Existential Hope

Existential Hope is a program by @foresightinst for thinking big about what positive futures are possible with science and tech.

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

What’s the best technology that doesn’t exist yet? Most funding is pouring into AGI right now. But there's much more being built that could be truly transformative, and almost no one is paying attention.

Some technologies can guide funding, coordination, and what feels possible long before they're built. The internet did; so did the Human Genome Project; AGI is doing it now. @michael_nielsen calls these hyper-entities.

We went looking for new ones in 100+ podcasts, worldbuilding scenarios, and essays from Existential Hope, a project that has been mapping positive futures for over 5 years.

From 300+ ideas, here are the 10 we’re most excited about:

• Chemputing – Chemistry made programmable: write code, a robot runs the reaction, same result everywhere.
• Machine-readable science – Scientific publishing made usable to AI, so that it can verify claims and build on findings directly.
• Open science networks – Infrastructure that rewards scientists for sharing data and replicating results, not just publishing first.
• Epistemic stack – A system that lets anyone trace a claim (in science, policy, the news, etc) through chains of evidence.
• Fiduciary AI assistants – An AI assistant that is bound to you and legally required to act in your interest.
• Immune-computer interface – Continuous real-time monitoring of your immune system.
• Conflict de-escalation protocol – AI mediation that finds fair outcomes before disputes escalate.
• Deep fission – Car-sized nuclear reactors built to be highly safe and to run autonomously for decades, installed underground.
• Digital twins – Living simulations of cities, ecosystems, supply chains, and other complex systems to test decisions before committing.
• Interspecies communication – Decoding what other species communicate to each other.

More info in the reply ↓

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

To learn more about the project: https://t.co/bkEx8NVlL7

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

AI could help us cure cancer, design gene therapies, and fix genetic diseases. But AI is only as good as the data it learns from. AlphaFold only worked because we had decades of data on how proteins fold. For most of precision medicine's hardest problems, that foundational data doesn't exist yet.

One of the biggest gaps: we don't have a good map of the proteins on cell surfaces that control what gets into cells. Without that, neither scientists nor AI models can reliably figure out how to deliver a therapy to the right place in the body. Most drugs in development today cluster around a small set of known targets, not by design, but because the rest of the map is blank.

The @deliverome Project is building that map from scratch, as an open-science nonprofit. They're cataloging which surface proteins exist, how abundant they are across different tissue types, and which ones can actively carry cargo into cells. Everything will be released openly and continuously, in formats ready for researchers and AI models alike.

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

We just brought our conversation with Jason to our new YouTube channel.

Watch here: https://t.co/lOZUmMjoRu

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

“Pessimism has this way of sounding smart and wise and sober and rational, but it's actually just wrong.”

That’s what @jasoncrawford had to say last year on the Existential Hope Podcast.

When you want to make a sober and rational prediction, you don’t assume any technological breakthroughs, and just just extrapolate current trends until every technology plateaus.

That’s why most of these predictions prove wrong in the end: throughout history, humans have kept finding solutions that almost no one anticipated.

[Foresight Institute @foresightinst]

Most thinking about transformative technology focuses on avoiding catastrophe, and leaves a question unanswered: what are we actually building toward?

The Existential Hope Futures track at Vision Weekend UK gathers researchers and builders thinking seriously about distinctly positive futures, and what it takes to get there:

• @anderssandberg (Institute of Future Studies) on Dyson 2070: how fast can we build a Dyson sphere?

• @leahelizmorris (Pillar VC) on lessons from the UK's AI for Science frontier.

• Zoë Brammer and Ankur Vora (Google DeepMind) on AI for Science 2030.

• @WeinbaumJonah (Institute for Progress) on the launch sequence: towards a concrete agenda for defensive acceleration.

• @lifeext (Foresight Institute) on Foresight: 40 years later.

Track emceed by @beatrice_erk from @HopeExistential. Sunday June 7, Bankside London.

Existential Hope Futures is one of seven tracks at Vision Weekend UK, alongside Emerging AI Paradigms, Life Unlimited, Neurotechnology, Nanotechnology, Energy, & Space, Funding X, and Pathways to Implementation.

Join us next week in London. Tickets in comments.

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

Know a student, artist, or young thinker who should be part of the conversation of what we do with AI? Please send it their way.

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

What does a good AI future actually look like to you? Design it and win up to $5k.

The AI Futures Challenge is open for one more month.
→ Our free, 1.5hr course will guide you through building your grounded, hopeful future with AI
→ Submit by June 30 for a chance to win: $5k Grand Prize + 5x$1k Bounties (Best Visuals, Best Institutions, and more)

Link in the reply ↓

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

Rules and submission: https://t.co/igPQeicahg

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

Watch on YouTube: https://t.co/4xLZJed0y3

Listen on Spotify: https://t.co/CO9Ch0fivV

Full transcript and resources: https://t.co/RfTFQkoBRw

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

Political polarization might have a surprisingly simple fix: ask people what they want for their communities in 50 years instead of today, and their answers start to look remarkably similar. But almost no political system is built to plan that long-term.

In this episode we talk to Taylor Dee Hawkins, founder of Foundations for Tomorrow (@FFT_Aus), a nonprofit pushing for long-term governance reform in Australia and internationally.

