June 18, 2025 • 41 mins
In this episode, I’m joined by Lucas Lorenzo Peña, a systems thinker, Creative Technologist, and AI Builder. Lucas sits at the intersection of strategic design, innovation frameworks, and emerging AI tools. This conversation dives deep into how AI is shaping the way we think, not just the way we work.
We explore how tools can be extensions of our thought processes, how engineering mindsets can drive creative innovation, and why resilience in the age of AI is less about learning every tool and more about learning how to think across systems. If you’ve ever wondered how to bridge artistic vision with technical skill, or how to build future-ready infrastructure for the ideas in your head, this one’s for you.
🔥 Topics We Cover:
- How AI tools are helping Lucas prototype and refine complex ideas
- Lucas’s approach to creative problem solving through systems thinking
- The difference between art, design, and engineering in the AI era
- Why learning to “vibe code” isn’t enough, and how to build a real foundation
- His strategy of “backcasting” and imagining from the future backwards
- Why staying adaptable with tools matters more than mastering any one platform
🧰 Tools Mentioned in This Episode:
- For thinking + writing: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, DeepSeek
- For coding + prototyping: Python, JavaScript, LLaMA
- For organizing ideas: Notion
Contact Lucas:
LinkedIn: lucaslpena
Substack: traverseinspace
🔗 Links Mentioned in the Episode:
Want to be featured?
Have a compelling AI use case or experimental workflow? Apply to be a guest at howiaipodcast.com.
Enjoy dining out? Use my inKind link to get $25 off your next $50+ meal. This is a referral link and I may receive a small reward if you use it.
More About Brooke:
Instagram: thebrookegram
Website: brookex.com
LinkedIn: Brooke Gramer
More About the Podcast:
Instagram: howiai.podcast
Website: howiaipodcast.com
"How I AI" is a concept and podcast series created and produced by Brooke Gramer of EmpowerFlow Strategies LLC. All rights reserved.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Brooke (00:02):
Welcome to How I AI the podcast featuring real people,
real stories, and real AI inaction.
I'm Brooke Gramer your host andguide on this journey into the
real world impact of artificialintelligence.
For over 15 years, I've workedin creative marketing events and
business strategy wearing allthe hats.
(00:22):
I know the struggle of trying toscale and manage all things
without burning out, but here'sthe game changer, ai.
This isn't just a podcast, How IAI is a community.
A space where curious minds likeyou can come together, share
ideas, and I'll also be bringingyou exclusive discounts, free
trials and insider resources soyou can test drive the latest
(00:45):
tools and tech yourself.
Because AI isn't just a trend,it's a shift.
The sooner we embrace it, themore freedom, creativity, and
opportunities we'll unlock.
How I AI is brought to you inpartnership with the collective,
A space designed to accelerateyour learning and AI adoption.
I joined the Collective and it'scompletely catapulted my
(01:07):
learning, expanded my network,and show me what's possible with
ai.
Whether you're just starting outor looking to refine your AI
strategy, The Collective givesyou the resources to grow.
Stay tuned to learn more at theend of this episode, or check
the show notes for my exclusiveinvite link..
Hello everyone.
Welcome to another episode ofHow I Ai.
(01:28):
I'm your host, Brooke Gramertoday I have a very special
guest.
His name is Lucas Lorenzo Pena,he is a creative studio founder.
He's also a creativetechnologist and an AI builder.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
Welcome.
Thanks for having me.
I love to give the opportunityfor everybody to expand more on
(01:50):
their introduction.
I'd love for you to share inyour own words more about
yourself and your background.
Lucas (01:55):
Cool.
Yeah, so I work in creativetechnology and what that means
is essentially using technologyin different creative ways.
Fundamentally, right?
I view creativity as somethingthat is really an extension of.
A practice that is creating withintention.
Design and engineering are thesame thing.
I view them that way.
And so for me, being a creativetechnologist, it's a way to
really design and constructexperiences or provocations, or
(02:19):
experimentations for clients,peoples teams, whatever.
And I've been in the, let's say,emergent tech space since 2016,
more or less.
Working in blockchain, civictechnology back then machine
learning, and now it's calledai.
Yeah, I've been in this spacesince 2016 and I've been
teaching creativity and AI since2018.
So I've been in and around theAI space for a while, and I
(02:41):
decided to have found my owncompany last year after leaving
big corporate innovation.
And before that I also had mydesign studio.
So I've been in and around let'ssay transformational tech for a
while.
Brooke (02:54):
Okay.
Wow.
Yeah.
Long
Lucas (02:55):
time.
Brooke (02:55):
Lots to dig in there.
So when did you start?
This, did you learn it inschool?
Did you end up in that area?
Lucas (03:03):
Yeah.
So my background is in computerscience, right?
But before that I was a musicianand I found that when I moved to
computer science that I was ableto have the same, excitement and
creativity when I was coding, asI did when I was, being in, on a
stage playing music.
Cool.
And so I've always sought outdifferent spaces that I can
experiment with.
Technology.
(03:23):
It just so happened that I wasable to.
move to Europe and study designprogram, which was very
different from computer science.
And then after that I studiedcognitive science, which is a
blend of philosophy.
Computational neuroscience.
I focused on roboticsspecifically and yeah, modeling
multi-agent systems, et cetera,et cetera.
It was a lot of fun.
And I think after that it was itreally just gave me this essence
(03:46):
that there is more.
Than just creating, there's morein theory than just Web2, right?
There's more than just makingwebsites.
And more than making products.
So I just sought that out andyeah, worked in the smart city
space.
And then from there I was ableto actually come up and
essentially create a, createlike an AI creative program in a
university.
E the Institute of AdvancedArchitecture of Catalonia.
(04:07):
And since then, it's just, I'vejust been in it really.
I've just been in it.
And for me it really comes downto the creative practice and
how.
AI or new technologies reallycan provoke us to think in
different ways.
So the work we do is less aboutbuilding products or building
automations.
It's more about building newways of thinking and then
downstream from there, buildingthe tools that can really take
(04:30):
the thinking into a businesssensor, into whatever kind of.
More, let's say, tangible goalthat we wanna move towards.
Yeah.
Brooke (04:37):
Okay.
So you transitioned to workingfor yourself Yeah.
In the last year.
What kind of clients do you workon?
And take me through.
How you work with them, becauseI dunno if I'm fully
understanding the scope so breakit down a little bit more.
It's a lot of
Lucas (04:52):
fun.
But it is a bit abstract, Iwould say.
Yes.
You and I think that thatambiguity is something that we
do like to bring in the spacewith our clients.
We've worked with a handful ofFortune 500 companies as well as
a handful of research teams andjust small community
organizations.
And what we really do is,firstly, we essentially do a
workshop with them to figure outhow does your business look
(05:12):
like, what do you care about?
What is your way of thinking?
And map out in 15, 20, even 30years, we do a little bit of
futuring exercises.
What does your business looklike?
Like how ideally do you want tobe operating in the year 2050?
From there, we say, okay, whattechnology can we help you use
that can start pushing youtowards that?
So then we go from the morestrategy side into the
(05:32):
production side, and we have ateam that that I lead where we
just write, we write code thatcan nudge the business or just
the objectives, KPI's, goals,whatever into more of this
future vision that they have forthe company.
It's this marriage betweenstrategy and thinking and
production and tooling.
It's straddling both worlds.
We're like a little boutique R&Dlab, if you will.
Brooke (05:51):
Okay.
Yeah, I think I understand itbetter.
So thank you for elaborating.
So my next question is, how manypeople on your team and what's
the technology stack that youall are currently using?
Lucas (06:04):
So we don't we don't subscribe to a tech stack.
Okay.
Because the space iscontinuously changing.
We're a team of five.
Maybe six total right now.
There's three engineers and I'mthe principal, engineer and
strategist.
And then we have a productionmanager, a biz dev person, and
like an organizational designperson.
And and then we also partnerwith other companies that do
some more strategic design worklike Jackie you might have.
(06:26):
Designed detangling, this kindof stuff.
So we.
Yeah, as I was saying, we don'tnecessarily stick to a stack
because it's always changing.
I really want my relationshipwith my clients to be such that
if they care about the future ofgenerative media and images and
video we are the team that says,okay, here is a platform that
you can use that can generateyou these things and that you
(06:47):
can use to uplift your creativeprocess.
And it doesn't matter ifsomething new comes out next
week or tomorrow, whatever.
We can just continuously updatethis for you.
The tech stack is usually Pythonor JavaScript.
Okay.
The languages that essentiallycan run anywhere and everywhere
just because for the sake ofaccessibility and tooling.
Yeah.
Brooke (07:04):
Wow.
That's good to hear that youjust are agile and it's based on
every client in different do yousay that you spend a lot on
those coding systems or do youfeel like it's more just
in-house?
Lucas (07:16):
We do.
The pipelines that we work on.
Are large.
They're six figure projects.
And they take months.
Yeah.
But I think that really when weare tinkering with these things,
we're continuously remindingourselves that it's more than
just the tools, right?
It's how the tools, like thetools are not necessarily meant
to replace people.
They're not meant to remove, ifwe, for example, have a tool
that generates images for amedia company, we're not wanting
(07:38):
to replace their creatives.
We want to create things thatcan uplift their creatives.
So while we do spend a lot oftime on the tooling, really the
framework and the capstones andthe guiding light that we're
pushing towards is very muchdownstream of these workshops.
So it's a lot of fun.
I love what I do really if Ilove it.
Yeah.
Truly.
I love what I do.
So
Brooke (07:56):
We were just in a mastermind together.
And you brought us through areally fun workshop where we did
that future scope and.
You had these prompts alreadybuilt out for us.
And I'm curious because you havea background in research and
development.
Yeah.
What goes into future planning?
How does one plan for the futureand create an outcome when
(08:18):
things are changing so much.
How does that work?
Lucas (08:20):
Yeah, it's scary.
Yeah.
Looking at the landscape of AIand technology, I was using a
tool the other day that.
One of my clients was reallywanting to use, and then a week
later it was like, on Twitterthey said this tool is dead, or
X, I'm not gonna call it X, buton Twitter, they said, this tool
is dead.
And it was like, oh, then threedays later, the tool that
apparently died came backbecause they had a new release.
(08:40):
Yes.
It's scary, but I think the besttool is really this.
What I like to call just mentalmodels, like different mental
models.
The way that I work is very muchlike I have different mental
models that I use to look atthings in different ways.
And I think connecting to thesedifferent ways of thinking,
whether it's the tool of backcasting, imagining how you wanna
be in the future and thenworking backwards, whether it's
(09:01):
this idea of the cone of thefuture.
Like these are all thepossibilities you might be able
to achieve tomorrow.
And from each possibility, whatmight this look like in three
years and in five years?
And, expanding the scope, thespace of futuring is really just
connecting to these tools.
