the hormones and everything um you know the whole Magic of puberty but nevertheless um nothing flashed and I came to this like weird realization that you know in there in in the hospital you know in the middle of the night that my life is boring so I kind of I decided that whatever life throws at me in the future uh I am going to take it and make sure that next time you know I in existential D danger as you know a meat sack with bacterium i e me um I am going to have something flash I'm GNA have memories I'm going to create them so yeah since then I kind of if I could reverse that you know that wish that I made that day I probably would uh but yeah my I've I've taken everything every opportunity that I had regardless of how crazy it sounded regardless of how many pivots it would require me to do and you know changes to make to My Life um I've always accepted that so my life wasn't up to this point wasn't easy but it was definitely not boring and you know the upside of that stupid teenage decision is the fact that without understanding it uh at first I've actually trained uh my adaptability so I kind of I've seen stuff and now I can adapt to it so like I know what it feels like I know all the methodologies all the rules of thumb and everything um so that's my life
Serhiy but you've asked me about my spoken word career
29:30 Public Speaking, Improvisation, and Creativity can also Be Logical
Igor uh no that I I improvise because when we open Singularity the way to um to develop that project quickly without any marketing B budgets or anything was to do a lot of You Know spoken word gigs so like whatever conference or Vlogs or whatever they threw at us we'd accept and I was the one who well I was an ambassador in the chapter so you know it's was up to me to kind of to speak and I was petrified of the stage at first but then I realized that like you know whatever we call Talent whatever we call creativity can Al also be logical and mathematical so like you know spoken words um if you read the book on like you know the Art of Storytelling if you read the book a couple of books about like you know human psychology and human perception of information and you know Arts uh if you kind of if you're willing to figure out a way to work your information into something more entertaining than just a boring keynote where you show slides with numbers on it people are going to pay attention uh if you can if you adapt your lingo uh your slang and your approach to the audience if you if you actually get off your ass and do some research about you know the crowd that's going to be listening to you like you know tomorrow uh that's what makes all the difference and it it was really funny because I kind of have uh Singularity self Finance so we we've never taken any money from the mothership and whenever we launched like competition so whenever we needed money I figured out that the best way would be to do just corporate spoken word and we did a very interesting experiment like many years ago like I think it was like year two year year three of Singularity um one month I've decided to accept every single um presentation and keynote offer that I got GI paid once and we actually made over $70,000 in one month just from me oh really speaking on stage okay nice gigs
Serhiy so yeah that but like look it sounds interesting it sounds incredible but
31:28 I Accepted Every Presentation for a Month and Made Over $70k
Igor like you know people are people want to be entertained especially in the world of overabundant information because like we adapt to it so in in a sense we're emotionally scarred now um it's like we've adapted our level of Tolerance of what used to tickle us before has gone up exponentially as well so um regardless of the sphere of information so whether it's like straight up entertainment whether it's like pornography or anything like everything we've ad we've adapted we kind of with that proverbial frog that's already
32:05 We Adapted to the Information Overflow
Igor boiling and the temperature you know in in that in that balll where it's going to boil a life is near boiling point at the moment so um now it's not enough to um to just be entertaining you need to know bit more about the intricacies of you know storytelling and and human psychology if you want to be successful in that field if you notice like there aren't that many new like Global show biz phenomena anymore like Taylor Swift I would say was like one of the L ones and now that like there is no new Metallica I mean there are good bands I mean there are bands that sell out Arenas but there are no more Legends no more Global like uh undisputable and undefeated champ Champions and show business why why because you know we've decentralized everything we've democratized everything and there's simply too much competition too much on offer for your attention and attention is actually human attention is the only resource that we are yet to exponentially um grow so like you know it's it's a scarse resource and there isn't much that we can do about it so if you think about it you know human attention stays at pretty much the same level that it will always stayed on in fact I would say it low it it it's going down we're getting Dumber because of that overabundance of information and the EXP the the availability and the frequency and the scale of that informational wave is exponential and it's already hit the curve it's like it's doubling at a noticeable rate now uh and and because of that like if if I had to name like one of the most disruptive factories in the world that would be it you know it's it's nothing to do with tech that we have it's nothing to do with like social institutes being disrupted it's all about information
34:12 The Most Disruptive Thing in the World is Information
