Explorez tous les épisodes du podcast London Futurists
| Titre | Date | Durée | |
|---|---|---|---|
| LFP 137: Perspectives on Machine Consciousness | 08 Oct 2026 | 00:36:41 | |
Our topic in this episode is a new book that has just been published, “Perspectives on Machine Consciousness”. It contains 26 chapters written by a total of 31 authors, who include a wide range of distinguished neuroscientists, philosophers, technologists, AI specialists, science fiction authors, and futurists. One of the book’s co-editors is Calum, which is why David is asking the questions today. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 136: Steve Keen - Will economists destroy capitalism? | 09 Sep 2026 | 00:40:11 | |
Our guest today is Professor Steve Keen, an economist and author best known for his long-standing critique of mainstream neoclassical economics. He was one of the relatively few economists to warn publicly, in advance, of the dangers that culminated in the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. In 2010 he received the Revere Award from the “Real World Economics Review” for that work. His books include “Debunking Economics”, “Can We Avoid Another Financial Crisis?”, and “The New Economics: A Manifesto”. He has held professorships at Kingston University London, the University of Western Sydney, and UCL – University College London. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 135: Pat Kane & Indra Adnan - If politics is broken, what's the alternative? | 24 Aug 2026 | 00:44:54 | |
Our guests in this episode are Pat Kane and Indra Adnan, the co-convenors of The Alternative Global. That project was launched in 2017 with the question, “If politics is broken, what’s the alternative?” Pat and Indra will be speaking at the London Futurists and IEET event in London on 19-20 September, “The Technoprogressive Opportunity,” where they’ll giving an update on progress with their project. Our episode today provides a chance to dive into what they have experienced and learned. Pat is a writer, musician, curator, consultant, activist and futurist. He is the author of the book “The Play Ethic”, and has written for the Independent, the Sunday Times, the Guardian/Observer and Scotland’s Sunday Herald, of which he was a founding editor in 1999. He is currently a columnist with The National, and is researching a new book on politics, creativity and the science of emotions. Indra is a psycho-social therapist, founder of the Soft Power Network, and a writer and events producer. She has consulted to the World Economic Forum, Indian, Finnish and Danish governments, NATO, the Scottish Executive and the Institute of Contemporary Arts amongst others. She is the author of the book “The Politics of Waking Up: Power & Possibility In The Fractal Age”. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 134: Ewan McMillan - AI overhang and economics impact | 12 Aug 2026 | 00:37:04 | |
We are continuing our investigation into the implications of the Economic Singularity, the time when we need a new economic system because full automation by AI means that people can no longer obtain the resources they need by doing jobs. Our guest today is Ewan McMillan, the founder of New Gradient, an Edinburgh-based consultancy that builds AI systems for a variety of industries, from biotech to mining. He took a degree in theoretical physics at the University of Edinburgh, and since then he has spent seven years delivering applied AI R&D. We wanted to have Ewan on the show because he also writes about the economics of AI from the perspective of someone who is actually implementing it. This spring he posted a series of thought-provoking articles called “The Economics of AGI”. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 133: Oliver Ritchie - Waking up Economists | 04 Aug 2026 | 00:40:31 | |
We are continuing our investigation into the implications of the Economic Singularity, the time when we need a new economic system because full automation by AI means people can no longer obtain the resources they need by doing jobs. Our guest today is Oliver Ritchie, the UK Policy Lead at the Future of Life Institute. Previously, he was a Senior Fellow at the Institute for AI Policy and Strategy, and a Research Scholar at GovAI. He also spent over six years in policy formation at the Treasury, which is where many of the brightest minds in UK public sector work, and where the really big decisions are made, because the Treasury hold the purse strings. We wanted to have Oliver on the show because he has written two thought-provoking articles on the Economic Singularity, a paper called “The Fiscal Challenge of Advanced AI”, and a Substack post which summarises it, called “Can we afford to support workers whose jobs are displaced by AI?” Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 132: Matteo Rossi MacDermant - Technoprogressive Worldbuilding | 21 Jul 2026 | 00:49:49 | |
