NVIDIA just hit a $5 trillion market cap. That’s more than the entire German economy. AI stocks are rewriting history, but investors often vacillate between unbridled fear and raging optimism.
On one side, believers say AI is the real deal, transforming productivity, driving corporate earnings, and justifying sky-high valuations. On the other, skeptics warn of circular funding, speculative hype, and déjà vu from the dot-com bubble.
JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon has called today’s valuations “a category of concern.” Bank of America’s global fund managers name an “AI equity bubble” as the top financial risk worldwide. Meanwhile, AI spending is projected to surge past $500 billion by 2026, with capital expenditure on data centers and chips outpacing U.S. consumer growth.
So is AI the new electricity or the next e-commerce bust?
Join us as we debate whether this trillion-dollar boom is innovation’s finest hour or Wall Street’s most dangerous illusion.
Born in August 1992 in Ankara, Türkiye, Tuva Atasever attended the Bilkent University, where he received a Bachelor of Science in Electrical and Electronics Engineering. After completing his undergraduate studies in 2014, Atasever moved to the United States and received a master’s degree in photonics from the University of California, Irvine. In addition, in 2018 Atasever completed the Space Studies Program (SSP) organized by Delft University of Technology, European Space Research and Technology Centre, and International Space University (ISU).
After receiving his Master’s degree in 2016, Atasever co-founded and acted as the CEO of Blue Dot VR where he worked on creating compelling experiences in virtual reality to induce pro-social, pro-environmental, and empathetic behaviors in users. In 2017,Atasever co-founded another startup called HyperSight, Inc., which focused on augmented reality.
After working on those ventures and gaining life-changing experiences, Atasever started working for ROKETSAN, Inc as an avionics systems engineer responsible from the avionic subsystems in the Micro Satellite Launch Vehicle (MSLV) and Space Sounding Rocket (SSR) development projects. As the payload integration manager for SSR, Atasever’s latest responsibility at ROKETSAN included selecting scientific and commercial payloads that were going to be launched on the SSR, creating technical requirements for those payloads, and successfully integrating them on the launch vehicle following the design verification process.
In May of 2022, Atasever enthusiastically applied for the first-ever astronaut selection campaign of the Turkish Space Agency (TUA). After passing all the phases successfully, he was selected as one of the first two astronauts of Türkiye.
Atasever enjoys swimming, outdoor running, camping, and backpacking, previously journeying across several national parks in Northern and Southern California and along the Mediterranean coast.
Atasever is honored and excited for the opportunity to be a part of the historic Ax-3 mission as the backup mission specialist, and looks forward to advancing Türkiye’s human spaceflight program in close cooperation with international partners to improve people’s lives here on Earth.
Once, politics was something you debated and moved on from. Today, it can redraw the boundaries of who we call a friend. In this episode of Arguable, we ask a question that’s become uncomfortably common: when someone you care about stands for ideas you find intolerable, should you preserve the relationship or protect your principles?
We explore how political identity has evolved into moral identity, how social media turns differences into declarations, and why disagreement now feels like disloyalty.
Is friendship about shared values or shared history? Can empathy coexist with conviction?
This episode examines the uneasy balance between moral ambition and political realism. Has the right’s coherence come at the cost of empathy, or has the left’s pluralism diluted its sense of purpose? Are voters choosing certainty over openness or merely responding to fatigue with ambiguity?
In this debate, we put forward two contrasting arguments. One side contends that the right’s success stems from its ability to offer direction, meaning, and belonging at a time of social uncertainty, while the left, preoccupied with management and moral positioning, has lost its visionary core. The other side argues that this framing overlooks how complexity, pluralism, and empathy make the left’s project inherently more demanding and perhaps more relevant in a fractured world.
The U.S. H-1B lottery just ended, and thousands of ambitious professionals are asking themselves the same question: is chasing a global career still worth it?
Immigration rules are tightening, borders are harder to cross, and belonging feels more elusive than ever.
In this episode, we think through the promise and pitfalls of building a life across countries. We’ll talk about the upside - bigger markets, faster growth, new horizons, and the downside - visa anxiety, dislocation, and the quiet ache of distance.
Harvard Business School graduate Abhilasha Sinha shares her reflections and mental models about
• Where you build your career, and how much of yourself you lose or find in the process.
• Does living “between worlds” expand us, or does it fracture us?