Igor the most dangerous technology is not nuclear weapons is not even like crisper or any other like digital biology magic ones that that will allow us you know to mess around with DNA I would say it's the Internet it's the gadgets it's like the thing I I even like uh one of my corporate class has asked me for help with like you know an opad an article uh to I think Washington Post or something I suggested this notion that um the thing that's standing um between us in our survival as species is the proverbial cats and Cat memes of Instagram so instead of like saving and saving our future we're looking at cats and dogs on the Instagram and like it's it's incredibly funny I mean like out of all the Doom Doomsday scenarios you'd never think that you know a cat meme or you know monkey farting and then smelling its finger is going to be what's going to bring down the Glorious human race but it is and I think we deserve it I think like look I think we're so narcissistic in our approach that we're like we're on top of the food chain it's undisputable and everything that we deserve to die because of cat memes
35:45 How Do We Learn to Be Sharp Thinkers
Serhiy how do we absorb learn information then because you said that the demand for well prepared speakers who do a proper resear research and everything is through the roof but at the same time the attention span is getting smaller and smaller and smaller where do we learn how to be sharp thinkers how do we do that
Igor well well specify your question so because information is also a Marketplace so we're talking about Supply or demand so you as demand what is your question about what you need to do to kind of to spend your attention uh in a more efficient man
Serhiy Supply how do you break through the let's let's take both ways for me as a Creator and for me someone who want to um make change right and and maybe also give speech or become media Persona and for me as a consumer because as much as I want to stay away from the overabundance of information over saturation I'm still being impacted by this everywhere
Igor well well let's let's begin with us as humans so um if we want to be more rational uh and more prepared and deal with information and disinformation and misinformation come us more efficiently I would say that first of all um digital detox is a must now and digital detox is it's not as simple as people think so they think it's just like you know locking your Gadget away for like three days to hear birds thing but it's not as simple as that because information is a bit like heroin so if you kind of if you don't inject that stuff into your veins for 3 days and survive it and inject yourself on the fourth you know nothing's going to change you're still an addict so um you know you have to rethink the uh the whole methodology of how you deal with information and what information you need and don't need in your life so um but that's that's you know that's a subject of a very long conversation or even an academic course we have one actually on on that but as far as like creators are concerned um let me start from afar so um I um as an as a primary Global ambassador of Singularity University and that meant back in the day that I'm actually not limited by my city chapter K or even Ukraine I'm a global Ambassador
38:10 How to Quickly Evaluate if The Startup Will be Successful
Igor so um I yeah I I can I can tell you this uh I've seen and dealt with a lot many startups like you know countless startups some have become unicorns some have died so but i' I've seen stuff as they say so uh and I've developed this methodology for myself to quickly evaluate you know whether a startup can be successful in the long run and they called it and they call it a genie test so like the prover proverbial Genie from the lamp so that grants you wishes so so instead of asking them how they're going to deal with like you know whatever scarcity related things that they they can encounter along the way as startup so why are you going to to succeed you know how are you going to deal with the you know the lack of funding or you know what if the competition destroys you and everything instead of asking you know scarcity uh based questions I asked them one simple abundance-based question so say you get you rub that lamp you get a proverbial gen he he or she or they you know welcome to the 21st century grants all the wishes for you um so describe your company in five years in a world where everything goes your way you got all the money that you need you got all the employeers the brains that you need it you know or your competition just jumped off a cliff so there's no competition CEO the yeah the world the World is Yours describe your company in detail in five years in that world and it turns out that you know most startups are so focused on that scarcity relation related like overcome uh short-term plans that they don't have a vision of where they want to be if everything goes their way and I don't want to deal with a startup that doesn't have a vision
40:43 How to be a Successful Influencer in the Competitive World
Igor so the reason I told you about the genie test you've asked me about um how to how to be successful and well known in the world of overabundance of information in a very competitive sphere and probably the most competitive sphere now in the world first of all same approach you know you have to look ahead and have a clear vision of who you are and where you want to be secondly you know as far as you know the um show business is concerned um you have to clearly see who you target audiences so um you need to understand the people that you're targeting now more than ever so I want like I want to be Taylor Swift and I want to be globally known and make billions is great but you have to start somewhere so you need to figure out who are those you know different Circles of your general audience are and you have to adapt to their wishes you need to penetrate their attention B bubble right so you know you you need to understand your target audience secondly you need to understand the trends um like I spoke with Brad pacley yesterday um you know the famous country singer the Grammy uh winning country singer is actually going to be on the yeah we're filming on the Monday so uh Jimmy uh BR B is actually going to be on the tonight and yeah I asked him to mention Ukraine so we spoke yesterday