0:00 Cold open
0:56 From climate advocacy to long-term governance: founding Foundations for Tomorrow
3:07 What made Taylor quit her job during COVID and start an organization
4:18 Why bad leadership isn't the problem, but broken incentive structures are
5:53 Policrastination: naming political procrastination so we can tackle it
6:59 What can actually be done about political short-termism
9:08 Governments leading the way on long-term thinking: Finland, Wales, Singapore, Kenya
13:17 The biggest misconception about long-term governance
14:29 How long-term thinking earns cross-party support in a polarized parliament
16:06 What the world looks like if every country takes future generations seriously
18:14 When long-term thinking goes wrong
19:25 Why one-solution thinking is the most overhyped idea in governance reform
20:44 The sharpest critiques of Taylor's work and what they've taught her
22:42 How governance can keep pace with fast-moving technology
24:12 Being the youngest person in the room: what Taylor does about it
25:58 How to break into long-term governance work
29:29 How to stay anchored to the long term when everything pulls you short-term
30:26 Taylor's existential hope vision for the future
31:13 The technology Taylor wishes existed
31:39 What Taylor would be doing if not this
31:57 The best piece of advice Taylor has ever received

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

Watch the full episode of the Existential Hope Podcast here → https://t.co/YKexLXj5Fr

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

Will AI make us mentally lazy by removing too much friction from our lives?

Neuroscientist @davideagleman pushes back on this worry. He explains that not all kinds of friction in our lives are valuable, and shares what it is that actually improves us.

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

🥈 Second place: REWIRE

Attention spans are declining among teenagers, and that has real consequences for learning, memory, and comprehension.

A student from Arizona College Prep High School built a web app called REWIRE that monitors brainwave activity in real time using data from a non-invasive electroencephalogram. When the app detects that your focus is dipping, it delivers a small audio or visual cue to re-engage you, personalized to your own baseline.

In a study with 49 participants across 245 sessions, the group using REWIRE showed significant improvements in reading focus, comprehension, and spatial memory compared to the control group. The idea is that consistent, timely feedback during moments of mental drift can actually strengthen attention over time, not just catch lapses as they happen.

More details: https://t.co/jqNJKZFudI

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

What kind of scientific research doesn’t just solve a narrow problem, but helps build toward a future we really want to live in?

That’s the question @foresightinst brought to ISEF 2026, the world's largest high school science fair run by @Society4Science.

We gave out the Existential Hope Award to projects showing great potential to contribute to a positive future for humanity, with bonus points for interdisciplinary thinking and awareness of broader societal implications.

This year's winners:

- First place: an AI system that simulates how cancer cells respond to drug combinations, to help match patients to the right therapies faster
- Second place: a brain-monitoring app that detects when your attention is fading and nudges it back in real time

Congratulations! More details about the winner projects below ↓

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

🥇 First place: The Virtual Cell 2.0

Finding the right drug combination for a cancer patient is hard. The number of possible combinations grows fast, and testing them all in a lab isn't realistic.

A student from Stanton College Preparatory School built an AI-assisted simulation system that models how a specific cancer cell will respond to different drug combinations based on its genetic and protein profile. The system generates millions of possible biochemical reactions, then trims them down based on the cell's actual molecular makeup. It can run a full simulation in about 35 seconds.

Tested across 12 cancer cell lines and 12 targeted therapies, the model's predictions matched real lab results with 95%+ accuracy. The goal: help oncologists prioritize which drug combinations are most likely to work for a specific patient's tumor, before ever running a trial.

More details: https://t.co/Wnq9vBts3H

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

Every year the economic gap between the US and Europe grows wider.

Progress studies is the field that asks why: why civilizations flourish or stall, and what we can do about it. It has gained real traction in the US, but the conversation is just starting in Europe. Last Monday in Stockholm, we hosted the first in a new salon series to help change that.

@johanknorberg talked about why golden ages end and how we can keep Europe’s alive; @StefanFSchubert about why we underestimate progress; and @beatrice_erk about what progress studies is and why Europe needs it.

Big thanks to everyone who joined us.

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

We just brought our conversation with Isabelle to our new YouTube channel. Watch it here: https://t.co/G6KEPmM6CI

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

You'd need 200 Chernobyls a year to kill as many people as fossil fuels. So why are most people so scared of nuclear energy?

Last year, @isabelleboemeke broke it down on the Existential Hope podcast. The fear started with Hiroshima and Nagasaki and was consolidated through decades of Cold War anxiety.

The data tells a very different story: nuclear is as safe as wind and solar, and safer than hydro.

And it could be the key to clean energy abundance. Growing up without reliable electricity in rural Brazil, she saw firsthand what energy scarcity looks like, and why degrowth isn't the answer.

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

https://t.co/fttbOTrm7j

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

@foresightinst Learn more and apply: https://t.co/2l3LaVnMG1

[Existential Hope @HopeExistential]

AI could strengthen how societies make decisions together, or it could accelerate power concentration and erode democratic institutions. Which way things go isn't predetermined.

On July 5 in Seoul, with @ForesightInst and @CooperativeAI we are hosting a full-day workshop to connect ~50 researchers, builders, and practitioners working on this problem.

Three focus areas: AI tools for collective deliberation, governance under rapid AI progress, and democratic practices that are working (or not).
The goal: surfacing concrete collaborations, not just exchanging ideas.

Application link in the reply ↓