• What does success look like when the passport is as important as the résumé?
• Is a global career still a realistic ambition?
Taylor Swift has built an empire that redefines what it means to be an artist-entrepreneur. Her ownership battles, billion-dollar tours, and mastery of narrative have been hailed as a leadership blueprint for a new generation. Yet critics argue her success rests on singular talent, timing, and cultural lightning strikes that no strategy can replicate.
This episode debates whether Swift offers a replicable playbook for millennial leadership—or whether her empire proves she’s the rare exception who can’t be copied.
Previously a Fulbright Scholar, Fox International Fellow and Teaching Fellow at Yale, Gul has also been a Lead for the Digital Transformation of Industries at the World Economic Forum in Geneva, and an Expert on Higher Education, Entrepreneurship, and Industrial Policy at the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation in Vienna. His book The New Geography of Innovation won the Financial Times/McKinsey Bracken Bower Prize for writers under 35.
In this episode you will learn
In order to thrive at work, must we always be working? For many young professionals, the hours outside work are no longer a refuge.
In this episode of Arguable, Dhruva and Utkarsh explore the shifting line between hobbies and side hustles, and what that says about careers today.
Are side hustles a smart form of insurance in an unpredictable economy, or a symptom of a culture that demands we monetise every interest?
Do they help us discover new sides of ourselves, or simply extend the workday into our free time? In order to thrive at work, must we always be working?
This episode explores whether the modern millennial’s embrace of stoicism, rigorous health routines, and padel reflects a genuine search for meaning or a set of coping mechanisms that ultimately fall short. Has the rise of self-discipline and structured lifestyles created a more resilient generation, or has it led to a quiet sense of emptiness masked by routine?
We examine the social and psychological roots of these trends, asking whether the appeal of ancient philosophy, physical optimisation, and curated leisure is a response to instability or a retreat from vulnerability and connection.
We live in an era of disciplinary chauvinism. While most hiring managers agree that deep generalists are precious for the modern workplace, they tend to hesitate before giving a shot to someone from a non-traditional background. That’s why it is important to study the careers of people like Arunima Anand who pivoted her career from literature and is building her category of one at Spotify, one of the fastest growing companies in the world.
In this masterclass, you will learn
How to position yourself as a deep-generalist who can add tangible value from day 1
How to attract interesting opportunities in fast-growing sectors
How Spotify really works and why the Asian market is critical for its success
Biography
Urvashi Prasad has spent the last 15 years trying to make the world a kinder, fairer, and better place through her policy-based interventions in heathcare. Armed with degrees from Cambridge and LSTH, she worked as a director at NITI Aayog was awarded the India-UK Achievers Award.
In addition to sharing principles and frameworks for building meaningful careers in public policy, Urvashi opens up about losing her beloved father and being diagnosed with cancer soon after.
We admire her resilience, and are proud to share her story with you. Here you will learn
How governments attempt to address systemic challenges in sectors like healthcare
How young professionals can carve out interesting and impactful careers in public policy
How to make sense of life when you lose your beloved parent and are diagnosed with cancer
Urvashi Prasad is a public health and policy advisor with over 15 years of leadership across government, academia, and grassroots innovation. As Director in the Office of the Vice Chairperson at NITI Aayog, India’s apex policy think tank, she helped shape the country’s COVID-19 response strategy, monitor Sustainable Development Goals in real time, and spearhead national programs advancing public health, gender equity, and social inclusion.
A co-author of India’s first Voluntary National Review presented at the UN High-Level Political Forum in 2017, Urvashi’s policy insights have been featured in 150+ publications globally. She is also the British Council’s UK Alumni Ambassador for SDG 10, an Honorary Professor at De Montfort University, UK, and a member of the World Economic Forum’s Expert Network. Her accolades include the India-UK Achievers Honors and recognition among India's most influential women. In 2023, she founded Spcace by Urvashi, a pioneering platform amplifying patient voices.
Diagnosed with Stage 4 ALK-positive lung cancer at age 35, Urvashi now brings lived experience to the policy table --challenging invisibility in cancer discourse and driving recognition of under-researched malignancies in young adults. Her advocacy bridges science, storytelling, and systemic reform.
She holds a master’s in public health from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, an MPhil in Bioscience Enterprise from Cambridge University, and a Bachelor's in Biological Sciences (Genetics) from the University of Birmingham, UK. In 2024, Urvashi received an honorary doctorate for her work in public health and policy.