and you know Brad is not getting younger and I'm not getting younger so um we had this really interesting conversation about how how like how we adapt to the world of like you know gen Z and g a right so you know the people who don't know don't really know who he is and like you know to whom you know the stuff that I'm describing is like you know their everyday life so uh and Brad is doing a collaboration with post Malone uh and I suggested to him I go like have you seen those like viral reels of like you know AI singing different famous songs with other artist voices like you know Metallica singing Russian songs and like you know Department from South Park singing deep fake technology or something vocal deep fakes and I go like we should train an AI to sing random songs with Brad pac's voice and I said it to Brad and then like we that way we can pick an audience that we want to appeal to so like if Brad P's voice does a Taylor Swift song you know that will make him known to they'll make the Taylor Swift crowd kind of wonder who the hell is that old dude who like you know you know from West Virginia who who sings country music right uh and so on so forth so you need to figure out the target audience and I would say that unless you've got it planned out and mapped out and verified by people who know what they're talking about um you should move ahead as you know potential influencer and everything because everything else is just a question of v and you know if if you're okay with gambling if you're okay with like flipping a coin enough but if you want to approach it with some form of guarantee of success you you need to be scientific about so target audience then every so every trick of the trade you should use
Igor so basically like look storytelling is is nothing Well has a lot to do with like talent and art and everything but the the end of the day you as a human being um your emotions are ruled by neural modulators in you uh so if you know how to trigger different biochemical responses in in in the human body with information with V with any cognitive stimulation uh then you can emotions so just right through the r pretty much yeah yeah yeah because like before you before you can afford uh yourself that level of empathy loyalty and trust with your audience where you can be rational with them you're competing on an emotional level because like everything now is you know is pretty much got emotions as the foundation like you know even like the era of like normal news has ended so now like even the most respectable media Outlets are going after your emotions with clickbait with everything so um you can't afford to be rational with if you want large enough audience so you need to manipulate the same way that everyone else does but then kind of build that empathy loyalty and trust and use it for the greater good
45:40 Creativity, Finding Balance, and Avoiding Sacrifice of Aspects of Life
Serhiy so tell me about the the Crea the the you know Rick Ruben's book The Art the creative act I think it is he he argues that every human being is creative you know what lies within creativity what why why because you you spoke to the matter that people choose either hidden ISM or like statues game and there's always a sacrifice so if you if you choose to be I don't know like a CEO if you want to make a lot of money you are sacrificing what you call to be Arts right
Igor or I think you no no you're wrong there you you don't have to sacrifice anything um you know uh you need to find the balance and you need to kind of adapt whatever you're doing whatever drives you to point away You're you know you're whole and you kind of you you get everything that you wanted to but no sacrifice only happens if you don't understand the underlying rules or if you don't understand how motivation works so so you don't need to sacrifice everything you and like as far as creativity and concerned you're not sacrificing art you're not sacrificing creativity because if you have to sacrifice it that means you just don't understand it it is how it works to pretty much like are you a talented musician um not in the sense of your mechanical ski skills say playing an instrument but can you write a song that will be liked by other people regardless of who you are yes you know why because if you have taste you have creativity and like in the era of uh generative AI I chat gpts mid Journeys and everything like you don't have to create you need to prompt and choose yeah so you have to you have to you have to learn to like mess around let's put it this way so if if you like if you want to write a song you know AI can do everything for you they could write drum Parts it could write like chord progressions they could sing for you using your voice a deep fake clone of your voice can do anything could write text you could RH text whatever uh one thing it it cannot do and one thing that makes you human still up to this point slightly more Superior to uh artificial intelligence is the fact that you can afford to choose you have taste you have Creative Visions you have you know abstract mentality you know you know what you uh and that's if you want to be creative that's the skill that you need to develop just like the genie test it you have to you have to learn to be a mini Visionary in your life so you need to you need to see the end result and in the linear world of the 20th century uh we we kind of got used to kind of working from 9 to six not from zero to result and like and that's one of the habits that we need to break
Serhiy I think this entire schedule based work uh it's just it should become obsolete but unfortunately there are too many people who like the control and the I couldn't I couldn't break away it's like that's what that's one of the things I'm kind of doing my best to uh educate people about
49:00 Spending a Day with an Oscar-winning Director