This is the first of a number of episodes on the broad theme of “the technoprogressive opportunity”. That’s the name of a conference taking place in London on the weekend of 19th and 20th September, co-organised by London Futurists and the IEET – the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. In these episodes, some of the speakers from that conference will be appearing as guests on this show. Our guest today is one of these speakers, Matteo Rossi MacDermant, a technophilosopher from the University of New Mexico. Matteo hosts a show called “Bread and Robots”, which covers subjects such as post-scarcity economics, universal basic income, the tech workers movement, and how technology can be steered toward collective abundance rather than corporate exploitation. Matteo is also the instructor for an online course called “An introduction to technoprogressive worldbuilding”. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 131: Ben Luong - The Discontinuity Thesis | 28 Jun 2026 | 00:34:52 | |
AI-driven automation of cognitive labour is not merely another technological transition but a structural discontinuity that will end, sooner or later, the central role of wages in how society operates. This discontinuity can be called “The End of Postwar Capitalism”. That’s the conclusion of a tightly argued set of essays, “The Discontinuity Thesis”, written by our guest in this episode, Ben Luong. The essays look at a range of arguments that all try to make the case that wages paid for cognitive labour will remain significant for the majority of people, so that capitalism can continue in place, even with AI having greatly expanded capabilities. According to Ben, each of these arguments fail. These back-and-forth debates are what we explore in this episode. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 130: Gerry Tsoukalas and Brett Falk - The AI Automation Layoff Trap | 01 Jun 2026 | 00:41:53 | |
This episode continues our investigation into the implications of advanced AI for jobs, and specifically, how to design an economic system that makes a huge success of full automation by AI. Back in 2017, Bill Gates mused that governments should address radical automation by taxing robots. Gates may not have known it at the time, but he was suggesting a Pigouvian tax. In a 1920 book called “The Economics of Welfare”, Arthur Pigou proposed levying taxes on activities that generate negative externalities — costs on third parties to a transaction. The classic example of that is pollution: a factory produces goods but creates pollution. The market price of the goods doesn't reflect the pollution costs, so the factory managers don’t try very hard to minimise them. A Pigouvian tax adds the social cost of the pollution into the price, so the producer is incentivised to minimise it. Gerry Tsoukalas and Brett Falk have published a well-received paper called “The AI Layoff Trap”, which recommends introducing a Pigouvian tax on automation that eliminates human jobs. Their proposal deserves credit for taking seriously the idea that AI may well cause severe automation, perhaps full automation – i.e. the Economic Singularity. The paper describes how firms face a prisoner’s dilemma. If they automate all their jobs then there will be no consumers to pay for any of their products. But if any of them don’t, their automating competitors will drive them out of business. Tsoukalas and Falk point out, counter-intuitively, that the fiercer the competition, the more acute the dilemma, so if we want to hold back automation, we might be better off with monopoly-ridden economies. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 129: Ted Shelton - Post-labour economics and the future of capitalism | 09 May 2026 | 00:44:24 | |
This episode continues our investigation into the potential wide-ranging implications of advanced AI for economics. Traditionally, value is said to be created by a combination of capital, which covers the cost of materials and equipment, and labour, whereby humans exercise skills, ingenuity, diligence, attention, and more. What has been a constant debate is the appropriate division of rewards between capital and labour. Critics of the operation of capitalism have often predicted that an accumulation of value within small groups of owners of capital will cause economic instabilities and a subsequent collapse. Despite these forecasts, capitalism has, so far, demonstrated great resilience, defying predictions of its collapse. But if human labour is increasingly displaced by advanced automation, the balance of labour and capital will be fundamentally changed, and capitalism will come under unprecedented pressures. That’s the thesis of our guest today, Ted Shelton. David first met Ted about 25 years ago, when Ted was Chief Strategy Officer of the software development tools company Borland, and David was an executive within the early smartphone industry. Since that time, Ted has worked for a variety of companies in and around Silicon Valley, including PwC, Cognizant Technology Solutions, Catalytic, Bain, and Inflection AI. Recently, he has been giving a great deal of thought to where AI is taking the economy. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 128: Adrian Brown - Windfall Trust and the Economic Singularity | 22 Apr 2026 | 00:44:58 | |