Esther Wojcicki is a renowned educator and journalist, best known for her transformative parenting philosophy outlined in her books
In this episode, she shares the principles that guided her as a mother to Susan Wojcicki, former CEO of YouTube, Anne Wojcicki, founder of 23andMe, and the late Dr Janet Wojcicki, a professor of paediatrics at UCSF.
She reflects on how childhood trauma, loss and adversity can be met with trust, respect, independence, collaboration and kindness—the values at the heart of her TRICK framework.
We also explore how her philosophy contrasts with more authoritarian approaches to parenting, such as those advanced by Amy Chua in Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. Esther argues that success does not require pressure or fear, but rather autonomy, connection, and trust.
Esther also discusses grief - a constant in most of our lives. This conversation goes well beyond parenting. It is about finding strength through meaning, creating space for healing, and choosing stories that uplift rather than confine. Esther’s insights offer a profound reminder that while loss is part of life, it does not have to define it.
What kind of economy does India need—not just to grow, but to serve its people with dignity and purpose? In this episode, we speak with Arun Maira, former Member of India’s Planning Commission, Chairman of BCG India, and author of Reimagining India’s Economy: An Inquiry into the Real Costs of Economic Growth.
Tracing his journey from Tata Motors to the highest levels of government, Maira reflects on what it takes to transform systems—both economic and institutional. He shares lessons from his work on industrial policy, capability-building, and ethical leadership, and calls for a bold shift away from GDP obsession toward a model grounded in inclusion, learning, and care.
We discuss:
• Why India is at a moral and economic crossroads
• What a “learning economy” looks like in practice
• How to design jobs-led growth that restores dignity to work
• Why systems thinking and listening must be central to leadership today
A compelling conversation with one of India’s most original thinkers on development, purpose, and how to shape an economy that works for everyone.
Podcast Description:
The nuclear family has become the dominant model in much of the world—but was its rise a step forward or a profound social loss?
Critics argue that the shift from joint families to nuclear households has led to loneliness, burnout, fragile caregiving systems, and the erosion of intergenerational wisdom. Joint families, they say, offered economic resilience, shared childcare, and a deep sense of belonging.
Supporters of the nuclear family, on the other hand, point to greater mobility, privacy, personal freedom, and protection from the toxic hierarchies that can exist in extended households.
In this episode, we explore the trade-offs:
Has the nuclear family empowered individuals—or left them isolated?
Did joint families offer support—or suppress autonomy?
Is modern parenting sustainable without shared kin networks?
Can we design a third path: community without control?
Private space travel once belonged in the realm of science fiction—but today, celebrities like Katy Perry are booking tickets on Blue Origin, and billionaires are launching rockets. In this episode, Dhruva and Utkarsh explore the growing role of private companies in space exploration and whether the shift away from government-led missions is cause for celebration or concern.
They delve into the tension between public and private funding: Should space exploration serve collective scientific goals or market incentives? Is "move fast and break things" the right ethos for a domain where failure can mean catastrophe? And as access to space becomes commercialized, who really benefits?
Supporters of private spaceflight argue it accelerates innovation, lowers costs, and inspires a new generation. But critics warn of widening inequalities, neglected public priorities, and the commodification of what many view as a shared human frontier.
Beyond rockets and revenue, this conversation grapples with deeper questions of purpose, responsibility, and who gets to write humanity’s next chapter among the stars.
In this episode, you will learn
In The Anti-Ableist Manifesto, Tiffany Yu highlights the myriad ways in which our society discriminates against people with disabilities - and what we can do about it. Foregrounding disabled identities that have too often been rendered invisible, she demonstrates how ending discrimination begins with self-reflection.
From recognising biases to understanding microaggressions, The Anti-Ableist Manifesto teaches us how to deconstruct ableism at work, in our communities and within ourselves.
About this Podcast
When European missionaries arrived in India in the sixteenth century, they entered a world both fascinating and bewildering. Hinduism, as they saw it, was a pagan mess: a worship of devils and monsters by a people who burned women alive, performed outlandish rites and fed children to crocodiles. But it quickly became clear that Hindu ‘idolatry’ was far more layered and complex than European stereotypes allowed, surprisingly even sharing certain impulses with Christianity.