Being able to, I have I'm aheavy notion user.
Brooke (09:16):
Okay.
Lucas (09:16):
Fucking love notion, plug notion.
And I would say that if, if youuse it the best thing you can do
is really just catalog, right?
You use it as a second brain.
And in this second brain ofmine, I have tons of these
tools.
I have, different, let's saywhat I call operations that I
can use to look at to look atthe world, whether it's asking
really weird questions like whatis the.
(09:38):
What I like to do is I to bridgedifferent, in different
modalities together.
So like, even just this sofa,right?
There's texture to it, butasking a question like what is
the texture of X?
And if X is really abstract orambiguous, it invites and
invites provocation.
Invites you to really think andsay I wonder what, what is it,
what is the texture of travelmean to me, for example?
And how can I incorporate thatinto my travel or vacation
company?
(09:58):
Things like these little mini.
Really verbs that you can applyon things is something that I
just have a list of.
And when we're working with theclients, it's finding these
interesting ways to poke andprod, because a lot of the
times, the problems that theyhave are, it's like an onion,
you have to ask why five times,and then even still, you might
not get to the core and youmight realize that this one part
(10:20):
of a complex system is connectedto this other part.
And you have to, you can't justpull one thread and the whole
thing unravels.
You have to really understandand pull multiple things at the
same time.
For me, just mental models andbeing really yeah.
Say introspective on things.
Yeah.
Is how my team has been able toreally stand apart from others
insofar as being able to reallyintroduce this new way of
(10:41):
thinking.
Yeah, it's a lot of fun, but itdoes take a lot of mental work.
I will say that I nerd out aboutthese things and I know that if
someone might not, it might seemlike mental gymnastics or just
like, why are we doing this?
Really?
But and I was even talking tosomeone who was in the workshop
with us, Finn, and he was sayingthat it's a bit even existential
in asking some of thesequestions, but I do think at a
point, you, the best way is toask yourself why.
(11:02):
And to ask yourself weirdquestions.
Yes.
And to try to answer them if youcan.
Brooke (11:07):
Yeah.
It sounds like each of theclients that you have are so
unique and individual.
You might not have a lot ofrepetitive work in your process
in your systems.
Yeah.
So how does AI benefit you?
I'm curious, what is maybe onehuge benefit that has automated
your workflow, or how exactlydoes it help you when it seems
(11:28):
like every client isn't thesame.
Lucas (11:29):
The way that we use AI when it comes to like, internal
processes is very much aroundintroducing these really
complex, multi-level promptsmm-hmm.
to help us.
Build some of theseprovocations, for example, or to
figure out how to create salespipelines and this kind of
stuff.
Okay.
I do really think though, thatunlike maybe traditional sale
(11:50):
offerings, we don't really havestandardized approaches because
we really like to buildrelationships with clients.
Mm-hmm.
Before we really work with themand unpack their wicked problem.
But AI for us is really moreabout, using chat GPT for
example, to interrogate us whenwe have assumptions about
clients and having this list, asI said, on notion to then just
dump in and say, okay, this ismy understanding of this client
(12:11):
and the scope.
Here's some research and fromthe research plus the tools.
Ask me a handful of questionsthat might introduce some new
ways of thinking.
And then we use this new way ofthinking in our workshops with
our clients.
So it's very yeah, it's notnecessarily.
It's more of a process goal.
Lemme say this, right?
Okay.
So there is, it's not a means toan end, but it's just a way to
(12:32):
help us to use the analogy used.
Help us, find some new texturesto some of these questions and
do so in a way that we can do itfaster and faster.
Brooke (12:39):
So you use it a lot on your business Marketing and
promoting your own business.
Yeah.
And more of
Lucas (12:44):
the strategy side.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Brooke (12:45):
That makes sense.
I'm curious if you've had anychallenges with AI with adopting
it or using it early on in thebeginning.
It seems like you've been inthis space for so long, it's
hard to think about the realbefore and after effect, which
is what I love to hone in on atthis point.
But like, was there ever alearning curve or such a big way
that you had to shift andrestructure.
(13:07):
Around using these new tools andsystems, or was it just always
organic for you?
Lucas (13:11):
For me, it was organic, but I say that I'm very
fortunate because.
I view myself as a creative thatreally has this engineering
framework.
And for me to know back beforeAI was called ai, we called it
machine learning.
It was like, okay, how can Ihave some adaptive, or how can I
have some evolutionaryalgorithm?
How can I have a goal that wecan really push towards quickly
(13:31):
and play with that was, that'sreally what it was.
Whether it's essentially doinglinear regression or finding a
point and a plot really, anddoing that at scale.
Whatever it was.
The main thing for me was justremembering okay, that even if I
am doing something creative, atthe end of the day, it still
comes down to code.
And realizing that the code isstill structured in this way.
For me, learning how the codeworks, being a software engineer
(13:54):
from my undergraduate degree hasjust helped me realize that when
I am approaching these problems,I know what's happening behind
the scenes.
I can better massage, even now,I can better massage my prompts
so that it really understandsthings.
Or back then I can really takemy inputs and map them to really
solid solid goals in the,machine learning algorithm back
(14:14):
then and everything in between.
There was no real before andafter.
It was just like a new tool, anew, again, a new mental model
that I'm applying things with.
But I know that it's not easyand for example, different
members of my team had to reallyunderstand the value of these
things, and especially, with ourclients, right?
Or my job really is to educatethem and bring them along and
think about things differently,which of course, at the end of
(14:35):
the day comes down to the codeand comes down to the algorithm.
It's yeah it's always a process,right?
The educational pipeline.
Yeah.
Brooke (14:43):
Love dining out.
Here's a little gift for you.
I've been using InKind and it'shonestly a game changer for food
lovers.
It's like a universal diningwallet that earns you 20% cash
back at amazing restaurants,cafes, and bars nationwide.
And as I thank you for being alistener, you can grab$25 off
your next$50 tab when you signup with my link in the show
(15:07):
notes.
Just pay with InKind, earnrewards and use them on your
next outing.
A quick heads up.
This offer is for new InKindusers only.
Valid one use per guest andcovers food, drinks and tax, but
no tips or fees.
The credit expires 30 days afteryou claim it, so don't let it go
(15:27):
to waste.
Check the show notes for myaffiliate link and enjoy your
next meal on me.
Well kind Of.
Okay.
My next question for you is offscript, but I'm curious about AI
and creativity.
Awesome.
They might seem like theanti-thesis of each other.
Yeah.
How do they coexist?
How do they support one anotherand not make each other
(15:51):
obsolete?
Lucas (15:52):
I have found that a lot of creatives who lemme start
with this.
Brooke (15:59):
Mm-hmm.
Lucas (16:00):
It's important to distinguish the difference
between being an artist andbeing a designer or being a
creative in this sense.
I view art as creating to to askquestions and design and
engineering are creating toanswer questions.
So one is goal oriented, one isintentional, and the other one
is a lot more about feeling it'ssomatic.
It's more about.
Communicating essence as opposedto communicating information and
(16:21):
knowledge.
When we go towards communicatinginformation and knowledge, then
from there it's, for me, it'seasy to break it down and say,
okay, if I were to ask someone,what is your formula of
creativity?
If you think about it longenough, I think you can probably
figure it out.
If I personally view my formulaof creativity as being tension
between competence andserendipity, right?
(16:43):
I know that I'm capable ofwriting code.
I realize that I have to meet agoal or deadline, and then I
have an aha moment, and thesethree things come together and
then bam, it's creative.
I would say that AI helps for meinsofar as I'm able to, whether
it's using prompts.
Or whether it's generativeimages or media, I'm able to
(17:03):
create a mechanism that for me,can can create this serendipity,
right?
The spontaneity that says, okay,what do you think about this?
What do you think about that?
Having this kind of breakdown ofthe knowledge or the things you
care about, whether you're aflorist or whether you're a
culinary artist.
And breaking it down to theseessential essence of meaning for
you.
And then from there saying,okay, now that I have this
essence of, for example, withculinary stuff, salt, fat,
(17:24):
grease, fire, heat, all thesethings.
What if I were to make this intosome kind of map and throw it
into a prompt, right?
What if I were to bring allthese weird things I have in my
cabinet and throw it into aprompt and see what it gives me
back?
And then it might give you backnonsense.
But as a culinary artist,knowing that fat is a delivery
of flavor, you might say, youknow what?
I'm gonna use this random thingin my cabinet, peanut butter,
(17:46):
for example, as the base,because I know that the peanut
butter is gonna make this thingtaste better.
AI is really helpful insofar asyou can simulate these
environments really quickly,right?
You can say, okay, it's notgonna work with salt, it's not
gonna work with, it's not gonnawork with bitterness, but we
need fat to be this thing that'sgonna do it, right?
Or umami whatever flavor youwanna go for.
And the same thing works,especially, we've seen it work
(18:07):
with products even before ai,right?
Like we have biomimicry thespace of being inspired by
nature to design a backpack thatdoesn't get crushed when we fall
backwards or whatever.
So the space of design andengineering has always borrowed
from other domains.
So now we're just able to borrowfrom even more domains, right?
And use AI to the biggest thingis this, as I said, this
simulation.
(18:27):
Really, which is a lot of funbecause you can simulate a whole
bunch of stuff without needingto go and actually like, design
something in CAD if you're,simulating a product or, smash
things together in the kitchento see if it tastes good or not.
You can ask ChatGPT
Brooke (18:38):
Yeah.
That was a lot to unpack anddigest.
You're very eloquent.
Yeah.
I spoke quickly.
You've already gone through allmy questions pretty much.
My next question I like to askpeople are usually about what
they want be creating right now.
If you were to wave a magic wandwhat is it that you're wanting
to create and put out thereright now that you haven't seen
(18:58):
in this?
Space yet?
If I were using ai, yes, usingai, if I were to
Lucas (19:03):
wave a magic wand I, I have two different answers,
right?
One is pure kind of absurdity,let's say right now.
But right now a lot of the toolsthat we're using are our built.
By massive corporations.
And massive data sets, massivecomponents and hardware and all
this stuff.
If I could wave a magic wand, Iwould love if we can have a
(19:25):
super intelligent system likeChatGPT being able to exist
completely offline, locally On adevice that doesn't need.
Tons of memory, like a cellphone.
Yes.
The digital divide for me issuper important.
I really think that we are justcontinuously pushing up, the top
20% who are, who have access tothese tools.
And pushing everyone down.
So this is more the pie in thesky thing.
The other thing though that Ithink is a lot more tangible is,
(19:49):
using AI for the sake ofeducating and trying to close
the gap from the other wayinstead of creating a new piece
of technology.
Using the existing one, we haveto bring this, let's say bottom
whatever percent 80%.
Higher up right in, into the 20,then make it 21 and 79 and 22
78, et cetera, et cetera.
