Topic map

Words spent on each topic per episode (chapters can carry up to three topics; sponsor reads and intros excluded). Darker = more discussion. Click a cell to open the episode.

Table view
TopicWordsEpisodes
Creativity & Craft218,13744
Identity & Self-Knowledge217,32450
Startups & Company Building207,45738
Philosophy, Meaning & Spirituality161,03443
Agency & Ambition134,94543
Tools & Software122,05123
Careers & Life Paths113,93441
Internet & Social Media112,85929
Investing & Markets107,86421
Writing & Publishing103,81527
Art, Film & Music103,73031
Design, Taste & Aesthetics103,19231
AI & Machine Intelligence99,97928
Stories, Memes & Ideas98,86532
Learning, Education & Talent90,97930
Cities, Scenes & Community84,88329
Media & Journalism82,99815
Friendship, Love & Family82,89836
Science, Progress & Futurism76,91219
Politics, Government & Institutions70,01421
Attention & Focus60,26827
Crypto & Web355,9938
Books & Reading51,05222
America & National Identity35,25510
Games & Play16,4008

Topics by total words

Across all 55 episodes.

Topic co-occurrence

Topics tagged on the same chapter. Line width = number of shared chapters (pairs with 6+). Node size = total words.

Table view
PairShared chapters
Identity & Self-Knowledge + Philosophy, Meaning & Spirituality46
Agency & Ambition + Identity & Self-Knowledge36
Identity & Self-Knowledge + Friendship, Love & Family33
Design, Taste & Aesthetics + Tools & Software31
Careers & Life Paths + Identity & Self-Knowledge28
Creativity & Craft + Writing & Publishing28
Investing & Markets + Startups & Company Building26
Art, Film & Music + Creativity & Craft25
Creativity & Craft + Identity & Self-Knowledge24
Agency & Ambition + Careers & Life Paths23
Creativity & Craft + Design, Taste & Aesthetics22
Creativity & Craft + Startups & Company Building21
Philosophy, Meaning & Spirituality + Science, Progress & Futurism20
Agency & Ambition + Startups & Company Building18
AI & Machine Intelligence + Tools & Software17
Philosophy, Meaning & Spirituality + Friendship, Love & Family16
AI & Machine Intelligence + Creativity & Craft16
Startups & Company Building + Tools & Software16
Identity & Self-Knowledge + Startups & Company Building16
Creativity & Craft + Stories, Memes & Ideas15
Philosophy, Meaning & Spirituality + Stories, Memes & Ideas15
Startups & Company Building + Stories, Memes & Ideas15
Art, Film & Music + Identity & Self-Knowledge15
Creativity & Craft + Philosophy, Meaning & Spirituality14
Agency & Ambition + Creativity & Craft14
Notes on methodology

Each transcript is split into chapters using the episode's own chapter headers (~870 chapters across the show). The 26-topic taxonomy was designed by reading all of those chapter titles; a language model (Claude Fable) then read a digest of every chapter and assigned it one to three topics, plus the tone scores used on the Tone tab.

Topic word counts weight each chapter by its length: all of a chapter's words count toward every topic it carries, so totals across topics exceed the corpus word count. Chapters that are sponsor reads, intros, or thanks are tagged "meta" and excluded from every number here.

Co-occurrence counts chapters tagged with both topics at once. Topic assignment is a model judgment of transcript text — treat boundaries between related topics (e.g. Creativity & Craft vs Design, Taste & Aesthetics) as soft.