What happens if AI delivers major advances in capability and productivity, but also creates significant disruption to jobs, incomes, and public finances? That question sits at the heart of today’s episode. Our guest is Adrian Brown, the Founder and Chief Executive of Windfall Trust, a nonprofit focused on helping governments and societies prepare for the economic consequences of advanced AI. Windfall describes itself not as a think tank, but as a “policy accelerator for the age of artificial intelligence”. Their work starts from a simple premise: if AI systems significantly reshape the economy, then the question is not only how we build them, but how we prepare for their impacts, and how the gains are ultimately shared. Before founding Windfall Trust, Adrian was the founding Executive Director of the Centre for Public Impact, worked as a policy advisor in the UK Cabinet Office, and held roles at McKinsey and the Boston Consulting Group. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| LFP 127: Anticipating 2026 | 07 Jan 2026 | 00:51:36 | |
When we started this Podcast back in August 2022, we, Calum and David, announced the theme to be “Anticipating and managing exponential impact”. We talked about three sub-themes: Developing the skills of exponential foresight; Distinguishing between scenarios, whether they were plausible or implausible, and whether they were desirable or undesirable; and thirdly, Supporting the community of collaborative exponential foresight. 126 episodes later, as we reach the transition between 2025 and 2026, it’s a good time for the two of us to take stock. Accordingly, in this episode, we each pick out a number of events from the last 12 months which we see as potential signals of larger exponential impact ahead. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| The puzzle pieces that can defuse the US-China AI race dynamic, with Kayla Blomquist | 23 Dec 2025 | 00:34:29 | |
Almost every serious discussion about options to constrain the development of advanced AI results in someone raising the question: “But what about China?” The worry behind this question is that slowing down AI research and development in the US and Europe will allow China to race ahead. It's true: the relationship between China and the rest of the world has many complications. That’s why we’re delighted that our guest in this episode is Kayla Blomquist, the Co-founder and Director of the Oxford China Policy Lab, or OCPL for short. OCPL describes itself as a global community of China and emerging technology researchers at Oxford, who produce policy-relevant research to navigate risks in the US-China relationship and beyond. In parallel with her role at OCPL, Kayla is pursuing a DPhil at the Oxford Internet Institute. She is a recent fellow at the Centre for Governance of AI, and the lead researcher and contributing author to the Oxford China Briefing Book. She holds an MSc from the Oxford Internet Institute and a BA with Honours in International Relations, Public Policy, and Mandarin Chinese from the University of Denver. She also studied at Peking University and is professionally fluent in Mandarin. Kayla previously worked as a diplomat in the U.S. Mission to China, where she specialized in the governance of emerging technologies, human rights, and improving the use of new technology within government services. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Jensen Huang and the zero billion dollar market, with Stephen Witt | 16 Dec 2025 | 00:44:42 | |
Our guest in this episode is Stephen Witt, an American journalist and author who writes about the people driving the technological revolutions. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker, and is famous for deep-dive investigations. Stephen's new book is "The Thinking Machine: Jensen Huang, Nvidia, and the World's Most Coveted Microchip", which has just won the 2025 Financial Times and Schroders Business Book of the Year Award. It is a definitive account of the rise of Nvidia, from its foundation in a Denny's restaurant in 1993 as a video game component manufacturer, to becoming the world's most valuable company, and the hardware provider for the current AI boom. Stephen's previous book, “How Music Got Free”, is a history of music piracy and the MP3, and was also a finalist for the FT Business Book of the Year. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| What's your p(Pause)? with Holly Elmore | 05 Dec 2025 | 00:43:42 | |
Our guest in this episode is Holly Elmore, who is the Founder and Executive Director of PauseAI US. The website pauseai-us.org starts with this headline: “Our proposal is simple: Don’t build powerful AI systems until we know how to keep them safe. Pause AI.” But PauseAI isn’t just a talking shop. They’re probably best known for organising public protests. The UK group has demonstrated in Parliament Square in London, with Big Ben in the background, and also outside the offices of Google DeepMind. A group of 30 PauseAI protesters gathered outside the OpenAI headquarters in San Francisco. Other protests have taken place in New York, Portland, Ottawa, Sao Paulo, Berlin, Paris, Rome, Oslo, Stockholm, and Sydney, among other cities. Previously, Holly was a researcher at the think tank Rethink Priorities in the area of Wild Animal Welfare. And before that, she studied evolutionary biology in Harvard’s Organismic and Evolutionary Biology department. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Real-life superheroes and troubled institutions, with Tom Ough | 31 Oct 2025 | 00:39:51 | |
