Mind the Future

Selective Optimism: a critique of AI 2040

Some context for this post: I’ve been working part-time as a consultant for the AI Futures Project over the last year.

Jul 9 • Richard Ngo

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June 2026

Agents as webs of beliefs

Unifying beliefs, goals, and actions

Jun 27 • Richard Ngo

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Towards a Formal Scientific Epistemology

Reevaluating Garrabrant induction

Jun 9 • Richard Ngo

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March 2026

Economic efficiency often undermines sociopolitical autonomy

Against being econ-brained

Mar 10 • Richard Ngo

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February 2026

Contra Caplan on higher education

Though it's still a waste of time and money

Feb 16 • Richard Ngo

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Aligning to Virtues

Which alignment target?

Feb 16 • Richard Ngo

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Distributed vs centralized agents

With applications to the far future

Feb 9 • Richard Ngo

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October 2025

21st Century Civilization curriculum

I’ve just released a curriculum on foundational questions in modern politics.

Oct 21, 2025 • Richard Ngo

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August 2025

Underdog bias rules everything around me

They're just as scared of us as we are of them

Aug 17, 2025 • Richard Ngo

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On Pessimization

Getting the opposite of what you want

Aug 16, 2025 • Richard Ngo

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April 2025

Well-foundedness as an organizing principle of healthy minds and societies

"If a kingdom is divided against itself, it cannot stand."

Apr 7, 2025 • Richard Ngo

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March 2025

Towards a scale-free theory of intelligent agency

An inherently multi-agent perspective

Mar 22, 2025 • Richard Ngo

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