Igor like you know there's no excuse nothing is impossible like you know whatever is impossible is contained in like you know chemistry physics and biology textbooks from seventh grade and even that might not be impossible everything else is completely possible like you know the walls are breaking down you know in fact we we're reaching that weird opportunity equality whereby you know if you have access to the internet if you have a gadget you can influence a billion people or you know all the people the majority of the people um so everything else is just an excuse you know it and and in a matter of like you know your desire to do or not to do something that's it but like one of the things we need to do urgently is to get rid of like you know that trait whereby we just kind of excuse ourselves from even trying like one of the biggest lessons I had in life that was like back in the day when I lived in London uh without telling you a very long story it so happened that I spent half a day entertaining an Oscar winning director uh very famous One um so we're sitting drinking coffee on chfb Avenue and um basically I him because I was a kid and like I was always fascinated with Hollywood and I wanted to direct movies and like I had visions of uh different like you know stories and everything so I asked him like you know how how how do I become you like you know how do I make it in Hollywood how do to win an Oscar how to get an opportunity to create you know without all the limit limitations of like being 20 and being nobody and that guy just told me uh probably the wisest thing that I've ever heard uh so I finished asking my question he kind of turned turned my head towards the window he pointed at the um at the street and he goes like well in those like 20 seconds that it's taken you to to ask that question I would argue that at least three or five people more talented than you and I combined have walked by this window oh yet yet yet none of them are gonna make it and you know why because then I get never going to try it's like it's it's the Paradox of a beautiful woman right so you know if a woman is like as they say in the US is a 10 uh you know model looking you know old men like breaking that neck looking at her in the street most likely she's a lot yeah you know why because you know manages too insecure and too shy to even talk to her they're afraid of her she's better than they can do she's better than they can achieve she you know it's impossible it's that impossible you know the corniest crap that I've seen But it actually works you know I've seen a meme that turns the word impossible to I impossible uh and like you know even that corny stuff it's better than just kind of sitting there scratching your you know your cheek and just going like nah
Serhiy it so we are creators of pretty much our destiny right and not not we're not like looking at the circumstances some people think we live in a simulation let them think that I'm not oppos
52:46 Living in The Simulation
Igor I I might be one of the people who are agnostic but leaning towards that particular hypothesis well even even if that's a simulation and some Superior minds are looking at how we're going to unfold this life it's still doesn't have to do doesn't have to be a superior mind like look if one last thing if you want if you want to understand what the um simulation theory is coming from so let's say um in the next like 30 to 50 years we don't destroy ourselves don't destroy a planet and you can live for a very very long time if not forever um and like you've tried everything and you can create a simulation that's uh indistinguishable from reality wouldn't you at some point try and do that wouldn't you wouldn't you simulate you in different scenarios probably would it might not be so pretty much could be just living forever playing game a game or something yeah it could be me for example you know kind of having lived through many scenarios just kind of going okay now now you're going to be living in Ukraine in 2023 seeing those stupid drones and missiles and like seeing a you know the verge of potential AGI and like in the most turbulent and scary period of human history here's where you're gonna do you're G you're gonna go and advise zinsky for a year and a half and then you're gonna stay in Kev and see you know if the Russians take it and defend it and if they don't take it like you know um see if you can do enough to Warrant a caliber missile hitting your house in KF you know if you do enough damage they're going to get pissed off and strike your house or something like that it all sounds incredibly crazy but like doesn't it sound like a simulation at least somewhat so one thing I can promise you I'm definitely not going the Elon route so I'm not gonna I'm not gonna lean right and go absolutely crazy
55:11 What Do You Think About Elon Musk, Freedom of Speech
Serhiy tell me about your perception of Elon and how did it had it changed over the years
Igor like look I can see where it's coming from uh like you know certain irrational things and things most of the things I disagree with can be to do with like different substances let's put it this way or with you know certain psychological uh issues but as far as like his um you know system of values and beliefs is concerned I disagree with it but I fully understand that he's what you call a freedom of speech absolutist and like you know if you think about it like you know do we believe in freedom of speech Yes uh on the other hand am I allowed to say anything and everything even if it can cause damage if it can cause a human to lose his life something like that no there are obviously limitations to all the freedoms that we kind of uh award ourselves uh but he's an absolutist so he's a black black or white guy so there's either a complete freedom of speech he can say anything he wants to regardless of how stupid it is and damage and Destroy and you know potentially harmful and if he can't say it it's not freedom of speech uh that's his kind of view and a lot of things he does is to provoke that particular conversation
57:43 Last Word
Serhiy thank you so much for the conversation in your was it was a bliss
Igor no problem no problem and like let's hope I'm wrong about many things but you know time will tell