Popular movies sometimes feature leagues of superheroes who are ready to defend the Earth against catastrophe. In this episode, we’re going to be discussing some real-life superheroes, as chronicled in the new book by our guest, Tom Ough. The book is entitled “The Anti-Catastrophe League: The Pioneers And Visionaries On A Quest To Save The World”. Some of these heroes are already reasonably well known, but others were new to David, and, he suspects, to many of the book’s readers. Tom is a London-based journalist. Earlier in his career he worked in newspapers, mostly for the Telegraph, where he was a staff feature-writer and commissioning editor. He is currently a senior editor at UnHerd, where he commissions essays and occasionally writes them. Perhaps one reason why he writes so well is that he has a BA in English Language and Literature from Oxford University, where he was a Casberd scholar. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Safe superintelligence via a community of AIs and humans, with Craig Kaplan | 10 Oct 2025 | 00:41:15 | |
Craig Kaplan has been thinking about superintelligence longer than most. He bought the URL superintelligence.com back in 2006, and many years before that, in the late 1980s, he co-authored a series of papers with one of the founding fathers of AI, Herbert Simon. Craig started his career as a scientist with IBM, and later founded and ran a venture-backed company called PredictWallStreet that brought the wisdom of the crowd to Wall Street, and improved the performance of leading hedge funds. He sold that company in 2020, and now spends his time working out how to make the first superintelligence safe. As he puts it, he wants to reduce P(Doom) and increase P(Zoom). Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| How progress ends: the fate of nations, with Carl Benedikt Frey | 17 Sep 2025 | 00:37:08 | |
Many people expect improvements in technology over the next few years, but fewer people are optimistic about improvements in the economy. Especially in Europe, there’s a narrative that productivity has stalled, that the welfare state is over-stretched, and that the regions of the world where innovation will be rewarded are the US and China – although there are lots of disagreements about which of these two countries will gain the upper hand. To discuss these topics, our guest in this episode is Carl Benedikt Frey, the Dieter Schwarz Associate Professor of AI & Work at the Oxford Internet Institute. Carl is also a Fellow at Mansfield College, University of Oxford, and is Director of the Future of Work Programme and Oxford Martin Citi Fellow at the Oxford Martin School. Carl’s new book has the ominous title, “How Progress Ends”. The subtitle is “Technology, Innovation, and the Fate of Nations”. A central premise of the book is that our ability to think clearly about the possibilities for progress and stagnation today is enhanced by looking backward at the rise and fall of nations around the globe over the past thousand years. The book contains fascinating analyses of how countries at various times made significant progress, and at other times stagnated. The book also considers what we might deduce about the possible futures of different economies worldwide. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Tsetlin Machines, Literal Labs, and the future of AI, with Noel Hurley | 08 Sep 2025 | 00:35:54 | |
Our guest in this episode is Noel Hurley. Noel is a highly experienced technology strategist with a long career at the cutting edge of computing. He spent two decade-long stints at Arm, the semiconductor company whose processor designs power hundreds of billions of devices worldwide. Today, he’s a co-founder of Literal Labs, where he’s developing Tsetlin Machines. Named after Michael Tsetlin, a Soviet mathematician, these are a kind of machine learning model that are energy-efficient, flexible, and surprisingly effective at solving complex problems - without the opacity or computational overhead of large neural networks. AI has long had two main camps, or tribes. One camp works with neural networks, including Large Language Models. Neural networks are brilliant at pattern matching, and can be compared to human instinct, or fast thinking, to use Daniel Kahneman´s terminology. Neural nets have been dominant since the first Big Bang in AI in 2012, when Geoff Hinton and others demonstrated the foundations for deep learning. For decades before the 2012 Big Bang, the predominant form of AI was symbolic AI, also known as Good Old Fashioned AI. This can be compared to logical reasoning, or slow learning in Kahneman´s terminology. Tsetlin Machines have characteristics of both neural networks and symbolic AI. They are rule-based learning systems built from simple automata, not from neurons or weights. But their learning mechanism is statistical and adaptive, more like machine learning than traditional symbolic AI. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Intellectual dark matter? A reputation trap? The case of cold fusion, with Jonah Messinger | 05 Aug 2025 | 00:40:11 | |