Nonetheless, missionaries became a threatening force as European power grew in India. Western ways of thinking gained further ascendancy during the British Raj: while interest in Hindu thought influenced Enlightenment thinkers like Voltaire in Europe, Orientalism and colonial rule pressed Hindus to reimagine their religion. In fact, in resisting foreign authority, they often adopted the missionaries’ own tools and strategies. It is this encounter, Manu S. Pillai argues, that has given Hinduism its present shape, also contributing to the birth of an aggressive Hindu nationalism.
Gods, Guns and Missionaries surveys these remarkable dynamics with an arresting cast of characters – maharajahs, poets, gun-wielding revolutionaries, politicians, polemicists, philosophers and clergymen. Lucid, ambitious, and provocative, it is at once a political history, an examination of the mutual impact of Hindu culture and Christianity upon each other, and a study of the forces that have prepared the ground for politics in India today. Turning away from simplistic ideas on religious evolution and European imperialism, the past as it appears here is more complicated – and infinitely richer – than previous narratives allow.
Selective admissions have long defined access to elite universities but a number of scholars are challenging this model, arguing that it reinforces privilege and entrenches inequality. In this episode, Dhruva and Utkarsh examine the case for replacing selective admissions with a lottery among qualified applicants. The discussion draws on John Rawls’s concept of the veil of ignorance, and Michael Sandel’s critique of meritocracy, which highlights how systems of selection often obscure privilege and foster a corrosive hubris among so-called “winners,” who come to believe their success is entirely self-made.
Advocates of the lottery system argue that it could democratize access, reduce stress and competition, and promote a more just distribution of opportunity. Critics counter that such a shift risks undermining academic standards, devaluing individual achievement, and replacing one set of biases with another.
This conversation goes beyond admissions policy and raises deeper questions about fairness, equity, and justice.
Foreign aid and reparations are terms often used interchangeably, yet they embody distinct principles and purposes. In this episode, we discuss the differences between these concepts, exploring their definitions, the potential risks of conflating them, and the implications of such conflation.
Foreign aid typically refers to financial or technical assistance provided by one nation to another, aiming to support economic development, humanitarian needs, or disaster relief. Reparations, however, are compensatory measures acknowledging and addressing historical injustices and systemic exploitation inflicted upon a nation or community. While both involve the transfer of resources, their underlying motivations and intended outcomes differ significantly.
Conflating foreign aid with reparations can lead to several risks. It may allow former colonial powers to sidestep genuine accountability by framing aid as a benevolent gesture rather than a responsibility. This conflation can also perpetuate power imbalances, as aid often comes with conditions that may not align with the recipient nation’s interests, undermining the reparative intent of acknowledging past wrongs.
To illustrate these complexities, we examine the historical and ongoing debates surrounding the United Kingdom’s colonial legacy in India. Indian politician and author Shashi Tharoor has been a vocal advocate for recognizing the economic and social damages caused by British colonial rule. In his 2015 speech at the Oxford Union, Tharoor argued that British colonialism led to the systematic deindustrialization and impoverishment of India, asserting that reparations are owed for the exploitation endured.
Tharoor’s subsequent book, An Era of Darkness: The British Empire in India, delves deeper into these issues, providing a comprehensive analysis of the economic exploitation and cultural suppression during colonial rule. He emphasizes that while foreign aid from Britain to India exists, it does not equate to reparations, as it lacks the acknowledgment of historical injustices and is often guided by the donor’s strategic interests rather than the recipient’s reparative needs.
Through these discussions, we aim to shed light on the importance of distinguishing between foreign aid and reparations.
Tariffs—taxes on imports—have long been a powerful tool in economic policy, shaping global trade for centuries. But are they always harmful, or can they serve a strategic purpose?
In this episode, we trace the history of tariffs from the British East India Company to modern trade disputes between the U.S., China, India, and Europe. William Dalrymple, in The Anarchy, writes about how Britain used tariffs to cripple India’s textile industry while strengthening its own, showing how trade policy can be a tool of both economic growth and exploitation.
The debate is complex: tariffs can protect domestic industries and address unfair trade practices, but they can also raise consumer prices, stifle innovation, and provoke retaliation. Are there cases where tariffs have strengthened national economies, or do they always come at a cost?
Join us as we explore the pros and cons of tariffs, their historical impact, and whether they still have a place in today’s interconnected world.