Hey everybody,
This video focuses on single artificial neurons, building up the idea of gradient descent and applying the single-neuron system to two kinds of applications: A distance predictor for a cannon, and a mango classifier based on length and mass.
I had originally planned to also cover more complex systems and to talk about AI more broadly, but I decided to cut scope. Even ...
2025-09-27 15:07:54 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey everybody,
I wanted to share the current version of a scene from the next video. It's one of the first scenes and shows a sort of proto training loop for a single artificial neuron, which is being used to predict how far a projectile will go when shot from a cannon with a given energy. Once the rest of the scenes are sketched out like this, I'll do the voiceover, time the animations t...
2025-07-09 22:52:56 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey folks, the stream is about to start.
After the stream, this link will lead to the recording on YouTube, so you can watch later.
Hello!
We'll be doing a livestream to dive more deeply into the evolution of aging.
It's scheduled for next Saturday, February 8th, at 10 am Central (US). It will be an unlisted stream on YouTube, and I'll make another Patreon post with the link just before the stream. If you're not able to make it, the video will be available to watch afterward at the same link.
The agen...
2025-02-01 17:26:43 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey folks, here's the video that will go live tomorrow. It's my longest video yet, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.
As a reminder, the Patreon tiers are going to change tomorrow. More details on that in the previous post and in the video. Please feel free to send me a message if you have any questions.
Thanks for all your support, and I hope you enjoy!
Justin
Hey folks,
Let’s jump right in.
Here’s the new set of tiers and rewards, which will go live when I publish the next video: Simulating the Evolution of Aging, which will come out in January. Basically, things are getting cheaper.
$3 – Name in the video credits, a discord role, and a merch discount. The main change here i...
2024-12-16 16:20:21 +0000 UTC View PostHey all,
I hope everyone’s 2023 is wrapping up nicely. Here’s my update for you.
First off, I’ll no longer do monthly Patreon updates. When I did a survey on them, responses were positive but few. I still intend to update regularly, but from now on if you see a Patreon post from me, you’ll know there’s something noteworthy. For those of you who enjoy smaller and more frequ...
2023-12-31 20:38:48 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey Insiders,
Here's the next video! It will release publicly on Saturday, assuming no major edits are needed.
The scope changed a lot as I was working on this one. When it began, I was planning to do a video on conditional strategies and introduce the concept of an Evolutionarily Stable Strategy (ESS). But after working on it for a while, I felt it made more sense to cover mixed ...
Hey folks,
Matias and I have been hard at work on creating a tool that will let us assemble scenes in the Unity editor similar to how one would use a video editor.
This example shows a scene-in-progress that will appear in the next on the binomial distribution. Some of the animations are defined with keyframes in the Unity editor, and some are defined through code. One of the big t...
Hey all, jumping on the year review train a bit early.
Contents
The tiers will remain the same, but there are some updates to rewards:
Hey folks,
The latest video just went live. It goes through the process of trying to calculate how many people might exist in the future, in a few different circumstances. I hope you like! This is also the fastest turnaround I've had on a video since the very early days. Less than two months.
The video is also related to an update. This summer, Primer received a grant from the Effe...
Hey everyone,
The main coin flipping video is finished.
Thanks for your support!
Justin
2022-06-25 16:45:18 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey folks,
Thanks for your help testing the game. It's now live with an intro on YouTube!
I'm excited to see how it goes.
Justin
2022-04-09 14:50:18 +0000 UTC View PostHey everyone,
As I mentioned in the most recent post, I've been working on an interactive version of the sim for the next video. It's finally ready for some play testing! My hope is to introduce it with a short video next week (assuming some issues can be resolved), then use data from it to in the main video ~2 weeks after that.
I'd be grateful if you tried it out and let me know w...
Hello all,
Time for a year-end update.
As the title hints, the most concrete change for all of you is that I’m switching Patreon charges to a per-month schedule. There’s more on the reasoning behind that below, but I wanted to call it out at the beginning to reduce the risk that someone might miss it.
No sponsored messages in 2022
In 2022, I'm planni...