Could the future see the emergence and adoption of a new field of engineering called nucleonics, in which the energy of nuclear fusion is accessed at relatively low temperatures, producing abundant clean safe energy? This kind of idea has been discussed since 1989, when the claims of cold fusion first received media attention. It is often assumed that the field quickly reached a dead-end, and that the only scientists who continue to study it are cranks. However, as we’ll hear in this episode, there may be good reasons to keep an open mind about a number of anomalous but promising results. Our guest is Jonah Messinger, who is a Winton Scholar and Ph.D. student at the Cavendish Laboratory of Physics at the University of Cambridge. Jonah is also a Research Affiliate at MIT, a Senior Energy Analyst at the Breakthrough Institute, and previously he was a Visiting Scientist and ThinkSwiss Scholar at ETH Zürich. His work has appeared in research journals, on the John Oliver show, and in publications of Columbia University. He earned his Master’s in Energy and Bachelor’s in Physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he was named to its Senior 100 Honorary. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| AI agents, AI safety, and AI boycotts, with Peter Scott | 29 Jul 2025 | 00:53:39 | |
This episode of London Futurists Podcast is a special joint production with the AI and You podcast which is hosted by Peter Scott. It features a three-way discussion, between Peter, Calum, and David, on the future of AI, with particular focus on AI agents, AI safety, and AI boycotts. Peter Scott is a futurist, speaker, and technology expert helping people master technological disruption. After receiving a Master’s degree in Computer Science from Cambridge University, he went to California to work for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. His weekly podcast, “Artificial Intelligence and You” tackles three questions: What is AI? Why will it affect you? How do you and your business survive and thrive through the AI Revolution? Peter’s second book, also called “Artificial Intelligence and You,” was released in 2022. Peter works with schools to help them pivot their governance frameworks, curricula, and teaching methods to adapt to and leverage AI. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| The remarkable potential of hydrogen cars, with Hugo Spowers | 18 Jul 2025 | 00:43:08 | |
The guest in this episode is Hugo Spowers. Hugo has led an adventurous life. In the 1970s and 80s he was an active member of the Dangerous Sports Club, which invented bungee jumping, inspired by an initiation ceremony in Vanuatu. Hugo skied down a black run in St.Moritz in formal dress, seated at a grand piano, and he broke his back, neck and hips when he misjudged the length of one of his bungee ropes. Hugo is a petrol head, and done more than his fair share of car racing. But if he’ll excuse the pun, his driving passion was always the environment, and he is one of the world’s most persistent and dedicated pioneers of hydrogen cars. He is co-founder and CEO of Riversimple, a 24 year-old pre-revenue startup, which have developed 5 generations of research vehicles. Hydrogen cars are powered by electric motors using electricity generated by fuel cells. Fuel cells are electrolysis in reverse. You put in hydrogen and oxygen, and what you get out is electricity and water. There is a long-standing debate among energy experts about the role of hydrogen fuel cells in the energy mix, and Hugo is a persuasive advocate. Riversimple’s cars carry modest sized fuel cells complemented by supercapacitors, with motors for each of the four wheels. The cars are made of composites, not steel, because minimising weight is critical for fuel efficiency, pollution, and road safety. The cars are leased rather than sold, which enables a circular business model, involving higher initial investment per car, and no built-in obsolescence. The initial, market entry cars are designed as local run-arounds for households with two cars, which means the fuelling network can be built out gradually. And Hugo also has strong opinions about company governance. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| AI and the end of conflict, with Simon Horton | 23 Jun 2025 | 00:38:45 | |
Can we use AI to improve how we handle conflict? Or even to end the worst conflicts that are happening all around us? That’s the subject of the new book of our guest in this episode, Simon Horton. The book has the bold title “The End of Conflict: How AI will end war and help us get on better”. Simon has a rich background, including being a stand-up comedian and a trapeze artist – which are, perhaps, two useful skills for dealing with acute conflict. He has taught negotiation and conflict resolution for 20 years, across 25 different countries, where his clients have included the British Army, the Saudi Space Agency, and Goldman Sachs. His previous books include “Change their minds” and “The leader’s guide to negotiation”. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| The AI disconnect: understanding vs motivation, with Nate Soares | 11 Jun 2025 | 00:48:53 | |
Our guest in this episode is Nate Soares, President of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, or MIRI.
