Steelman with Mehran Java

Steel Man is a podcast about the tradeoffs hiding underneath every "obvious" decision — in technology, business, health, relationships, and the way we live.

I'm Mehran Java, a tech founder, AI engineer, and author of Play Your Cards Right, a book about the hidden costs behind every choice we make. While writing it, I noticed the same pattern everywhere: every time we engineer a fix, we break something else. AI is the most recent example, but it's true for parenting, recovery, social media, medicine, money, and the small daily decisions that compound into a life.

Every episode is a real long-form conversation, with one twist: my custom AI agent — Steel Man — runs alongside us live. It strengthens our arguments, surfaces the weaknesses, fact-checks claims, and brings in research we'd otherwise miss.

I'm interested in serious thinkers and practitioners across technology, AI, psychology, behavioral science, addiction and recovery, philosophy, business, faith, parenting, longevity, and culture — anyone with a hard-won perspective on a hidden tradeoff most people miss. If you've shipped something, lived something, or studied something deeply, and you're willing to have your strongest ideas pressure-tested respectfully, let's talk.