2021-12-17 02:35:55 +0000 UTC View Post
This is the one where I actually get Hamilton's rule right. Most of the time on this one was re-writing it a thousand times to try to make clear the subtlety that led to my initial confusion. It still feels a little complicated and long, but I hope the goal has been achieved for many viewers.
Thanks for your support, and special thanks to those of you who gave feedback on the early versio...
2021-08-28 20:22:50 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey everybody,
This video has been a long time coming. Ever since calling Hamilton's rule a lie (over two years ago, now), I've been wrestling with how to communicate its subtleties that I didn't originally appreciate. It's still not perfect, but I'm reasonably happy with how it turned out.
This is not quite the final version. There are a few warts and some pieces to polish. Most no...
2021-08-20 20:49:45 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey all,
Here's the latest video.
It's the remake of the video I took down. I took out the erroneous part about hamilton's rule but it's also remade to be a better video in a number of other ways, from production value to the fact that I use many sim runs for the discussions rather than running a single sim and asking the audience to trust me that I picked a representative run. I ...
Hey folks,
These feedback posts are normally reserved for the Adviser tier. But it wasn't a paid video, and the departure from the normal style makes me want extra feedback, so I'm opening this one up to everyone.
This was an unusual video in several ways.
1. It was an apology/correction video
2. It featured my face on camera
3. It did not feature a simulation
Her...
2020-12-18 17:46:06 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey folks,
New video today. This one isn't a paid Patreon post, though, since it's not a normal video. I made it to address a mistake in a previous video. It's also my first try at a talking-head video and isn't the highest production quality. Overall, it didn't feel right to charge you fine people for this one.
In "The Natural Selection of Altruism", I claimed that Hamilton's...
2020-12-06 23:42:19 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey folks!
We have a new video. I know this one might be surprising, since I had been working on the Hamilton's rule video, but I started learning about voting systems and decided a video introducing alternate voting systems could be both interesting and important.
I hope you enjoy it! And if you're waiting for more bio, the Hamilton's rule vid shouldn't be too long in coming.
...
Hey everyone. A few announcements.
First off, the next video is coming along in the next few weeks. It's a little too early to give an exact date, though. Sneak peek animations coming soon. (I've left much of the visual work for last.)
Second, as a way of trying to connect a bit more often (and to give myself a small bit of structure), I'm going to stream myself working on ...
Hey folks,
Here's a feedback survey for the latest video. There are two quick questions and an optional text box if you'd like to write anything.
I'm excited to hear your thoughts!
Justin
2020-05-20 16:49:25 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey folks,
The next video is done and will premiere at 10 am US Central time tomorrow (May 17).
I was planning not to do a COVID-19 video, but we've been seeing a lot of coverage of specifics when many people don't have a great understanding of the basics. This video focuses on those basics and doesn't try to make predictions or advocate for particular solutions. I'm hoping this hel...
2020-05-16 21:03:01 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey folks,
Here's the final version, live on YouTube. Thanks for the feedback on the early version.
Tier rewards and surveys to come.
<3
Justin
Hey folks,
Here it is! It's unlisted for now, and it goes live Saturday at 10 am Central.
Let me know if you have any feedback.
Justin
2020-03-12 03:51:21 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey folks,
Two quick announcements to give you more info around a YouTube post I'm about to make.
1. The next video is coming Saturday, March 14. I'll release it for early access on Monday or Tuesday.
2. The Primer merch store is now live. Patrons get 20% off with the code 65KZHJM7GQ5N at chec...
Hello dear friends,
It has been too long, but I finally have a preview of the next video.
The next several videos in the economics series will build a model economy from scratch, exploring general concepts along the way. This clip shows the basic building block of an economy: a single agent making decisions subject to its production possibilities and utility function.
I still ...
2019-11-20 04:17:52 +0000 UTC View PostHey folks,
With the success of the last two videos, it now seems very likely that Primer has the potential to become sustainable, so I've been thinking a bit more about the long term. Here are a few updates.
I'm not taking outside work anymore
I just finished my last remaining freelance contract, so I'll be full-time on Primer for the foreseeable future. ...
2019-08-31 00:54:41 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey all,
Next video is up. Hope you enjoy! I'll follow up soon with surveys, rewards, etc.
Thanks for being here,
Justin
2019-07-28 00:06:38 +0000 UTC View Post