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Anticipating an Einstein moment in the understanding of consciousness, with Henry Shevlin | 28 May 2025 | 00:41:02 | |
Our guest in this episode is Henry Shevlin. Henry is the Associate Director of the Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence at the University of Cambridge, where he also co-directs the Kinds of Intelligence program and oversees educational initiatives. He researches the potential for machines to possess consciousness, the ethical ramifications of such developments, and the broader implications for our understanding of intelligence. In his 2024 paper, “Consciousness, Machines, and Moral Status,” Henry examines the recent rapid advancements in machine learning and the questions they raise about machine consciousness and moral status. He suggests that public attitudes towards artificial consciousness may change swiftly, as human-AI interactions become increasingly complex and intimate. He also warns that our tendency to anthropomorphise may lead to misplaced trust in and emotional attachment to AIs. Note: this episode is co-hosted by David and Will Millership, the CEO of a non-profit called Prism (Partnership for Research Into Sentient Machines). Prism is seeded by Conscium, a startup where both Calum and David are involved, and which, among other things, is researching the possibility and implications of machine consciousness. Will and Calum will be releasing a new Prism podcast focusing entirely on Conscious AI, and the first few episodes will be in collaboration with the London Futurists Podcast. Selected follow-ups:
Other researchers mentioned:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| The case for a conditional AI safety treaty, with Otto Barten | 09 May 2025 | 00:37:03 | |
How can a binding international treaty be agreed and put into practice, when many parties are strongly tempted to break the rules of the agreement, for commercial or military advantage, and when cheating may be hard to detect? That’s the dilemma we’ll examine in this episode, concerning possible treaties to govern the development and deployment of advanced AI. Our guest is Otto Barten, Director of the Existential Risk Observatory, which is based in the Netherlands but operates internationally. In November last year, Time magazine published an article by Otto, advocating what his organisation calls a Conditional AI Safety Treaty. In March this year, these ideas were expanded into a 34-page preprint which we’ll be discussing today, “International Agreements on AI Safety: Review and Recommendations for a Conditional AI Safety Treaty”. Before co-founding the Existential Risk Observatory in 2021, Otto had roles as a sustainable energy engineer, data scientist, and entrepreneur. He has a BSc in Theoretical Physics from the University of Groningen and an MSc in Sustainable Energy Technology from Delft University of Technology. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Humanity's final four years? with James Norris | 30 Apr 2025 | 00:48:27 | |
In this episode, we return to the subject of existential risks, but with a focus on what actions can be taken to eliminate or reduce these risks. Our guest is James Norris, who describes himself on his website as an existential safety advocate. The website lists four primary organizations which he leads: the International AI Governance Alliance, Upgradable, the Center for Existential Safety, and Survival Sanctuaries. Previously, one of James' many successful initiatives was Effective Altruism Global, the international conference series for effective altruists. He also spent some time as the organizer of a kind of sibling organization to London Futurists, namely Bay Area Futurists. He graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a triple major in psychology, sociology, and philosophy, as well as with minors in too many subjects to mention. Selected follow-ups:
Other people mentioned include:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Human extinction: thinking the unthinkable, with Sean ÓhÉigeartaigh | 23 Apr 2025 | 00:41:56 | |
Our subject in this episode may seem grim – it’s the potential extinction of the human species, either from a natural disaster, like a supervolcano or an asteroid, or from our own human activities, such as nuclear weapons, greenhouse gas emissions, engineered biopathogens, misaligned artificial intelligence, or high energy physics experiments causing a cataclysmic rupture in space and time. These scenarios aren’t pleasant to contemplate, but there’s a school of thought that urges us to take them seriously – to think about the unthinkable, in the phrase coined in 1962 by pioneering futurist Herman Kahn. Over the last couple of decades, few people have been thinking about the unthinkable more carefully and systematically than our guest today, Sean ÓhÉigeartaigh. Sean is the author of a recent summary article from Cambridge University Press that we’ll be discussing, “Extinction of the human species: What could cause it and how likely is it to occur?” Sean is presently based in Cambridge where he is a Programme Director at the Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence. Previously he was founding Executive Director of the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk, and before that, he managed research activities at the Future of Humanity Institute in Oxford. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| The best of times and the worst of times, updated, with Ramez Naam | 26 Mar 2025 | 00:44:36 | |
Our guest in this episode, Ramez Naam, is described on his website as “climate tech investor, clean energy advocate, and award-winning author”. But that hardly starts to convey the range of deep knowledge that Ramez brings to a wide variety of fields. It was his 2013 book, “The Infinite Resource: The Power of Ideas on a Finite Planet”, that first alerted David to the breadth of scope of his insight about future possibilities – both good possibilities and bad possibilities. He still vividly remembers its opening words, quoting Charles Dickens from “The Tale of Two Cities”: Quote: “‘It was the best of times; it was the worst of times’ – the opening line of Charles Dickens’s 1859 masterpiece applies equally well to our present era. We live in unprecedented wealth and comfort, with capabilities undreamt of in previous ages. We live in a world facing unprecedented global risks—risks to our continued prosperity, to our survival, and to the health of our planet itself. We might think of our current situation as ‘A Tale of Two Earths’.” End quote. 12 years after the publication of “The Infinite Resource”, it seems that the Earth has become even better, but also even worse. Where does this leave the power of ideas? Or do we need more than ideas, as ominous storm clouds continue to gather on the horizon? Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| PAI at Paris: the global AI ecosystem evolves, with Rebecca Finlay | 27 Feb 2025 | 00:38:19 | |