These types of educationalpipelines or whether it's, even
(20:11):
something as simple as using theSocratic method and just saying,
Hey, I want to learn about X,ask me questions.
Brooke (20:15):
And.
Lucas (20:17):
The questions it asks could push you down a rabbit
hole on Wikipedia and then youcan actually understand it and
then you can keep askingquestions.
Then maybe after 15 questionsyou're like, I know about
podcast and recording studiosand sound compression and audio,
whatever it is.
So even just these differenttools that we can use, I think
can be really well structured inthe education space.
Yes.
At the same time.
(20:37):
It's really important that wedon't try to optimize education.
I find that when, I think humansare just notoriously bad at
this.
Like, we're so good at setting abar.
It's like people need to passtests.
We're both from Florida.
We have to pass the fcat.
You have to do this, you have,and then it's like you're in
school and you're studying forthe test.
You're not studying necessarilyto understand.
Yes.
(20:57):
And AI can, if done the rightway, can really help us to.
Understand better.
It can provoke us.
Really, for me, it's notnecessarily about generating
this prompt or this text.
It's like, how can AI help usask the right questions?
And it's capable of doing so,especially with context.
And so it's just that, right?
How can we use AI for the morehumanistic approach and human
(21:20):
based KPIs and goals and notjust KPIs and goals and
efficiencies that are defined bymassive corporations in San
Francisco, yeah, that's this,these for me are the long-term
things I really wanna work on.
Yeah.
Brooke (21:32):
That's awesome.
I love that.
You touched about education andthe future of education.
What do you think the future ofeducation looks like in the next
five years?
Lucas (21:45):
I saw a paper by Lego and someone else.
I think I shared it Yes.
In a group chat.
Yeah, I read it and they weretalking about how, of course
it's really cool that thestudents have access to these
things.
I do think that we just need tobe careful, right?
I can see definitely there'sgoing to be a space of education
where.
Yeah, there's not going to bestudent teachers in the
(22:06):
classroom.
It's just gonna be robots.
You're just gonna learn from AIand I don't think that's
necessarily the best approach.
I do think education willcontinue to bifurcate and you'll
have the Montessori of Waldorfschools, these types of, like
the green school, the place,beautiful place you went to.
Connected with it, and it'slike, we're gonna have these
spaces where students are goingto learn more of the soft skills
of the of art of curation.
(22:27):
And then we're gonna move intothe space where some schools are
just purely gonna be productionbased.
And I'm not entirely sure what'sgonna happen because of it, I do
think that it's going to bequite impactful, but we've
already seen that, we have anentire.
Generation who grew up, swipingon TikTok and you can tell that
there's a bit of you, you mightlose on social skills when all
(22:49):
day you're, you're interactingand your social.
Other is a, is an iPad.
And I think that we're gonnahave more of that, which is
unfortunate.
It's really unfortunate,especially with the state of
standardized testing, yes, I getit.
But when we push things and makethem scale, it's like we are
going to lose the, the magicthat we might need when things
need to be boring or slow ormessy.
(23:11):
You need to figure that stuffout.
That's what being a human is.
We're not robots.
And that's the thing is whenwe're getting taught by robots,
it's easy for the robots to justassume, or use the same
algorithms and frameworks thatitself understand and knows.
But yeah, the humanities need tocome in and save us in that
aspect.
Brooke (23:27):
There's this Instagram account I follow, I think it's
called something like Future ofEducation, and it's a school in
Texas.
And they hold this thing calledAlpha School for Children.
And what they do is they use AIa lot and they are able to
condense the learning into avery short period of time.
And then do more practical, reallife.
Yeah.
That's wonderful.
Hands on.
(23:47):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Skills with people.
And so there is like a hyperspeeded learning.
Moment during the day with ai,but then they build in the life
skills and the people skills andyeah, that's super important.
Prepare them for the real world.
So to say.
In it.
So I'm hoping that more systemsthat are mixed that way come out
because I agree.
Same.
(24:07):
I even have nephews that are,gen alpha and, having a hard
time with those social aspects.
Yeah.
I see it already happening inreal time.
Yeah.
And I also love that you touchedon wanting to ask the right
questions.
Because I have a background incoaching and that's so
important, right?
Yeah.
Is to know the right questionsto ask and how that can give you
the best output.
(24:28):
And I've experienced that realtime with your prompts and your
masterful prompt engineeringthat you've done already.
My next question is more aboutthe future because a lot of
people are in this moment where.
They're trying to think abouthow they can position themselves
for the future.
Yeah.
In a skillful manner, in acompetitive manner.
(24:49):
At one point, does AI just comefor everything in all of our
jobs and yeah.
We are all just like doing whatcan we do?
Hug each other pretty
Lucas (24:59):
much and get paid to
Brooke (25:00):
hug each other.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That machines can't do.
But getting your take on thefuture.
And at what point even what itis that you do for a service
business, at what point is AIcoming for your job?
Lucas (25:13):
Yeah I really I find that some of these interesting and
weird ways of thinking will bethe last things to go.
Brooke (25:22):
Okay.
And I'm
Lucas (25:22):
happy about that, that in, in the luxury, in the
industry of luxury, I feel likepeople are not gonna want to get
massaged by robots.
We always we're.
We will always wanna, they havethose already for sure, but I'm
sure it's a very differentexperience, right?
Yes.
Massage by robots versus aperson.
While the luxuries space theluxury industry is is a lot
more, oriented towards aspecific socioeconomic space.
(25:42):
I think that the other one,these interesting ways of
thinking and provocation is thething that can really offset as
long as we can maintain it, wecan offset AI coming for our
jobs.
So if you are a creative andyou.
Your job is to just know whichtools to click on Photoshop.
You are definitely gonna getreplaced.
But if you are a creative andyou really understand the space
(26:04):
of semiotics and know, okay,we're gonna have this color and
this texture, and we're gonna goon this place and this lighting
and we're gonna have thisalleyway instead of that one,
whatever these types of things,for now, AI is not going to
replace.
And also it's important to knowthat we're having a whole bunch
of information and knowledgethat AI is.
That we are creating because ofai and a lot of AI is becoming
(26:25):
circular.
So I think that there is goingto be in a way there's gonna be
like a walled garden, like alocked paradigm of things and
stuff that gets created from AIand culture downstream that gets
created from AI and things thatare outside of it.
So my invitation is to try to beoutside of it as much as you
can.
Of course you can use ChatGPT tocome up with ideas or image
generation models for whatevervideo.
(26:45):
Same thing.
Yes.
But.
The real thing is like, just askyourself why a few times and
figure out how to follow it.
Because if not, I agree withyou.
Essentially we are just gonna beused to harvest data for those
who are making capital fromthese systems, right?
AI in of itself is a reallystrong mechanism of
consolidating power, and so thequestion is just how do we wanna
(27:08):
make sure that we arecontinuously trying to smooth it
out really.
Yeah.
Brooke (27:13):
Very great point.
My next question for you is thefuture of coding, since you do
that already.
Yeah.
I know that we chatted a bitabout vibe coding at our
mastermind.
Yeah.
Do you vibe code and do you feellike coding is gonna be obsolete
soon?
Lucas (27:27):
There's a talk, I don't remember the name of the
speaker, but he gave this talkin maybe 2003 and he was talking
about the future of coding.
And a handful of things that hementioned in the future of
coding.
Even right now, we still don'thave.
It was funny because he gave thetalk, with like a pen, like a
pocket protector and on anoverhead projector, like how,
I'm sure growing up, but it wasin early two thousands.
(27:49):
Yeah.
And it was a satire way ofsaying like.
This, a lot of the, a lot of theinteresting innovations that
we've seen in coding has beenaround since since the nineties,
eighties, maybe even seventies.
But we haven't used a lot of it.
And I think now we're startingto really use a lot of it and
vibe coding.
While again, it's nice.
I really think that going intothe coding space and just vibe
coding is absolutely not goingto be the way, because as I
(28:11):
said, you are then creating adomain of knowledge that is
separate from everything else.
So you're not gonna be able tocreate anything new.
The real important thing is ifyou are a coder to firstly learn
how to code.
Don't learn how to code, vibe,coding.
Learn how to code, and know thatthese systems are not
necessarily perfect.
And if you do wanna createthings that are novel and
interesting and innovative, youcan only do that if you blend
those two parts of your braintogether, right?
(28:33):
Of the vibe, coding and theother one.
So that's how I would say youcan build resilience in the
coding space.
Brooke (28:39):
I think you bring up a really good point is that.
To not just learn how to dosomething with ai, to first
learn how to do somethingwithout ai.
Yeah.
And really build up that contextand that background.
And that is gonna help you standout.
It should be the tool that takesyou.
The system that takes you to thenext level and not just getting
(29:01):
you there all the way.
Lucas (29:03):
Exactly.
'cause it can't get you theother way.
Really, it speaks to what I wassaying before with the mental
models.
Like you need to understand,like even if you're in the
culinary space, you need tounderstand you know how to cook
vegetables before you can go andmake a lasagna if you want to
truly make a good lasagna.
And it's the same thing.
You can't just start going inand doing stuff because not only
you can argue it's reckless ordangerous or unethical, but
you're just not going to get thevalue and even individual
(29:25):
meaning that you want to get outof it, right?
Which is.
Again, I think is a push towardsmoving us away from this sense
of purpose.
Yes.
You'll become a robot if you arenot learning anything.
Yes.
And it's
easy.
'cause if you're talking torobots all day and you're acting
like a robot all day.
Yeah.
You pretty much become one.
Brooke (29:41):
Absolutely.
I know that you are very caughtup on reading and AI trends and
everything.
So I'm curious if you haveanything to share about recent
trends and what you seehappening in this space.
In the next year, I always.
Talk about how this year was,the year of the agents and the
agent marketplace.
Yep.
What do we think about 2026 and2027?
(30:03):
What do you think is gonna belike the commonality there?
Lucas (30:07):
I think we are moving into a space where there's gonna
be a lot more robots,specifically humanoids, in
places like Japan.
In other parts of Asia, theyhave like Roomba style robots
and, packing warehouses and thistype of stuff.
But I do think we're going toget to a place in the next few
years where right now we havefairly intelligent brains that
we're talking to, like ChatGPT.
(30:27):
And it's just a matter ofgetting the actual motors and
cables and wires and everything.
To just connect this to somekind of camera.
And then we have, a essentiallya new robotic servant that's
gonna be walking around.
I really do think in the nextfew years this is gonna be
fairly common in five years.
I wouldn't be surprised if,instead of a Roomba in people's
homes, they're just gonna havethese types of humanoids walking
(30:48):
around and tons of companies arereally advancing that.
I really think next year and theyear thereafter, we're gonna see
way more, not just in thefactory floors.
Yeah.
Brooke (30:56):
Fascinating.
I know that you said that youhave a background in robotics at
one point as well.
