Will Automation Cause Runaway Inequality? (with Phil Trammell)

AI for Civilizational Sanity (with Rose Hadshar and Owen Cotton-Barratt)

Owen Cotton-Barratt is a research consultant working with the Future of Life Institute, and a co-author of several recent Forethought articles on AI tools for epistemics and coordination. Rose Hadshar is a researcher at Forethought. They discuss: * Whether LLMs are now good enough to start building tools that meaningfully help people track what's true * What AI-powered reliability tracking could look like * How AI negotiation systems could work * Structured transparency and automated arms inspection — verifying compliance without revealing confidential information * Whether coordination tech is more likely to enable cooperation or collusion * The vision of a "Sensible Revolution": moving from individual tools to background infrastructure that makes civilisation's decision-making less insane * Why building the good versions of these tools early matters for path dependency You can read a full transcript here [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Dlx8PIX2iozEY-ThAtPrhX61YUfqc4QbgAhjYG3KCfE/]. To see all Forethought's published research, visit forethought.org/research [https://forethought.org/research]. To subscribe to our newsletter, visit forethought.org/subscribe [https://www.forethought.org/subscribe#newsletter].

Will Automation Cause Runaway Inequality? (with Phil Trammell)

Phil Trammell is an economics postdoc at Stanford University's Digital Economy Lab, working on questions related to economic growth and AI. He discusses: * Why Piketty's thesis about runaway inequality was likely wrong about the past but right about the future * How full automation turns capital and labour into gross substitutes * Why catch-up growth between rich and poor countries could end * How the privatisation of returns is already concentrating wealth * Why family dynasties and inheritance become far more important in a post-automation economy * Whether autocratic regimes can outgrow democracies after AGI * How to measure whether capital is becoming truly self-replicating — and what the data currently shows Watch the video version on YouTube [https://youtu.be/rvkl1tgv_nQ]. Read a full transcript here [https://docs.google.com/document/d/171OBENu7nTslCt9NwIzeab5S8hRSo7zrI9FwZveNaL8/edit?usp=sharing]. To see all Forethought’s published research, visit forethought.org/research [https://forethought.org/research]. To subscribe to our newsletter, visit forethought.org/subscribe [https://www.forethought.org/subscribe#newsletter].

[AI Narration] Moral public goods are a big deal for whether we get a good future

This is an AI narration of "Moral public goods are a big deal for whether we get a good future" [https://www.forethought.org/research/moral-public-goods-are-a-big-deal-for-whether-we-get-a-good-future] by Tom Davidson, William MacAskill, Mia Taylor. The article was first released on 23rd February 2026. You can read more of our research at forethought.org/research [https://www.forethought.org/research]. Thank you to Type III audio [https://type3.audio/] for providing these automated narrations.

Can Liberal Democracy Survive AGI? (with Sam Hammond)

Sam Hammond is is Chief Economist at the Foundation for American Innovation [https://www.thefai.org/]. He discusses: * How collapsing transaction costs could push towards privatising the nation-state * The “distributed denial of service” problem for courts and regulators * Why perfect enforcement of existing laws would be effectively totalitarian * Estonia's government-as-API as a model for AI-era governance * Whether 20th-century social democracy was a technological aberration * Why post-AGI states might look more like Dubai than Denmark * Mormons, religion, and social scaffolding for a post-scarcity world Watch the video version on YouTube [https://youtu.be/grGtNLHXeHc]. Read a full transcript here [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1r7Wq0MEakhiFsRwKiazw0kk-u8j8sgkDNkRq42gbEKg/edit?usp=sharing]. To see all Forethought’s published research, visit forethought.org/research [https://forethought.org/research]. To subscribe to our newsletter, visit forethought.org/subscribe [https://www.forethought.org/subscribe#newsletter].

[AI Narration] Design sketches for a more sensible world

This is an AI narration of "Design sketches for a more sensible world" [https://www.forethought.org/research/design-sketches-for-a-more-sensible-world] by Owen Cotton-Barratt, Lizka Vaintrob, Oly Sourbut, and Rose Hadshar. The article was first released on 5th February 2026. You can read more of our research at forethought.org/research [https://www.forethought.org/research]. Thank you to Type III audio [https://type3.audio] for providing these automated narrations.