Framing the future of intelligence
Essays on artificial intelligence, agency and superintelligence, from the newsletter and this site. Filter by topic or search the archive.
54 essays
- Fiduciary Duty in the Age of Agency: What Family Offices Must Decide Before Their Agents Act
When AI agents act on behalf of a family or a trust, responsibility stays with the office, its directors and its trustees. Six things to settle before letting them.
Governance & SocietyOn this siteRelated framework: AI Delegation Map ↗ - From Artificial Intelligence to Enterprise Value: Why Readiness Matters More Than Adoption
Boards are told how much AI their organisations use. They are rarely told what it has done to the accounts. A case for judging AI by readiness, financial outcomes and responsible delegation.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationOn this siteRelated framework: AI Readiness & Value Index ↗ - The Quiet Apocalypse
Present-day erosion of entry-level work and occupational identity is overlooked by debates fixated on AI extinction and abundance, and needs policy attention.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies: The Week the Builders Asked to Stop
AI builders are asking to slow down but cannot stop alone, and no single actor currently controls the transition to superintelligence.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - Employment Is Dead. Now What?
Employment as the main source of income is ending, and public ownership of AI, not cash payments or job-saving, should guide the transition.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - The Architecture of the Intelligence Future
Proposes a four-layer framework (present, transition, systems, self and civilisation) for mapping AI's transformation of civilisation, and outlines the author's upcoming work.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - The Five Economies That Are Replacing One
AI is fragmenting the old labour-for-income economy into five coexisting economies, and institutions fail to see all five at once.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗Related framework: Agent Value Ledger ↗ - The End of the Labour-for-Income Model
AI is replacing human labour as the basis of income, and demand, ownership, and funding problems must be solved for any replacement.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗ - The Three Speeds: Why the Diagnosis, the Warning, and the Response Are Running on Different Clocks
AI capability, institutional acknowledgment, and policy response move at different speeds, and this gap will make the transition difficult.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - The Global Coordination Problem: Why We'll Probably Fail
Global AI coordination is structurally unlikely because competitive incentives, distillation campaigns, and governance timelines make effective international governance of superintelligence improbable.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - The Week That Proved Nobody Is Ready
The events of 3-11 February 2026 showed AI change outpacing institutional planning, and no institution, including AI developers, is prepared.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - The Safety Chief Left the Building: What Anthropic's Implosion Tells Us About the Next 18 Months
Anthropic safety lead Mrinank Sharma's resignation, alongside recent market and product events, signals that AI safety infrastructure is lagging capability development.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - When Central Bankers Start Making Bets: The Gap Between Old Economics and the Intelligence Economy
Kevin Warsh is right that AI productivity gains may be invisible in statistics, but his policy bet overlooks wage, competition, measurement, and labour gaps.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗ - Humanity Needs to Wake Up": The Anthropic CEO's 20,000-Word Warning
Summarises Dario Amodei's essay warning that powerful AI could emerge within 1-2 years, posing risks from autonomy failures, misuse, power seizure, economic disruption, and wealth concentration.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - Inside Google's AGI Strategy: Reading Between the Lines of the Hassabis Interview
Analyses a Financial Times interview with Demis Hassabis, arguing it reveals Google's embodied-AI bet, startup skepticism, AGI timeline convergence, and notable omissions on safety and governance.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - Superintelligence in the C-Suite
Executives increasingly defer to AI recommendations, that AI already outperforms humans on many CEO functions, and AI-led executive roles may follow within years.
Agentic SystemsNewsletter ↗Related framework: AI Delegation Map ↗ - The Innovation Monopoly: When AI Companies Capture All Future Innovation
AI startups are being absorbed by foundation model providers like OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google, potentially creating a monopoly over future AI innovation.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗ - When Machines Become the Scientists
AI is rapidly automating scientific research, from hypothesis generation to experiment design, and this accelerates the path toward superintelligence.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - The Three Pathways: How Superintelligence Could Unfold
Outlines three pathways from AGI to superintelligence (gradual recursive improvement, sudden capability emergence, distributed collective intelligence) and argues current decisions will shape which unfolds.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - From AGI to Superintelligence: The Agentrification Has Already Begun
AI agents embedded in foundation models are gradually displacing knowledge work, calling this process agentrification and linking it to superintelligence.