Yeah.
And that's something I've onlyvery lightly talked about with
some guests in the past, somaybe we can dig even deeper
into it.
Okay.
Humanoids.
In our house.
What are they doing?
Cleaning and just doing basicstuff, or?
Lucas (31:14):
I would think so, yeah.
The thing is, right now a lot ofthem are used for like elderly
care, okay.
We have massive populations thepopulations not making enough
children to take care of theelderly.
And then of course with that youhave not enough workers that are
going to the workforce andsocial security, and then
everything's topsy turvy becauseof that, the biggest space.
That I think we'll see at firstas elderly care, which is really
sad.
Personally.
I think that multi-generationalhousing we should move back
(31:37):
towards personally.
So that everyone lives together.
Yeah.
But unfortunately the, just thenature of urbanization and the
architecture that is downstreamof that just means that, our
parents will be probablysomewhere not near us when we
have families and live ourlives.
And so elderly care withrobotics is really the space.
And then of course, you havethings like, disaster relief and
going into, I think somedangerous jobs will firstly
(31:59):
replace, people that have to goand, diffuse bombs or, going
into burning buildings and thiskind of stuff, so that'll be the
first, but eventually it will bejust like, servants cleaning,
doing the dishes, this type ofstuff.
And I don't think we'll be ableto relax because of it.
I think we, we'll just probablyend up working more, which is
part of the problem.
Brooke (32:17):
Really I
Lucas (32:17):
truly think it's gonna be really hard for us to do that.
Even look at AI right now, likeyeah, I am way more productive,
but I am not working less hours.
I want to work less hours.
Brooke (32:28):
That I always think that it's important to for sure,
like, go deeper on that.
And that we should be workingless.
Lucas (32:36):
Absolutely.
We should be working less.
We should be working less.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But I think just the nature ofit, you know it because it's
very competitive and becauseit's continuously changing.
Yeah.
And if you are a business owner,you know that it is, you can
feel the competition.
You look around and okay, Imight be, one of maybe a handful
of agencies that are, that isdoing exactly what I'm doing and
I know that if I'm not faster orsmarter or just, it's the nature
(32:58):
of, it's the nature ofcapitalism, right?
You must, you have to try to befaster.
It's unfortunate, but I reallydo hope we get to a place where
we can relax a bit, but not inthis wally esque future where
we're just like, laying onsofas, going around and having
robots do everything for us.
Of course, I do think meaning isalso found through a bit of
struggle if you will.
We have to work, we, we needwork for meaning.
Yes.
So
Brooke (33:19):
I'm not saying go to not working, but what about 75%
work?
25% rest.
Lucas (33:27):
That sounds great.
Like I, I don't know where thecapital's gonna come from
though.
Yeah, because if AI, as I said,is really a mechanism to
amalgamate power, and right nowthose who are doing that are not
necessarily they're notnecessarily governments,
municipalities, right?
They're private companies.
So the question is like, thenwhere does the capital come
(33:48):
from?
If we work 75% less.
Do we still get the same salary?
Is there some kind of, universalbasic income?
If so, how does that happen ifthe government is not
necessarily the one who ispowering the ai, but meta and
Google are are they the onesgetting super taxed?
If so, can they lobby againstit?
There's all these, everything isa complex, it's a super complex
(34:09):
political system.
Yes.
So I would hope maybe one day wecan work less truly, 75% less,
but.
I don't know.
Brooke (34:17):
Yeah.
Who's paying for all theserobots?
Is it gonna be just more taxmoney?
Lucas (34:22):
I think firstly it's gonna be private.
Okay.
It'd definitely be private moneyand but the luxury robots, the
ones that are gonna be doingdish washing and taking care of
maybe even taking care of littlekids or walking the dog, they
will be private.
And I don't see the governmentjust giving robots away and,
yeah.
From there, of course then youhave, these future, these movies
like iRobot and these thingswhere like, how do the robots
(34:44):
have moral ethics?
How do they make decisions?
What are their norms?
Do they have rights?
What if they have to make adecision that ends in someone
getting hurt?
Moral dilemmas, these types ofthings.
I think we're just opening ThePandora's box with this, I do
think in, in a way, it'sinevitable, but I don't wanna be
a, I don't wanna be a DebbieDowner.
I don't want, I don't wanna behere and just talk about how
it's all bad.
But there is a lot to justprepare for it, really, as I
(35:05):
said is asking these questionsYeah.
And trying to smooth it out,because if not, it's so easy to
surrender our agency.
We've already, in theory,surrendered our privacy with
social media.
Let's not surrender ourknowledge.
Brooke (35:16):
Very valid point as well.
Mm-hmm.
So I think that sets me up formy next question.
Yeah.
Is for those who are justentering AI or getting into it,
in the beginner phase, whatpoint of advice do you have for
them?
And any key takeaways that youwant to give with all of your
vast knowledge and experience?
Lucas (35:35):
I would say the most important thing is to remember
that when you're using thesetools.
That they're always gonna bechanging.
So the cool thing is you can askChatGPT to tell yourself, you
can write, tell me how to use,tell me how to use ChatGPT, it's
wonderful.
At the same time, that sameprotocol might not necessarily
work for Google Gemini.
Or Claude.
(35:57):
The main thing is to just getcomfortable with learning new
things quickly.
And being able to ask yourself,okay.
If I'm talking to a largelanguage model, if I'm talking
to something that I'm writingwith my keyboard It's giving me
texts back.
What little tools can I use?
Whether it's giving context tosay, you're a medical doctor, I
have a cough, this is reallydifferent.
Versus saying you're a lawyer, Ihave a cough.
You need to have positioning andcontext.
(36:18):
Yes.
So these types of things you canborrow.
So it's about just gettinglittle tools and putting them on
your tool belt that that you canadapt in different spaces.
That's the biggest thing I wouldrecommend.
And of course, just playing withthe tools if you can.
There's a handful of open sourcetools which people don't need to
spend money on.
Which I would recommend playingwith
Brooke (36:34):
Which ones?
Lucas (36:34):
Deep Seek Okay.
Is good.
You can run it on a, on yourcomputer in in five or 10
minutes you can run on yourcomputer.
And llama is also good fromFacebook, deep Sea Car One's
from a Chinese company, I don'tremember the name.
But yeah, there's different onesyou can use that you don't need
to spend 20 bucks a month for.
And I really think that theeducation part for me is
everything.
As you go through these thingsand as you understand the
different tools that I wasmentioning, it's like
(36:56):
continuously asking yourself,how can I use these tools in
different ways?
If I'm gonna be talking tosomething that generates images,
how does this work?
And maybe if I talk to somethingelse that generates images, how
can I borrow some things?
That's really it.
Brooke (37:08):
I love that.
Where do you learn ai?
Who teaches you?
Lucas (37:14):
I get a lot of my stuff from Twitter.
Okay.
But it's mainly because my feedis just, I try to use social
media.
I know social media is an echochamber.
So if I see something asvaluable, I like, and I bookmark
and I share, and eventually justTwitter is gonna be like, oh,
this new thing came out and thatnew thing came out.
Okay.
I try to just construct eachsocial media with that end in
(37:35):
mind.
For example, my Instagram is notreally much of my Instagram is
like travel and photography.
'cause I like, snowboarding,travel and photography.
My Instagram is snowboarding,travel photography.
But Twitter for me is thisthing.
So I would say just constructingyour social media around it is
good.
YouTube is also a good place,good resources there.
And as I said, you can ask thetool, you can say ChatGPT, how
do I use, how do I use you as atool?
And it can tell you.
Brooke (37:56):
Yes.
Yeah, just ask ChatGPT literally
Lucas (37:58):
say, how do I use, how do I use yourself?
How do I use a tool?
I guess it's weird to say it,but that's what you would type
in, right?
Yes.
Yeah.
So
Brooke (38:05):
even if I'm on client calls and they ask me something
directly that I don't know theanswer to, I'll even just ask
ChatGPT Live, be like, let's getto the bottom of this right
here.
Yeah.
Lucas (38:14):
Yeah.
And the cool thing is with theresearch mode, it connects to
the internet and you can, youcan expand the knowledge that
it's trained on.
Yes.
Which is really cool.
And yeah, these tools are superhelpful.
It's, yeah, they're just alwayschanging, right?
So I would say don't getattached to one.
Because if you do, then you'reeither going to fall behind when
something new comes out, or ifyou don't really ask yourself,
(38:35):
how am I using this tool and howcan I take this somewhere else?
When something new comes, thenyou have to do this step, which
is just takes a lot of work andtime.
Yeah, I like to view it as like,when you're learning math in
school, everything is built onsomething else, right?
Multiplication is just additionat scale.
Algebra is practically the samething.
Calculus, okay.
It's just, we're just addingdifferent layers and we're going
up, and it's the same thing withthis as with any skill, the only
(38:57):
way to just, you're gonna be abeginner and you're gonna get
better and better.
Eventually.
You might be a beginner again,but you have all these tools
that you can bring into yourrepertoire of knowledge that you
can say, okay, I wanna use thisor use that.
It's just being aware of thatreally like, as I said, use
notion, write things down, makea model or operations page and
nerd out about nerding out.
Yes.
Really
Brooke (39:17):
nerd out about nerding out.
Nerd out about nerding out.
I think that's an amazing finalquote to end on.
How can listeners reach out toyou?
How can they get in contact withyou?
Lucas (39:26):
Cool.
My my studio is called Traversein Space.
And right now we're doing arebrand, but we are on LinkedIn.
Myself, I'm also on LinkedIn.
Lucas Lorenzo Pena Traverse inSpace is traverse in space.
Okay.
Our whole thing is about, inabout bridging information
across these multidisciplinaryspaces, hence.
We're traversing themultidisciplinary spaces.
And yeah, you can find me there,you can find our thoughts
traversing space as a substackwhere we try to provoke
(39:49):
interesting and spicy things.
Which might not necessarily are,is best on LinkedIn because
LinkedIn's, about scale andlikes.
But yeah.
We're there, feel free to reachout.
And we work with mainly bigcorporates, but we also are
thinking about opening differentcontainers for people who are
interested, small SMEs, smallbusiness founders, solopreneurs,
to help them really leveragesome of the learnings we've used
(40:10):
in.
For example, fortune 500companies, so we yeah, stay
tuned because these types ofthings are in the works.
And for me, really it's justabout helping everyone get
access to this beautiful stuffbecause if not, then society
will just, things will bifurcatein ways we don't want them to,
yeah.
Thank you.
Brooke (40:24):
Wonderful.
I can't thank you enough forbeing here today.
There was a lot to unpack inthis episode.
So I'm sure it's one of thoseepisodes where people listen to
it twice, if not three timesmaybe.
Lucas (40:35):
Or maybe just have another conversation in the
future.
Brooke (40:38):
Yes.