In this episode, our guest is Rebecca Finlay, the CEO at Partnership on AI (PAI). Rebecca previously joined us in Episode 62, back in October 2023, in what was the run-up to the Global AI Safety Summit in Bletchley Park in the UK. Times have moved on, and earlier this month, Rebecca and the Partnership on AI participated in the latest global summit in that same series, held this time in Paris. This summit, breaking with the previous naming, was called the Global AI Action Summit. We’ll be hearing from Rebecca how things have evolved since we last spoke – and what the future may hold. Prior to joining Partnership on AI, Rebecca founded the AI & Society program at global research organization CIFAR, one of the first international, multistakeholder initiatives on the impact of AI in society. Rebecca’s insights have been featured in books and media including The Financial Times, The Guardian, Politico, and Nature Machine Intelligence. She is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences and sits on advisory bodies in Canada, France, and the U.S. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| AI agents: challenges ahead of mainstream adoption, with Tom Davenport | 03 Feb 2025 | 00:33:29 | |
The most highly anticipated development in AI this year is probably the expected arrival of AI agents, also referred to as “agentic AI”. We are told that AI agents have the potential to reshape how individuals and organizations interact with technology. Our guest to help us explore this is Tom Davenport, Distinguished Professor in Information Technology and Management at Babson College, and a globally recognized thought leader in the areas of analytics, data science, and artificial intelligence. Tom has written, co-authored, or edited about twenty books, including "Competing on Analytics" and "The AI Advantage." He has worked extensively with leading organizations and has a unique perspective on the transformative impact of AI across industries. He has recently co-authored an article in the MIT Sloan Management Review, “Five Trends in AI and Data Science for 2025”, which included a section on AI agents – which is why we invited him to talk about the subject. Selected follow-ups:
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| Post-labour economics, with David Shapiro | 23 Jan 2025 | 00:42:49 | |
In this episode, we return to a theme which is likely to become increasingly central to public discussion in the months and years ahead. To use a term coined by this podcast’s cohost Calum Chace, this theme is the Economic Singularity, namely the potential all-round displacement of humans from the workforce by ever more capable automation. That leads to the question: what are our options for managing the transition of society to increasing technological unemployment and technological underemployment.
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| Longevity activism at 82, 86, and beyond, with Kenneth Scott and Helga Sands | 10 Jan 2025 | 00:45:10 | |
Our guests in this episode have been described as the world’s two oldest scientifically astute longevity activists. They are Kenneth Scott, aged 82, who is based in Florida, and Helga Sands, aged 86, who lives in London.
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| Models for society when humans have zero economic value, with Jeff LaPorte | 02 Jan 2025 | 00:41:02 | |
Our guest in this episode is Jeff LaPorte, a software engineer, entrepreneur and investor based in Vancouver, who writes Road to Artificia, a newsletter about discovering the principles of post‑AI societies.
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| From ineffective altruism to effective altruism? with Stefan Schubert | 26 Dec 2024 | 00:34:12 | |
Our subject in this episode is altruism – our human desire and instinct to assist each other, making some personal sacrifices along the way. More precisely, our subject is the possible future of altruism – a future in which our philanthropic activities – our charitable donations, and how we spend our discretionary time – could have a considerably greater impact than at present. The issue is that many of our present activities, which are intended to help others, aren’t particularly effective.
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| The global energy transition: an optimistic assessment, with Amory Lovins | 16 Dec 2024 | 00:34:34 | |
Our guest in this episode is Amory Lovins, a distinguished environmental scientist, and co-founder of RMI, which he co-founded in 1982 as Rocky Mountain Institute. It’s what he calls a think do and scale tank, with 700 people in 62 countries, and a budget of well over $100m a year.
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| Building brain-like AIs, with Alexander Ororbia | 09 Dec 2024 | 00:47:08 | |
Some people say that all that’s necessary to improve the capabilities of AI is to scale up existing systems. That is, to use more training data, to have larger models with more parameters in them, and more computer chips to crunch through the training data. However, in this episode, we’ll be hearing from a computer scientist who thinks there are many other options for improving AI. He is Alexander Ororbia, a professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York State, where he directs the Neural Adaptive Computing Laboratory.
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| To sidestep death, preserve your connectome, with Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston | 18 Nov 2024 | 00:41:23 | |
In David's life so far, he has read literally hundreds of books about the future. Yet none has had such a provocative title as this: “The future loves you: How and why we should abolish death”. That’s the title of the book written by the guest in this episode, Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston. Ariel is a neuroscientist, and a Research Fellow at Monash University, in Melbourne, Australia.
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| Insights from 15 years leading the self-driving vehicle industry, with Sterling Anderson | 05 Nov 2024 | 00:41:24 | |
Our guest in this episode is Sterling Anderson, a pioneer of self-driving vehicles. With a masters degree and a PhD from MIT, Sterling led the development and launch of the Tesla Model X, and then led the team that delivered Tesla Autopilot. In 2017 he co-founded Aurora, along with Chris Urmson, who was a founder and CTO of Google’s self-driving car project, which is now Waymo, and also Drew Bagnell, who co-founded and led Uber’s self-driving team.