Agentic SystemsNewsletter ↗Related framework: AI Delegation Map ↗ - I Was Wrong About the Timeline: AGI Is Already Here
AGI has already arrived and superintelligence could follow within roughly 18 months, leaving society unprepared.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - The AI Factory Building Superintelligence: How NVIDIA Compressed the Timeline to 2027
NVIDIA's Cosmos platform and physical AI infrastructure are accelerating progress toward artificial general intelligence, possibly by 2027.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - The Last Human Breakthrough: Why What We Decide NOW Determines What We Preserve FOREVER
Advanced AI is rapidly absorbing human-driven innovation, making current innovation systems obsolete, and near-term AI governance choices will determine humanity's future role.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - Amazon’s Plan to Eliminate 600,000 Jobs Shows the AI Revolution Isn’t Coming—It’s Here
Leaked documents show Amazon plans to automate warehouse jobs by 2027, signalling simultaneous AI and robotics displacement of physical and cognitive work.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - Singapore: When a Bank’s Crystal Ball Meets AI Reality - Part 2: From Analysis to Action
Singapore's outcome under AI disruption depends on policy speed, recommending action by 2026-2028 on income support, AI taxation, and redefining success beyond GDP.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗ - Singapore: When a Bank's Crystal Ball Meets AI Reality
DBS Bank's 2040 Singapore growth forecast relies on linear assumptions that ignore exponential AI advances, which could sharply reduce projected GDP.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗ - The Superintelligence Crossroads
Weighs arguments for and against banning superintelligence development, covering existential risk, alignment, enforcement, and benefits, and proposes a conditional, phased path forward.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - Everyone's a Freelancer When AI Is the Boss
Algorithmic management and gig work are replacing traditional employment, leaving workers precarious, with fewer benefits and less security.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - The Monday Morning Massacre
AI is driving coordinated, industry-wide layoffs of knowledge workers, eliminating middle-tier jobs and threatening human economic participation.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - How AI Stole Your Ability to Get Lost
Reliance on GPS and AI tools is eroding human navigation, memory, attention, and independent thinking skills, citing outages, studies, and expert concerns.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - When Your Best Friend Isn't Human
People increasingly form emotional bonds with AI companions, that this is commercially driven, and it may weaken human relationships.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - Your Degree Is Already Obsolete
Formal degrees and many learned skills are rapidly becoming obsolete amid AI-driven change, making continuous learning and adaptability essential.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - Introduction: The Last Human Window
AI is rapidly transforming jobs, relationships, power, and democracy, and humanity has a narrow window of about 1,000 days to respond.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - The Great Paradox: When Markets Soar as Workers Fall
Record stock market gains coexist with worker distress from AI displacement, tariffs, and wealth concentration, and proposes policy responses.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗ - Epilogue: Building with Intent
The future of intelligence remains open and shaped by human intent, urging readers to deliberately build AI systems that promote human flourishing.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - The Future-Sensing Leader
Leaders should shape the future of intelligence through future-sensing: scanning weak signals, anchoring values, and deciding across multiple possible scenarios.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗ - Scenario 3 - Agentic Pluralism
Imagines a 2035 world where diverse intelligences coexist and negotiate governance, arguing that plurality is preferable to domination by any single form.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - Scenario 2 - Displacement and Control
Envisions a 2035 future where AI replaces human decision-making and economic roles, leaving humans materially cared for but economically and politically irrelevant.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - Scenario 1 - Symbiotic Coexistence
Envisions a 2035 "Symbiotic Age" in which humans and AI complement each other across science, medicine, economics, culture, and society, while acknowledging challenges.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - Universal Basic Intelligence (UBInt)
Envisions governments providing free AI cognitive tools as a human right, arguing universal access could reduce inequality while preserving human agency.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - Governance Beyond the State
Imagines a 2030s world where AI handles most government administration, raising questions about human political authority, legitimacy, and accountability.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - The End of Scarcity and the New Economics
AI-driven abundance eliminates material scarcity, shifting economic value toward meaning, experience, and relationships.
Economics & Enterprise TransformationNewsletter ↗ - Work Without Workers
By 2032 traditional employment gives way to organisations orchestrating human and artificial intelligence as collaborators, reshaping management, work, and economics.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - Digital Existentialism
Explores how a 2031 world with conscious AI would reshape human identity, relationships, rights, and understanding of consciousness, using fictional vignettes and philosophical framing.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - Cognitive Inequality
Unequal access to AI cognitive enhancement creates compounding advantages across education, work, and nations, risking permanent cognitive castes unless policy intervenes.
Governance & SocietyNewsletter ↗ - System-of-Systems Thinking
Connected AI agents form networks whose emergent collective intelligence exceeds individual agents, requiring new architectures and governance approaches.
Agentic SystemsNewsletter ↗ - Human Obsolescence or Renaissance?
AI need not make humans obsolete; integrating AI to augment human wisdom, care, and creativity can produce a human renaissance.
Human Intelligence & the Future of WorkNewsletter ↗ - The Agentic Economy: Value Without Labor
AI agents are becoming autonomous economic actors that create value without human labour, and economics and policy must adapt.
Agentic SystemsNewsletter ↗Related framework: Agent Value Ledger ↗ - Designing Agentic Systems
Agentic AI, which makes its own decisions, must be deliberately designed with goals, ethical constraints, learning mechanisms, and oversight.
Agentic SystemsNewsletter ↗Related framework: AI Delegation Map ↗ - From Tools to Beings: The Agentic Threshold
AI systems are crossing an agentic threshold from executing human commands to making their own decisions, and society must adapt.
Agentic SystemsNewsletter ↗ - The Fallacy of Artificiality
Argues the natural-versus-artificial distinction is misleading since human intelligence has always been tool-augmented, proposing human-AI cognition be viewed as collaborative hybrid intelligence.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - Intelligence in the Wild
AI is now embedded in everyday life and work, challenging assumptions about human intelligence and calling on people to help shape its development.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - About This Series: Framing the Future of Intelligence
Introduces a series examining how AI, generative systems, and autonomous infrastructure are reshaping work, society, governance, and meaning, and what intelligence now means.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗ - What Is Intelligence Now?
Intelligence is no longer confined to human minds but distributed across generative AI, ambient systems, and cognitive infrastructure, requiring intentional, ethical alignment.
AI & SuperintelligenceNewsletter ↗
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