I would love to talk again.
So thank you so much.
I appreciate you.
Lucas (40:42):
Thanks.
Brooke (40:44):
I hope today's episode opened your mind to what's
possible with ai.
Do you have a cool use case onhow you're using AI and wanna
share it?
DM me.
I'd love to hear more andfeature you on my next podcast.
Until next time, here's toworking smarter, not harder.
See you on the next episode ofHow I Ai.
This episode was made possiblein partnership with the
(41:06):
Collective ai, a communitydesigned to help entrepreneurs,
creators, and professionalsseamlessly integrate AI into
their workflows.
One of the biggest game changersin my own AI journey was joining
this space.
It's where I learned, connectedand truly enhanced my
understanding of what's possiblewith ai.
(41:27):
And the best part, they offermultiple membership levels to
meet you where you are.
Whether you want to DIY, your AIlearning or work with a
personalized AI consultant foryour business, the collective
has you covered.
Learn more and sign up using myexclusive link in the show
notes.
Welcome to How I AI the podcast featuring real people,
real stories, and real AI inaction.
I'm Brooke Gramer your host andguide on this journey into the
real world impact of artificialintelligence.
For over 15 years, I've workedin creative marketing events and
business strategy wearing allthe hats.
(00:22):
I know the struggle of trying toscale and manage all things
without burning out, but here'sthe game changer, ai.
This isn't just a podcast, How IAI is a community.
A space where curious minds likeyou can come together, share
ideas, and I'll also be bringingyou exclusive discounts, free
trials and insider resources soyou can test drive the latest
(00:45):
tools and tech yourself.
Because AI isn't just a trend,it's a shift.
The sooner we embrace it, themore freedom, creativity, and
opportunities we'll unlock.
How I AI is brought to you inpartnership with the collective,
A space designed to accelerateyour learning and AI adoption.
I joined the Collective and it'scompletely catapulted my
(01:07):
learning, expanded my network,and show me what's possible with
ai.
Whether you're just starting outor looking to refine your AI
strategy, The Collective givesyou the resources to grow.
Stay tuned to learn more at theend of this episode, or check
the show notes for my exclusiveinvite link..
Hello everyone.
Welcome to another episode ofHow I Ai.
(01:28):
I'm your host, Brooke Gramertoday I have a very special
guest.
His name is Lucas Lorenzo Pena,he is a creative studio founder.
He's also a creativetechnologist and an AI builder.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
Welcome.
Thanks for having me.
I love to give the opportunityfor everybody to expand more on
(01:50):
their introduction.
I'd love for you to share inyour own words more about
yourself and your background.
Lucas (01:55):
Cool.
Yeah, so I work in creativetechnology and what that means
is essentially using technologyin different creative ways.
Fundamentally, right?
I view creativity as somethingthat is really an extension of.
A practice that is creating withintention.
Design and engineering are thesame thing.
I view them that way.
And so for me, being a creativetechnologist, it's a way to
really design and constructexperiences or provocations, or
(02:19):
experimentations for clients,peoples teams, whatever.
And I've been in the, let's say,emergent tech space since 2016,
more or less.
Working in blockchain, civictechnology back then machine
learning, and now it's calledai.
Yeah, I've been in this spacesince 2016 and I've been
teaching creativity and AI since2018.
So I've been in and around theAI space for a while, and I
(02:41):
decided to have found my owncompany last year after leaving
big corporate innovation.
And before that I also had mydesign studio.
So I've been in and around let'ssay transformational tech for a
while.
Brooke (02:54):
Okay.
Wow.
Yeah.
Long
Lucas (02:55):
time.
Brooke (02:55):
Lots to dig in there.
So when did you start?
This, did you learn it inschool?
Did you end up in that area?
Lucas (03:03):
Yeah.
So my background is in computerscience, right?
But before that I was a musicianand I found that when I moved to
computer science that I was ableto have the same, excitement and
creativity when I was coding, asI did when I was, being in, on a
stage playing music.
Cool.
And so I've always sought outdifferent spaces that I can
experiment with.
Technology.
(03:23):
It just so happened that I wasable to.
move to Europe and study designprogram, which was very
different from computer science.
And then after that I studiedcognitive science, which is a
blend of philosophy.
Computational neuroscience.
I focused on roboticsspecifically and yeah, modeling
multi-agent systems, et cetera,et cetera.
It was a lot of fun.
And I think after that it was itreally just gave me this essence
(03:46):
that there is more.
Than just creating, there's morein theory than just Web2, right?
There's more than just makingwebsites.
And more than making products.
So I just sought that out andyeah, worked in the smart city
space.
And then from there I was ableto actually come up and
essentially create a, createlike an AI creative program in a
university.
E the Institute of AdvancedArchitecture of Catalonia.
(04:07):
And since then, it's just, I'vejust been in it really.
I've just been in it.
And for me it really comes downto the creative practice and
how.
AI or new technologies reallycan provoke us to think in
different ways.
So the work we do is less aboutbuilding products or building
automations.
It's more about building newways of thinking and then
downstream from there, buildingthe tools that can really take
(04:30):
the thinking into a businesssensor, into whatever kind of.
More, let's say, tangible goalthat we wanna move towards.
Yeah.
Brooke (04:37):
Okay.
So you transitioned to workingfor yourself Yeah.
In the last year.
What kind of clients do you workon?
And take me through.
How you work with them, becauseI dunno if I'm fully
understanding the scope so breakit down a little bit more.
It's a lot of
Lucas (04:52):
fun.
But it is a bit abstract, Iwould say.
Yes.
You and I think that thatambiguity is something that we
do like to bring in the spacewith our clients.
We've worked with a handful ofFortune 500 companies as well as
a handful of research teams andjust small community
organizations.
And what we really do is,firstly, we essentially do a
workshop with them to figure outhow does your business look
(05:12):
like, what do you care about?
What is your way of thinking?
And map out in 15, 20, even 30years, we do a little bit of
futuring exercises.
What does your business looklike?
Like how ideally do you want tobe operating in the year 2050?
From there, we say, okay, whattechnology can we help you use
that can start pushing youtowards that?
So then we go from the morestrategy side into the
(05:32):
production side, and we have ateam that that I lead where we
just write, we write code thatcan nudge the business or just
the objectives, KPI's, goals,whatever into more of this
future vision that they have forthe company.
It's this marriage betweenstrategy and thinking and
production and tooling.
It's straddling both worlds.
We're like a little boutique R&Dlab, if you will.
Brooke (05:51):
Okay.
Yeah, I think I understand itbetter.
So thank you for elaborating.
So my next question is, how manypeople on your team and what's
the technology stack that youall are currently using?
Lucas (06:04):
So we don't we don't subscribe to a tech stack.
Okay.
Because the space iscontinuously changing.
We're a team of five.
Maybe six total right now.
There's three engineers and I'mthe principal, engineer and
strategist.
And then we have a productionmanager, a biz dev person, and
like an organizational designperson.
And and then we also partnerwith other companies that do
some more strategic design worklike Jackie you might have.
(06:26):
Designed detangling, this kindof stuff.
So we.
Yeah, as I was saying, we don'tnecessarily stick to a stack
because it's always changing.
I really want my relationshipwith my clients to be such that
if they care about the future ofgenerative media and images and
video we are the team that says,okay, here is a platform that
you can use that can generateyou these things and that you
(06:47):
can use to uplift your creativeprocess.
And it doesn't matter ifsomething new comes out next
week or tomorrow, whatever.
We can just continuously updatethis for you.
The tech stack is usually Pythonor JavaScript.
Okay.
The languages that essentiallycan run anywhere and everywhere
just because for the sake ofaccessibility and tooling.
Yeah.
Brooke (07:04):
Wow.
That's good to hear that youjust are agile and it's based on
every client in different do yousay that you spend a lot on
those coding systems or do youfeel like it's more just
in-house?
Lucas (07:16):
We do.
The pipelines that we work on.
Are large.
They're six figure projects.
And they take months.
Yeah.
But I think that really when weare tinkering with these things,
we're continuously remindingourselves that it's more than
just the tools, right?
It's how the tools, like thetools are not necessarily meant
to replace people.
They're not meant to remove, ifwe, for example, have a tool
that generates images for amedia company, we're not wanting
(07:38):
to replace their creatives.
We want to create things thatcan uplift their creatives.
So while we do spend a lot oftime on the tooling, really the
framework and the capstones andthe guiding light that we're
pushing towards is very muchdownstream of these workshops.
So it's a lot of fun.
I love what I do really if Ilove it.
Yeah.
Truly.
I love what I do.
So
Brooke (07:56):
We were just in a mastermind together.
And you brought us through areally fun workshop where we did
that future scope and.
You had these prompts alreadybuilt out for us.
And I'm curious because you havea background in research and
development.
Yeah.
What goes into future planning?
How does one plan for the futureand create an outcome when
(08:18):
things are changing so much.
How does that work?
Lucas (08:20):
Yeah, it's scary.
Yeah.
Looking at the landscape of AIand technology, I was using a
tool the other day that.
One of my clients was reallywanting to use, and then a week
later it was like, on Twitterthey said this tool is dead, or
X, I'm not gonna call it X, buton Twitter, they said, this tool
is dead.
And it was like, oh, then threedays later, the tool that
apparently died came backbecause they had a new release.
(08:40):
Yes.
It's scary, but I think the besttool is really this.
What I like to call just mentalmodels, like different mental
models.
The way that I work is very muchlike I have different mental
models that I use to look atthings in different ways.
And I think connecting to thesedifferent ways of thinking,
whether it's the tool of backcasting, imagining how you wanna
be in the future and thenworking backwards, whether it's
(09:01):
this idea of the cone of thefuture.
Like these are all thepossibilities you might be able
to achieve tomorrow.
And from each possibility, whatmight this look like in three
years and in five years?
And, expanding the scope, thespace of futuring is really just
connecting to these tools.
Being able to, I have I'm aheavy notion user.
Brooke (09:16):
Okay.
Lucas (09:16):
Fucking love notion, plug notion.
And I would say that if, if youuse it the best thing you can do
is really just catalog, right?
You use it as a second brain.
And in this second brain ofmine, I have tons of these
tools.
I have, different, let's saywhat I call operations that I
can use to look at to look atthe world, whether it's asking
really weird questions like whatis the.
(09:38):
What I like to do is I to bridgedifferent, in different
modalities together.
So like, even just this sofa,right?
There's texture to it, butasking a question like what is
the texture of X?
And if X is really abstract orambiguous, it invites and
invites provocation.
Invites you to really think andsay I wonder what, what is it,
what is the texture of travelmean to me, for example?
And how can I incorporate thatinto my travel or vacation
company?
(09:58):
Things like these little mini.
Really verbs that you can applyon things is something that I
just have a list of.