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| The race for AI supremacy, with Parmy Olson | 29 Oct 2024 | 00:46:49 | |
Our guest in this episode is Parmy Olson, a columnist for Bloomberg covering technology. Parmy has previously been a reporter for the Wall Street Journal and for Forbes. Her first book, “We Are Anonymous”, shed fascinating light on what the subtitle calls “the Hacker World of LulzSec, Anonymous, and the Global Cyber Insurgency”.
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| A narrow path to a good future with AI, with Andrea Miotti | 21 Oct 2024 | 00:40:46 | |
Our guest in this episode is Andrea Miotti, the founder and executive director of ControlAI. On their website, ControlAI have the tagline, “Fighting to keep humanity in control”. Control over what, you might ask. The website answers: control deepfakes, control scaling, control foundation models, and, yes, control AI. The initiative has already received lots of feedback, both positive and negative, which we discuss.
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| Gen AI cuts costs by 30%: lessons from a leading law firm, with David Wakeling | 11 Oct 2024 | 00:35:30 | |
Our guest in this episode is David Wakeling, a partner at A&O Shearman, which became the world’s third largest law firm in May, thanks to the merger of Allen and Overy, a UK “magic circle” firm, with Shearman & Sterling of New York.
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| Climate change and populism: Grounds for optimism? with Matt Burgess | 26 Sep 2024 | 00:38:44 | |
Our guest in this episode is Matt Burgess. Matt is an Assistant Professor at the University of Wyoming, where he moved this year after six years at the University of Boulder, Colorado. He has specialised in the economics of climate change.
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| Rejuvenation biotech - progress and potential, with Karl Pfleger | 18 Sep 2024 | 00:45:03 | |
Our guest in this episode is Karl Pfleger. Karl is an angel investor in rejuvenation biotech startups, and is also known for creating and maintaining the website Aging Biotech Info. That website describes itself as “Structured info about aging and longevity”, and has the declared mission statement, “Everything important in the field (outside of academia), organized.”
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration | |||
| ChatGPT runs for president, with Pedro Domingos | 01 Sep 2024 | 00:49:23 | |
Our guest today is Pedro Domingos, who is joining an elite group of repeat guests – he joined us before in episode 34 in April 2023.
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| The rise of digital pandemics, with James Ball | 20 Aug 2024 | 00:39:31 | |
Our guest in this episode is the journalist and author James Ball. James has worked for the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, The Guardian, WikiLeaks, BuzzFeed, The New European, and The Washington Post, among other organisations. As special projects editor at The Guardian, James played a key role in the Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the NSA leaks by Edward Snowden.
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| Thinking more athletically about the future, with Brett King and Rob Tercek | 12 Aug 2024 | 00:55:24 | |
In this episode, we have not one guest but two – Brett King and Robert Tercek, the hosts of the Futurists Podcast.
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| The low-cost future of preserving brains, with Jordan Sparks | 02 Aug 2024 | 00:37:55 | |
Our guest in this episode is Jordan Sparks, the founder and executive director of Oregon Brain Preservation (OBP), which is located at Salem, the capital city of Oregon. OBP offers the service of chemically preserving the brain in the hope of future restoration.
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| Surveillance and diversity: surprising insights from the Gulf, with Holly Joint | 25 Jul 2024 | 00:35:36 | |
Our guest in this episode is Holly Joint, who was born and educated in the UK, but lives in Abu Dhabi in the UAE.
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| The double-edged sword of technology, with Wendell Wallach | 19 Jul 2024 | 00:53:53 | |
How do we keep technology from slipping beyond our control? That’s the subtitle of the latest book by our guest in this episode, Wendell Wallach.
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| Stop cryocrastinating! with Emil Kendziorra | 12 Jul 2024 | 00:40:05 | |
Our guest in this episode is Dr. Emil Kendziorra. Emil graduated summa cum laude, which means, with the highest honours, from the University of Göttingen in Germany, having previously studied at the University of Pécs in Hungary. For several years, he then devoted himself to cancer research with the hope of contributing to longevity science. After realizing how slowly life-extension research was progressing, he pivoted into entrepreneurship. He has been CEO of multiple tech and medical companies, most recently as a Founder and CEO of Medlanes and onFeedback, which were sold, respectively, to Zava and QuestionPro.
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