Foresight Institute is a non-profit organization that was founded in 1986 on a vision of coming revolutions in technology that will bring extraordinary opportunities, as well as unprecedented challenges: “If we push in the right directions — learning, teaching, arguing, shifting directions, and pushing further — then we may yet steer the technology race toward a future with room enough for our dreams.” —K. Eric Drexler, Engines of Creation
Advancing nanotechnology, biotechnology, and computer science for the long-term benefit of life.
Nanotech
A group of scientists, entrepreneurs, and institutional allies who cooperate to advance progress on atomically precise applications in energy, medicine, and materials science toward Feynman’s vision of molecular machines. Apply.
Biotech
Sponsored by 100 Plus Capital this group of scientists, entrepreneurs, and institutional allies cooperate in spurring field-wide progress on technologies that fight aging and increase human healthspan. Apply.
Computation
A group of experts in computer science, cryptography, AI, and related fields who apply these tools to build a future defined by intelligent cooperation and decentralized defenses against automated physical and digital threats. Apply.
Foresight
A group of scientists, innovators, philosophers, and activists who collaborate on seeking crucial opportunities for humanity to leverage high-impact STEM areas for flourishing futures. Apply.
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2021 Foresight Fellow in Decentralized Market Design
Jazear is a computer scientist (BS Computer Science and Economics from Yale) with a decade of leadership and engineering experience working within the technology and financial services industry.
Today Jazear focuses mainly on blockchain technology. Blockchain became Jazear’s paradise when he was able to combine his skill set in engineering and economics to develop novel cryptoeconomic models and trading strategies. Jazear has developed blockchain software for various notable cryptocurrency projects including Cosmos and Thorchain before starting Sifchain.
Sifchain’s goal is for new blockchains to consider cross-chain integration as essential as a wallet or block explorer. Liquidity from all cryptocurrencies can then be accessed on-chain, allowing the coordinated deployment of capital from all cryptocurrencies by DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations).
Glen Weyl on Social Technology for a Political Economy of Increasing Returns
GLEN WEYL serves at Microsoft’s Office of the Chief Technology Officer Political Economist and Social Technologist (OCTOPEST), where he helps design and implement technology ambitious corporate social commitments. He is Founder and Chair of the RadicalxChange Foundation, a non-profit that coordinates a global social movement for social technology.
In 2018, he was one of Bloomberg Businessweek’s 50 most influential people, WIRED’s 25 people shaping the next 25 years of technology and Coindesk’s 10 most influential people in blockchain.
In this video Glen speaks about how capitalist institutions are optimized for settings with decreasing returns (viz. value submodular in inputs). Yet the major technological engines of prosperity (e.g. cities, networks, etc.) all feature significant increasing returns (viz.supermodularity). He illustrates some approximately optimal institutions for addressing problems of increasing returns that are being deployed at significant scale and with some success today and highlight how radically different such institutions are than traditional capitalist or democratic formalisms.
Glen Weyl, RadicalxChange | Social Technology for a Political Economy of Increasing Returns
foresight.org
Glen Weyl works to collaboratively envision, design, experiment with and organize around next generation political economic institutions. He serves at Micro...
David Baker on Protein-based assemblies and molecular machines
DAVID BAKER is the director of the Institute for Protein Design, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, the Henrietta and Aubrey Davis Endowed Professor in Biochemistry, and an adjunct professor of genome sciences, bioengineering, chemical engineering, computer science, and physics at the University of Washington. His research group is focused on the design of macromolecular structures and functions.
He is the recipient of the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences, Irving Sigal and Hans Neurath awards from the Protein Society, the Overton Prize from the ISCB, the Feynman Prize from the Foresight Institute, the AAAS Newcomb Cleveland Prize, the Sackler prize in biophysics, and the Centenary Award from the Biochemical society.
Dr. Baker is also a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Protein-based Assemblies and Molecular Machines | David Baker, University of Washington
foresight.org
David Baker is the director of the Institute for Protein Design, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, the Henrietta and Aubrey Davis Endowed Professor in Biochemistry, and...
James Peyer on How to Fund and Build Geroprotectors
JAMES PEYER is the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Cambrian Biopharma.
He has spent his entire life dedicated to the mission of finding ways of preventing diseases like cancer and Alzheimer’s instead of waiting for people to get sick. James was previously Founder and Managing Partner at Apollo Ventures, the first global longevity-focused venture capital firm, investing across the US and Europe.
foresight.org/salon/james-peyer-cambrian-bio-how-to-fund-and-build-geroprotectors/
James Peyer | Cambrian Bio: How to Fund and Build Geroprotectors
foresight.org
James Peyer is the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Cambrian Biopharma. He also serves as the Chairman of the Board of Sensei Biotherapeutics...
Ronald Kohanski on Promising aging approaches
RONALD KOHANSKI, PhD. is the Acting Director of the Division of Aging Biology at the National Institute on Aging, NIH.
Dr. Kohanski has promoted aging research in the specific areas of stem cell biology and cardiovascular biology. More broadly he promotes research efforts to expand studies beyond laboratory animals, to address the basic biology of aging explicitly in human populations and non-laboratory animals (domestic and wild populations).
Have you checked out the Existential Hope-website yet?
The goal of the Existential Hope project is to create a map of possible futures we wish we could send back in time to our younger selves.
Many young adults who will soon shape our future are plagued by information overload, disillusionment, or disinterest. They are aware of a multitude of systems that should be torn down but have very few positive comprehensive visions to work towards.
We’re creating a living onboarding document for the next generation to get every 20 year- old to have the common map of what’s at stake for civilization, wrapped in a shared experience that allows them to swap their existential angst for existential hope.
Check out existentialhope.com.