And when we're working with theclients, it's finding these
interesting ways to poke andprod, because a lot of the
times, the problems that theyhave are, it's like an onion,
you have to ask why five times,and then even still, you might
not get to the core and youmight realize that this one part
(10:20):
of a complex system is connectedto this other part.
And you have to, you can't justpull one thread and the whole
thing unravels.
You have to really understandand pull multiple things at the
same time.
For me, just mental models andbeing really yeah.
Say introspective on things.
Yeah.
Is how my team has been able toreally stand apart from others
insofar as being able to reallyintroduce this new way of
(10:41):
thinking.
Yeah, it's a lot of fun, but itdoes take a lot of mental work.
I will say that I nerd out aboutthese things and I know that if
someone might not, it might seemlike mental gymnastics or just
like, why are we doing this?
Really?
But and I was even talking tosomeone who was in the workshop
with us, Finn, and he was sayingthat it's a bit even existential
in asking some of thesequestions, but I do think at a
point, you, the best way is toask yourself why.
(11:02):
And to ask yourself weirdquestions.
Yes.
And to try to answer them if youcan.
Brooke (11:07):
Yeah.
It sounds like each of theclients that you have are so
unique and individual.
You might not have a lot ofrepetitive work in your process
in your systems.
Yeah.
So how does AI benefit you?
I'm curious, what is maybe onehuge benefit that has automated
your workflow, or how exactlydoes it help you when it seems
(11:28):
like every client isn't thesame.
Lucas (11:29):
The way that we use AI when it comes to like, internal
processes is very much aroundintroducing these really
complex, multi-level promptsmm-hmm.
to help us.
Build some of theseprovocations, for example, or to
figure out how to create salespipelines and this kind of
stuff.
Okay.
I do really think though, thatunlike maybe traditional sale
(11:50):
offerings, we don't really havestandardized approaches because
we really like to buildrelationships with clients.
Mm-hmm.
Before we really work with themand unpack their wicked problem.
But AI for us is really moreabout, using chat GPT for
example, to interrogate us whenwe have assumptions about
clients and having this list, asI said, on notion to then just
dump in and say, okay, this ismy understanding of this client
(12:11):
and the scope.
Here's some research and fromthe research plus the tools.
Ask me a handful of questionsthat might introduce some new
ways of thinking.
And then we use this new way ofthinking in our workshops with
our clients.
So it's very yeah, it's notnecessarily.
It's more of a process goal.
Lemme say this, right?
Okay.
So there is, it's not a means toan end, but it's just a way to
(12:32):
help us to use the analogy used.
Help us, find some new texturesto some of these questions and
do so in a way that we can do itfaster and faster.
Brooke (12:39):
So you use it a lot on your business Marketing and
promoting your own business.
Yeah.
And more of
Lucas (12:44):
the strategy side.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Brooke (12:45):
That makes sense.
I'm curious if you've had anychallenges with AI with adopting
it or using it early on in thebeginning.
It seems like you've been inthis space for so long, it's
hard to think about the realbefore and after effect, which
is what I love to hone in on atthis point.
But like, was there ever alearning curve or such a big way
that you had to shift andrestructure.
(13:07):
Around using these new tools andsystems, or was it just always
organic for you?
Lucas (13:11):
For me, it was organic, but I say that I'm very
fortunate because.
I view myself as a creative thatreally has this engineering
framework.
And for me to know back beforeAI was called ai, we called it
machine learning.
It was like, okay, how can Ihave some adaptive, or how can I
have some evolutionaryalgorithm?
How can I have a goal that wecan really push towards quickly
(13:31):
and play with that was, that'sreally what it was.
Whether it's essentially doinglinear regression or finding a
point and a plot really, anddoing that at scale.
Whatever it was.
The main thing for me was justremembering okay, that even if I
am doing something creative, atthe end of the day, it still
comes down to code.
And realizing that the code isstill structured in this way.
For me, learning how the codeworks, being a software engineer
(13:54):
from my undergraduate degree hasjust helped me realize that when
I am approaching these problems,I know what's happening behind
the scenes.
I can better massage, even now,I can better massage my prompts
so that it really understandsthings.
Or back then I can really takemy inputs and map them to really
solid solid goals in the,machine learning algorithm back
(14:14):
then and everything in between.
There was no real before andafter.
It was just like a new tool, anew, again, a new mental model
that I'm applying things with.
But I know that it's not easyand for example, different
members of my team had to reallyunderstand the value of these
things, and especially, with ourclients, right?
Or my job really is to educatethem and bring them along and
think about things differently,which of course, at the end of
(14:35):
the day comes down to the codeand comes down to the algorithm.
It's yeah it's always a process,right?
The educational pipeline.
Yeah.
Brooke (14:43):
Love dining out.
Here's a little gift for you.
I've been using InKind and it'shonestly a game changer for food
lovers.
It's like a universal diningwallet that earns you 20% cash
back at amazing restaurants,cafes, and bars nationwide.
And as I thank you for being alistener, you can grab$25 off
your next$50 tab when you signup with my link in the show
(15:07):
notes.
Just pay with InKind, earnrewards and use them on your
next outing.
A quick heads up.
This offer is for new InKindusers only.
Valid one use per guest andcovers food, drinks and tax, but
no tips or fees.
The credit expires 30 days afteryou claim it, so don't let it go
(15:27):
to waste.
Check the show notes for myaffiliate link and enjoy your
next meal on me.
Well kind Of.
Okay.
My next question for you is offscript, but I'm curious about AI
and creativity.
Awesome.
They might seem like theanti-thesis of each other.
Yeah.
How do they coexist?
How do they support one anotherand not make each other
(15:51):
obsolete?
Lucas (15:52):
I have found that a lot of creatives who lemme start
with this.
Brooke (15:59):
Mm-hmm.
Lucas (16:00):
It's important to distinguish the difference
between being an artist andbeing a designer or being a
creative in this sense.
I view art as creating to to askquestions and design and
engineering are creating toanswer questions.
So one is goal oriented, one isintentional, and the other one
is a lot more about feeling it'ssomatic.
It's more about.
Communicating essence as opposedto communicating information and
(16:21):
knowledge.
When we go towards communicatinginformation and knowledge, then
from there it's, for me, it'seasy to break it down and say,
okay, if I were to ask someone,what is your formula of
creativity?
If you think about it longenough, I think you can probably
figure it out.
If I personally view my formulaof creativity as being tension
between competence andserendipity, right?
(16:43):
I know that I'm capable ofwriting code.
I realize that I have to meet agoal or deadline, and then I
have an aha moment, and thesethree things come together and
then bam, it's creative.
I would say that AI helps for meinsofar as I'm able to, whether
it's using prompts.
Or whether it's generativeimages or media, I'm able to
(17:03):
create a mechanism that for me,can can create this serendipity,
right?
The spontaneity that says, okay,what do you think about this?
What do you think about that?
Having this kind of breakdown ofthe knowledge or the things you
care about, whether you're aflorist or whether you're a
culinary artist.
And breaking it down to theseessential essence of meaning for
you.
And then from there saying,okay, now that I have this
essence of, for example, withculinary stuff, salt, fat,
(17:24):
grease, fire, heat, all thesethings.
What if I were to make this intosome kind of map and throw it
into a prompt, right?
What if I were to bring allthese weird things I have in my
cabinet and throw it into aprompt and see what it gives me
back?
And then it might give you backnonsense.
But as a culinary artist,knowing that fat is a delivery
of flavor, you might say, youknow what?
I'm gonna use this random thingin my cabinet, peanut butter,
(17:46):
for example, as the base,because I know that the peanut
butter is gonna make this thingtaste better.
AI is really helpful insofar asyou can simulate these
environments really quickly,right?
You can say, okay, it's notgonna work with salt, it's not
gonna work with, it's not gonnawork with bitterness, but we
need fat to be this thing that'sgonna do it, right?
Or umami whatever flavor youwanna go for.
And the same thing works,especially, we've seen it work
(18:07):
with products even before ai,right?
Like we have biomimicry thespace of being inspired by
nature to design a backpack thatdoesn't get crushed when we fall
backwards or whatever.
So the space of design andengineering has always borrowed
from other domains.
So now we're just able to borrowfrom even more domains, right?
And use AI to the biggest thingis this, as I said, this
simulation.
(18:27):
Really, which is a lot of funbecause you can simulate a whole
bunch of stuff without needingto go and actually like, design
something in CAD if you're,simulating a product or, smash
things together in the kitchento see if it tastes good or not.
You can ask ChatGPT
Brooke (18:38):
Yeah.
That was a lot to unpack anddigest.
You're very eloquent.
Yeah.
I spoke quickly.
You've already gone through allmy questions pretty much.
My next question I like to askpeople are usually about what
they want be creating right now.
If you were to wave a magic wandwhat is it that you're wanting
to create and put out thereright now that you haven't seen
(18:58):
in this?
Space yet?
If I were using ai, yes, usingai, if I were to
Lucas (19:03):
wave a magic wand I, I have two different answers,
right?
One is pure kind of absurdity,let's say right now.
But right now a lot of the toolsthat we're using are our built.
By massive corporations.
And massive data sets, massivecomponents and hardware and all
this stuff.
If I could wave a magic wand, Iwould love if we can have a
(19:25):
super intelligent system likeChatGPT being able to exist
completely offline, locally On adevice that doesn't need.
Tons of memory, like a cellphone.
Yes.
The digital divide for me issuper important.
I really think that we are justcontinuously pushing up, the top
20% who are, who have access tothese tools.
And pushing everyone down.
So this is more the pie in thesky thing.
The other thing though that Ithink is a lot more tangible is,
(19:49):
using AI for the sake ofeducating and trying to close
the gap from the other wayinstead of creating a new piece
of technology.
Using the existing one, we haveto bring this, let's say bottom
whatever percent 80%.
Higher up right in, into the 20,then make it 21 and 79 and 22
78, et cetera, et cetera.
These types of educationalpipelines or whether it's, even
(20:11):
something as simple as using theSocratic method and just saying,
Hey, I want to learn about X,ask me questions.
Brooke (20:15):
And.
Lucas (20:17):
The questions it asks could push you down a rabbit
hole on Wikipedia and then youcan actually understand it and
then you can keep askingquestions.
Then maybe after 15 questionsyou're like, I know about
podcast and recording studiosand sound compression and audio,
whatever it is.
So even just these differenttools that we can use, I think
can be really well structured inthe education space.
Yes.
At the same time.
(20:37):
It's really important that wedon't try to optimize education.
I find that when, I think humansare just notoriously bad at
this.
Like, we're so good at setting abar.
It's like people need to passtests.
We're both from Florida.
We have to pass the fcat.
You have to do this, you have,and then it's like you're in
school and you're studying forthe test.
You're not studying necessarilyto understand.
Yes.
(20:57):
And AI can, if done the rightway, can really help us to.
Understand better.
