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Aaron VanDevender

Chief Scientist, Founders Fund · 1 appearance on the record.

computed by AI from the episodes · how this works → · full disclaimer →

Aaron VanDevender is the Chief Scientist at Founders Fund, where he assesses technologies and monitors portfolio scientific impact. He previously designed single-photon systems before joining the firm.

12statements → 6claims → 1claims resolved → 3.83/5average certainty → 2.83/5average debate potential → 4.4/5argument clarity · the sources → 6said about them ↓

0 supported 0 partly supported 1 contradicted 5 not checkable as stated how the 6 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

3 predictions · 3 assertions · 2 opinions · 4 insights · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 6 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 1 is resolved, and 5 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Aaron argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

Their most notable contradicted claim

Assertion Contradicted
VanDevender: Atomic electron microscopes require quantum computing techniques
“So we built single atom resolution electron microscopes, which turns out to be very similar to building quantum computers. And that you're manipulating the quantum states of individual atoms, but use that for biotechnology purposes.”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 3:34 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender

Argument clarity: do they answer the question? how? →

4.4 / 5 directness 4.6 · coherence 4.8 · precision 4.1 · compression 4

answered every one of 24 assessed questions directly

This is a score against a rubric. It is not a rank. Every host question → answer exchange is scored with names hidden on directness, coherence, precision and compression, 1–5 each, on meaning alone: disfluencies are ignored, and only raw unedited episodes count. This is the score that measures thought. Every scored exchange, scores shown → · The rubric and its checks →

How they sound: speaking style how? →

216 words/min while actually speaking · 6.6 um and uh per 1k words

Measured by listening to the audio itself: 4,718 words across 1 episode of raw-level tape, transcribed verbatim with every um and uh kept, each one attributed only where the alignment onto our timed stream is unambiguous. These are measurements of speaking style. We do not rank them: across this corpus, fluency and argument quality are nearly uncorrelated (ρ≈0.2), and smooth talking does not signal clear thinking. How it's measured →

How the interview went all their pushback → series average →

Across 1 rated episode:

host pushback ▾ 3/10
pushed back at the host ▾ 5/10
setup questions received 75%

Everything Aaron VanDevender said on 20VC that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Opinion
VanDevender: Most products marketed as AI are rebranded actuarial science
“Most of the things that call themselves AI out there are really just a rebranding.”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 6:58 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Opinion
VanDevender: Defensive data moats are oversold and mostly noise
“Most of the data sets out there or the defensibility data sets out there I think are oversold. There is this very, it's a very compelling, very tantalizing notion that, oh, I just have so much data, and nobody else has it, and therefore it must be special, but…”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 12:21 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Insight
VanDevender: Smaller datasets force self-driving car companies to build better algorithms
“Even if you have a much, much smaller data set than Google, you can still do a really good job of developing a self-driving car, and in fact, it almost forces you into a better position, because if you have complete knowledge of the entire street grid, you can…”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 14:39 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Prediction Not checkable as stated
VanDevender: Autonomous trucks will improve delivery but erode rural wealth distribution
“So if you replace the trucks with self-driving trucks, you end up with a much better goods distribution system, which is positive, but the trucking system is a much worse wealth distribution system.”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 17:54 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Insight
VanDevender: Digital platforms increase the economic value of physical proximity
“The lesson has been that actually those digital technologies have actually made proximity more valuable. If you think about like where, where a lot of that value to people has come from, it's from companies like Lyft, like Postmates, a Craigslist, Amazon Prime…”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 23:56 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Assertion Not checkable as stated
VanDevender: Deep learning is just linear algebra at industrial scale
“At the core of it is just this matrix multiplication operations. It's, you know, you're just sort of doing linear algebra at industrial scale. We haven't gotten to the point for most of these things or most of the things that call themselves AI, where you're r…”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 8:43 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Assertion Not checkable as stated
VanDevender: Most 'big data' datasets are only megabytes or gigabytes
“Most of the things that are sort of big data are actually not that big. You know, you would like to, you'd like to think of these petabytes and exabytes floating around there and coming up with really amazing insights that could never have been seen. But a lot…”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 9:10 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Insight
VanDevender: US trucking operates as both goods and wealth distribution
“The whole trucking system does serves two purposes at the same time. One, it's a goods distribution system. So we load things on the trucks, we ship them around. That's how we get all the stuff that we buy at the store, but it's also a wealth distribution syst…”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 16:43 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Prediction Not checkable as stated
VanDevender: VR will repeat the mistaken belief that physical location doesn't matter
“I think we're sort of poised to make that same mistake again with virtual reality.”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 23:52 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Insight
VanDevender: Drilling into specific technical details tests a founder's true depth
“Even if you don't necessarily yourself have the complete picture by just, you know, drilling down on specific aspects, you know, whether that person has, like, has all the answers and can go as deep as you want to go is a really good sign.”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 6:03 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Prediction Not checkable as stated
VanDevender: Robot maintenance jobs will pay more but employ fewer people
“There will be those, some of those jobs created and they will be better jobs than trucker jobs. Those people will be more productive. They'll get paid more. They won't be on the road all the time. They'll be home for dinner with their kids. So it'll be a bette…”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 20:15 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender
Assertion Contradicted
VanDevender: Atomic electron microscopes require quantum computing techniques
“So we built single atom resolution electron microscopes, which turns out to be very similar to building quantum computers. And that you're manipulating the quantum states of individual atoms, but use that for biotechnology purposes.”
Aaron VanDevender Oct 16, 2017 ▶ 3:34 20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large Datasets Is Mostly Overplayed & The Societal Effects of 4m Truck Drivers Being Unemployed with Aaron Vandevender

The other half of the tape: Aaron VanDevender's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 6 times in 4 episodes on 20VC. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 6

Every mention by year

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20VC: Founders Fund's Chief Scientist on Why AI Is Mostly A Scam, Why The Value of Large D Oct 16, 2017 23m
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