It can provoke us.
Really, for me, it's notnecessarily about generating
this prompt or this text.
It's like, how can AI help usask the right questions?
And it's capable of doing so,especially with context.
And so it's just that, right?
How can we use AI for the morehumanistic approach and human
(21:20):
based KPIs and goals and notjust KPIs and goals and
efficiencies that are defined bymassive corporations in San
Francisco, yeah, that's this,these for me are the long-term
things I really wanna work on.
Yeah.
Brooke (21:32):
That's awesome.
I love that.
You touched about education andthe future of education.
What do you think the future ofeducation looks like in the next
five years?
Lucas (21:45):
I saw a paper by Lego and someone else.
I think I shared it Yes.
In a group chat.
Yeah, I read it and they weretalking about how, of course
it's really cool that thestudents have access to these
things.
I do think that we just need tobe careful, right?
I can see definitely there'sgoing to be a space of education
where.
Yeah, there's not going to bestudent teachers in the
(22:06):
classroom.
It's just gonna be robots.
You're just gonna learn from AIand I don't think that's
necessarily the best approach.
I do think education willcontinue to bifurcate and you'll
have the Montessori of Waldorfschools, these types of, like
the green school, the place,beautiful place you went to.
Connected with it, and it'slike, we're gonna have these
spaces where students are goingto learn more of the soft skills
of the of art of curation.
(22:27):
And then we're gonna move intothe space where some schools are
just purely gonna be productionbased.
And I'm not entirely sure what'sgonna happen because of it, I do
think that it's going to bequite impactful, but we've
already seen that, we have anentire.
Generation who grew up, swipingon TikTok and you can tell that
there's a bit of you, you mightlose on social skills when all
(22:49):
day you're, you're interactingand your social.
Other is a, is an iPad.
And I think that we're gonnahave more of that, which is
unfortunate.
It's really unfortunate,especially with the state of
standardized testing, yes, I getit.
But when we push things and makethem scale, it's like we are
going to lose the, the magicthat we might need when things
need to be boring or slow ormessy.
(23:11):
You need to figure that stuffout.
That's what being a human is.
We're not robots.
And that's the thing is whenwe're getting taught by robots,
it's easy for the robots to justassume, or use the same
algorithms and frameworks thatitself understand and knows.
But yeah, the humanities need tocome in and save us in that
aspect.
Brooke (23:27):
There's this Instagram account I follow, I think it's
called something like Future ofEducation, and it's a school in
Texas.
And they hold this thing calledAlpha School for Children.
And what they do is they use AIa lot and they are able to
condense the learning into avery short period of time.
And then do more practical, reallife.
Yeah.
That's wonderful.
Hands on.
(23:47):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Skills with people.
And so there is like a hyperspeeded learning.
Moment during the day with ai,but then they build in the life
skills and the people skills andyeah, that's super important.
Prepare them for the real world.
So to say.
In it.
So I'm hoping that more systemsthat are mixed that way come out
because I agree.
Same.
(24:07):
I even have nephews that are,gen alpha and, having a hard
time with those social aspects.
Yeah.
I see it already happening inreal time.
Yeah.
And I also love that you touchedon wanting to ask the right
questions.
Because I have a background incoaching and that's so
important, right?
Yeah.
Is to know the right questionsto ask and how that can give you
the best output.
(24:28):
And I've experienced that realtime with your prompts and your
masterful prompt engineeringthat you've done already.
My next question is more aboutthe future because a lot of
people are in this moment where.
They're trying to think abouthow they can position themselves
for the future.
Yeah.
In a skillful manner, in acompetitive manner.
(24:49):
At one point, does AI just comefor everything in all of our
jobs and yeah.
We are all just like doing whatcan we do?
Hug each other pretty
Lucas (24:59):
much and get paid to
Brooke (25:00):
hug each other.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That machines can't do.
But getting your take on thefuture.
And at what point even what itis that you do for a service
business, at what point is AIcoming for your job?
Lucas (25:13):
Yeah I really I find that some of these interesting and
weird ways of thinking will bethe last things to go.
Brooke (25:22):
Okay.
And I'm
Lucas (25:22):
happy about that, that in, in the luxury, in the
industry of luxury, I feel likepeople are not gonna want to get
massaged by robots.
We always we're.
We will always wanna, they havethose already for sure, but I'm
sure it's a very differentexperience, right?
Yes.
Massage by robots versus aperson.
While the luxuries space theluxury industry is is a lot
more, oriented towards aspecific socioeconomic space.
(25:42):
I think that the other one,these interesting ways of
thinking and provocation is thething that can really offset as
long as we can maintain it, wecan offset AI coming for our
jobs.
So if you are a creative andyou.
Your job is to just know whichtools to click on Photoshop.
You are definitely gonna getreplaced.
But if you are a creative andyou really understand the space
(26:04):
of semiotics and know, okay,we're gonna have this color and
this texture, and we're gonna goon this place and this lighting
and we're gonna have thisalleyway instead of that one,
whatever these types of things,for now, AI is not going to
replace.
And also it's important to knowthat we're having a whole bunch
of information and knowledgethat AI is.
That we are creating because ofai and a lot of AI is becoming
(26:25):
circular.
So I think that there is goingto be in a way there's gonna be
like a walled garden, like alocked paradigm of things and
stuff that gets created from AIand culture downstream that gets
created from AI and things thatare outside of it.
So my invitation is to try to beoutside of it as much as you
can.
Of course you can use ChatGPT tocome up with ideas or image
generation models for whatevervideo.
(26:45):
Same thing.
Yes.
But.
The real thing is like, just askyourself why a few times and
figure out how to follow it.
Because if not, I agree withyou.
Essentially we are just gonna beused to harvest data for those
who are making capital fromthese systems, right?
AI in of itself is a reallystrong mechanism of
consolidating power, and so thequestion is just how do we wanna
(27:08):
make sure that we arecontinuously trying to smooth it
out really.
Yeah.
Brooke (27:13):
Very great point.
My next question for you is thefuture of coding, since you do
that already.
Yeah.
I know that we chatted a bitabout vibe coding at our
mastermind.
Yeah.
Do you vibe code and do you feellike coding is gonna be obsolete
soon?
Lucas (27:27):
There's a talk, I don't remember the name of the
speaker, but he gave this talkin maybe 2003 and he was talking
about the future of coding.
And a handful of things that hementioned in the future of
coding.
Even right now, we still don'thave.
It was funny because he gave thetalk, with like a pen, like a
pocket protector and on anoverhead projector, like how,
I'm sure growing up, but it wasin early two thousands.
(27:49):
Yeah.
And it was a satire way ofsaying like.
This, a lot of the, a lot of theinteresting innovations that
we've seen in coding has beenaround since since the nineties,
eighties, maybe even seventies.
But we haven't used a lot of it.
And I think now we're startingto really use a lot of it and
vibe coding.
While again, it's nice.
I really think that going intothe coding space and just vibe
coding is absolutely not goingto be the way, because as I
(28:11):
said, you are then creating adomain of knowledge that is
separate from everything else.
So you're not gonna be able tocreate anything new.
The real important thing is ifyou are a coder to firstly learn
how to code.
Don't learn how to code, vibe,coding.
Learn how to code, and know thatthese systems are not
necessarily perfect.
And if you do wanna createthings that are novel and
interesting and innovative, youcan only do that if you blend
those two parts of your braintogether, right?
(28:33):
Of the vibe, coding and theother one.
So that's how I would say youcan build resilience in the
coding space.
Brooke (28:39):
I think you bring up a really good point is that.
To not just learn how to dosomething with ai, to first
learn how to do somethingwithout ai.
Yeah.
And really build up that contextand that background.
And that is gonna help you standout.
It should be the tool that takesyou.
The system that takes you to thenext level and not just getting
(29:01):
you there all the way.
Lucas (29:03):
Exactly.
'cause it can't get you theother way.
Really, it speaks to what I wassaying before with the mental
models.
Like you need to understand,like even if you're in the
culinary space, you need tounderstand you know how to cook
vegetables before you can go andmake a lasagna if you want to
truly make a good lasagna.
And it's the same thing.
You can't just start going inand doing stuff because not only
you can argue it's reckless ordangerous or unethical, but
you're just not going to get thevalue and even individual
(29:25):
meaning that you want to get outof it, right?
Which is.
Again, I think is a push towardsmoving us away from this sense
of purpose.
Yes.
You'll become a robot if you arenot learning anything.
Yes.
And it's
easy.
'cause if you're talking torobots all day and you're acting
like a robot all day.
Yeah.
You pretty much become one.
Brooke (29:41):
Absolutely.
I know that you are very caughtup on reading and AI trends and
everything.
So I'm curious if you haveanything to share about recent
trends and what you seehappening in this space.
In the next year, I always.
Talk about how this year was,the year of the agents and the
agent marketplace.
Yep.
What do we think about 2026 and2027?
(30:03):
What do you think is gonna belike the commonality there?
Lucas (30:07):
I think we are moving into a space where there's gonna
be a lot more robots,specifically humanoids, in
places like Japan.
In other parts of Asia, theyhave like Roomba style robots
and, packing warehouses and thistype of stuff.
But I do think we're going toget to a place in the next few
years where right now we havefairly intelligent brains that
we're talking to, like ChatGPT.
(30:27):
And it's just a matter ofgetting the actual motors and
cables and wires and everything.
To just connect this to somekind of camera.
And then we have, a essentiallya new robotic servant that's
gonna be walking around.
I really do think in the nextfew years this is gonna be
fairly common in five years.
I wouldn't be surprised if,instead of a Roomba in people's
homes, they're just gonna havethese types of humanoids walking
(30:48):
around and tons of companies arereally advancing that.
I really think next year and theyear thereafter, we're gonna see
way more, not just in thefactory floors.
Yeah.
Brooke (30:56):
Fascinating.
I know that you said that youhave a background in robotics at
one point as well.
Yeah.
And that's something I've onlyvery lightly talked about with
some guests in the past, somaybe we can dig even deeper
into it.
Okay.
Humanoids.
In our house.
What are they doing?
Cleaning and just doing basicstuff, or?
Lucas (31:14):
I would think so, yeah.
The thing is, right now a lot ofthem are used for like elderly
care, okay.
We have massive populations thepopulations not making enough
children to take care of theelderly.
And then of course with that youhave not enough workers that are
going to the workforce andsocial security, and then
everything's topsy turvy becauseof that, the biggest space.
That I think we'll see at firstas elderly care, which is really
sad.
Personally.
I think that multi-generationalhousing we should move back
(31:37):
towards personally.
So that everyone lives together.
Yeah.
But unfortunately the, just thenature of urbanization and the
architecture that is downstreamof that just means that, our
parents will be probablysomewhere not near us when we
have families and live ourlives.
And so elderly care withrobotics is really the space.
And then of course, you havethings like, disaster relief and
going into, I think somedangerous jobs will firstly
(31:59):
replace, people that have to goand, diffuse bombs or, going
into burning buildings and thiskind of stuff, so that'll be the
first, but eventually it will bejust like, servants cleaning,
doing the dishes, this type ofstuff.
And I don't think we'll be ableto relax because of it.
I think we, we'll just probablyend up working more, which is
part of the problem.
Brooke (32:17):
Really I
Lucas (32:17):
truly think it's gonna be really hard for us to do that.
Even look at AI right now, likeyeah, I am way more productive,
but I am not working less hours.
I want to work less hours.
Brooke (32:28):
That I always think that it's important to for sure,
like, go deeper on that.
And that we should be workingless.
Lucas (32:36):
Absolutely.
We should be working less.
We should be working less.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But I think just the nature ofit, you know it because it's
very competitive and becauseit's continuously changing.
Yeah.
And if you are a business owner,you know that it is, you can
feel the competition.
You look around and okay, Imight be, one of maybe a handful
of agencies that are, that isdoing exactly what I'm doing and
I know that if I'm not faster orsmarter or just, it's the nature
(32:58):
of, it's the nature ofcapitalism, right?
You must, you have to try to befaster.
It's unfortunate, but I reallydo hope we get to a place where
we can relax a bit, but not inthis wally esque future where
we're just like, laying onsofas, going around and having
robots do everything for us.
Of course, I do think meaning isalso found through a bit of
struggle if you will.
We have to work, we, we needwork for meaning.
Yes.
So
Brooke (33:19):
I'm not saying go to not working, but what about 75%
work?
25% rest.
Lucas (33:27):
That sounds great.
Like I, I don't know where thecapital's gonna come from
though.
Yeah, because if AI, as I said,is really a mechanism to
amalgamate power, and right nowthose who are doing that are not
necessarily they're notnecessarily governments,
municipalities, right?
They're private companies.
So the question is like, thenwhere does the capital come
(33:48):
from?
If we work 75% less.
Do we still get the same salary?
Is there some kind of, universalbasic income?
If so, how does that happen ifthe government is not
necessarily the one who ispowering the ai, but meta and
Google are are they the onesgetting super taxed?
If so, can they lobby againstit?
There's all these, everything isa complex, it's a super complex
(34:09):
political system.
Yes.
So I would hope maybe one day wecan work less truly, 75% less,
but.
I don't know.
Brooke (34:17):
Yeah.
Who's paying for all theserobots?
Is it gonna be just more taxmoney?
Lucas (34:22):
I think firstly it's gonna be private.
Okay.
It'd definitely be private moneyand but the luxury robots, the
ones that are gonna be doingdish washing and taking care of
maybe even taking care of littlekids or walking the dog, they
will be private.
And I don't see the governmentjust giving robots away and,
yeah.
From there, of course then youhave, these future, these movies
like iRobot and these thingswhere like, how do the robots
(34:44):
have moral ethics?
How do they make decisions?
What are their norms?
Do they have rights?
What if they have to make adecision that ends in someone
getting hurt?
Moral dilemmas, these types ofthings.
I think we're just opening ThePandora's box with this, I do
think in, in a way, it'sinevitable, but I don't wanna be
a, I don't wanna be a DebbieDowner.
I don't want, I don't wanna behere and just talk about how
it's all bad.
But there is a lot to justprepare for it, really, as I
(35:05):
said is asking these questionsYeah.
And trying to smooth it out,because if not, it's so easy to
surrender our agency.
We've already, in theory,surrendered our privacy with
social media.
Let's not surrender ourknowledge.
Brooke (35:16):
Very valid point as well.
Mm-hmm.
So I think that sets me up formy next question.
Yeah.
Is for those who are justentering AI or getting into it,
in the beginner phase, whatpoint of advice do you have for
them?
And any key takeaways that youwant to give with all of your
vast knowledge and experience?
Lucas (35:35):
I would say the most important thing is to remember
that when you're using thesetools.
That they're always gonna bechanging.
So the cool thing is you can askChatGPT to tell yourself, you
can write, tell me how to use,tell me how to use ChatGPT, it's
wonderful.
At the same time, that sameprotocol might not necessarily
work for Google Gemini.
Or Claude.
(35:57):
The main thing is to just getcomfortable with learning new
things quickly.
And being able to ask yourself,okay.
If I'm talking to a largelanguage model, if I'm talking
to something that I'm writingwith my keyboard It's giving me
texts back.
What little tools can I use?
Whether it's giving context tosay, you're a medical doctor, I
have a cough, this is reallydifferent.
Versus saying you're a lawyer, Ihave a cough.
You need to have positioning andcontext.
(36:18):
Yes.
So these types of things you canborrow.
So it's about just gettinglittle tools and putting them on
your tool belt that that you canadapt in different spaces.
That's the biggest thing I wouldrecommend.
And of course, just playing withthe tools if you can.
There's a handful of open sourcetools which people don't need to
spend money on.
Which I would recommend playingwith
Brooke (36:34):
Which ones?
Lucas (36:34):
Deep Seek Okay.
Is good.
You can run it on a, on yourcomputer in in five or 10
minutes you can run on yourcomputer.
And llama is also good fromFacebook, deep Sea Car One's
from a Chinese company, I don'tremember the name.
But yeah, there's different onesyou can use that you don't need
to spend 20 bucks a month for.
And I really think that theeducation part for me is
everything.
As you go through these thingsand as you understand the
different tools that I wasmentioning, it's like
(36:56):
continuously asking yourself,how can I use these tools in
different ways?
If I'm gonna be talking tosomething that generates images,
how does this work?
And maybe if I talk to somethingelse that generates images, how
can I borrow some things?
That's really it.
Brooke (37:08):
I love that.
Where do you learn ai?
Who teaches you?
Lucas (37:14):
I get a lot of my stuff from Twitter.
Okay.
But it's mainly because my feedis just, I try to use social
media.
I know social media is an echochamber.
So if I see something asvaluable, I like, and I bookmark
and I share, and eventually justTwitter is gonna be like, oh,
this new thing came out and thatnew thing came out.
Okay.
I try to just construct eachsocial media with that end in
(37:35):
mind.
For example, my Instagram is notreally much of my Instagram is
like travel and photography.
'cause I like, snowboarding,travel and photography.
My Instagram is snowboarding,travel photography.
But Twitter for me is thisthing.
So I would say just constructingyour social media around it is
good.
YouTube is also a good place,good resources there.
And as I said, you can ask thetool, you can say ChatGPT, how
do I use, how do I use you as atool?
And it can tell you.
Brooke (37:56):
Yes.
Yeah, just ask ChatGPT literally
Lucas (37:58):
say, how do I use, how do I use yourself?
How do I use a tool?
I guess it's weird to say it,but that's what you would type
in, right?
Yes.
Yeah.
So
Brooke (38:05):
even if I'm on client calls and they ask me something
directly that I don't know theanswer to, I'll even just ask
ChatGPT Live, be like, let's getto the bottom of this right
here.
Yeah.
Lucas (38:14):
Yeah.
And the cool thing is with theresearch mode, it connects to
the internet and you can, youcan expand the knowledge that
it's trained on.
Yes.
Which is really cool.
And yeah, these tools are superhelpful.
It's, yeah, they're just alwayschanging, right?
So I would say don't getattached to one.
Because if you do, then you'reeither going to fall behind when
something new comes out, or ifyou don't really ask yourself,
(38:35):
how am I using this tool and howcan I take this somewhere else?
When something new comes, thenyou have to do this step, which
is just takes a lot of work andtime.
Yeah, I like to view it as like,when you're learning math in
school, everything is built onsomething else, right?
Multiplication is just additionat scale.
Algebra is practically the samething.
Calculus, okay.
It's just, we're just addingdifferent layers and we're going
up, and it's the same thing withthis as with any skill, the only
(38:57):
way to just, you're gonna be abeginner and you're gonna get
better and better.
Eventually.
You might be a beginner again,but you have all these tools
that you can bring into yourrepertoire of knowledge that you
can say, okay, I wanna use thisor use that.
It's just being aware of thatreally like, as I said, use
notion, write things down, makea model or operations page and
nerd out about nerding out.
Yes.
Really
Brooke (39:17):
nerd out about nerding out.
Nerd out about nerding out.
I think that's an amazing finalquote to end on.
How can listeners reach out toyou?
How can they get in contact withyou?
Lucas (39:26):
Cool.
My my studio is called Traversein Space.
And right now we're doing arebrand, but we are on LinkedIn.
Myself, I'm also on LinkedIn.
Lucas Lorenzo Pena Traverse inSpace is traverse in space.
Okay.
Our whole thing is about, inabout bridging information
across these multidisciplinaryspaces, hence.
We're traversing themultidisciplinary spaces.
And yeah, you can find me there,you can find our thoughts
traversing space as a substackwhere we try to provoke
(39:49):
interesting and spicy things.
Which might not necessarily are,is best on LinkedIn because
LinkedIn's, about scale andlikes.
But yeah.
We're there, feel free to reachout.
And we work with mainly bigcorporates, but we also are
thinking about opening differentcontainers for people who are
interested, small SMEs, smallbusiness founders, solopreneurs,
to help them really leveragesome of the learnings we've used
(40:10):
in.
For example, fortune 500companies, so we yeah, stay
tuned because these types ofthings are in the works.
And for me, really it's justabout helping everyone get
access to this beautiful stuffbecause if not, then society
will just, things will bifurcatein ways we don't want them to,
yeah.
Thank you.
Brooke (40:24):
Wonderful.
I can't thank you enough forbeing here today.
There was a lot to unpack inthis episode.
So I'm sure it's one of thoseepisodes where people listen to
it twice, if not three timesmaybe.
Lucas (40:35):
Or maybe just have another conversation in the
future.
Brooke (40:38):
Yes.
I would love to talk again.
So thank you so much.
I appreciate you.
Lucas (40:42):
Thanks.
Brooke (40:44):
I hope today's episode opened your mind to what's
possible with ai.
Do you have a cool use case onhow you're using AI and wanna
share it?
DM me.
I'd love to hear more andfeature you on my next podcast.
Until next time, here's toworking smarter, not harder.
See you on the next episode ofHow I Ai.
This episode was made possiblein partnership with the
(41:06):
Collective ai, a communitydesigned to help entrepreneurs,
creators, and professionalsseamlessly integrate AI into
their workflows.
One of the biggest game changersin my own AI journey was joining
this space.
It's where I learned, connectedand truly enhanced my
understanding of what's possiblewith ai.
(41:27):
And the best part, they offermultiple membership levels to
meet you where you are.
Whether you want to DIY, your AIlearning or work with a
personalized AI consultant foryour business, the collective
has you covered.
Learn more and sign up using myexclusive link in the show
notes.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.