Each week the college hosts a community dinner called Ration Club. It's open to anyone who'd like to find out more about the college and its work. To find out more or if you'd like to attend, please register.

Artificial intelligence is increasingly playing an important part in our sociopolitical life. Some worry about the erosion of democracy by propagating disinformation and entrapping citizens in epistemic bubbles; others are convinced of AI’s ability to facilitate direct democracy and make public deliberation more efficient. 

​This is the first event in a series on democratic AI that sets out to explore how AI tools can be leveraged for democratic deliberations, collective decision-making, and enhanced social cohesion. 

​Join us to explore the Habermas Machine, created by Google DeepMind, in a hands-on workshop held at Newspeak House.

​​The event will kick off with a short talk introducing the Habermas Machine and its role in fostering meaningful group deliberation. Participants will then split into small groups to discuss pressing political and social questions, guided by a structured process facilitated by a version of the Habermas Machine itself.

​​Michiel Bakker and MH Tessler, the creators of the Habermas Machine, will oversee the process and facilitate the synthesis of insights from each group. Discussions will incorporate factual briefings, freeform debates, and collaborative drafting of group statements, culminating in a final vote to reveal consensus and divergence.

​​Whether you’re curious about AI’s role in democracy, enjoy collaborative discussion, or simply want to meet others passionate about democratic AI, this event offers a unique opportunity to get involved.

​​Spaces are limited—sign up now to reserve your spot!

​Can’t make this event?

​Sign up for the mailing list to be updated on future events in this series: Subscribe.

​About the event organisers

​Simon Wisdom and Yung-Hsuan Wu are both 2024-25 fellow candidates of the Newspeak House. Learn more about their work from the Newspeak House fellowship cohort website.

A monthly London-based meetup for members of the rationalist diaspora. The diaspora includes, but is not limited to, LessWrong, Astral Codex Ten, rationalist tumblrsphere, and parts of the Effective Altruism movement.

You don’t have to identify as a rationalist to attend: basically, if you think we seem like interesting people you’d like to hang out with, welcome! You are invited. You do not need to think you are clever enough, or interesting enough, or similar enough to the rest of us, to attend. You are invited.

Our reading list for this time is:

• Deadly by Default (https://homosabiens.substack.com/p/deadly-by-default)
  
• Safety isn’t safety without a social model (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/F2voF4pr3BfejJawL/safety-isn-t-safety-without-a-social-model-or-dispelling-the)
  
• Focus on the places where you feel shocked everyone’s dropping the ball (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Zp6wG5eQFLGWwcG6j/focus-on-the-places-where-you-feel-shocked-everyone-s)

We’ll start to discuss these around 3. If you have articles you want to suggest for future readings, you can do that at https://redd.it/v3646u.

​This session is part of the Introduction to Political Technology course at Newspeak House, open to faculty and fellowship candidates only.

​In this session we will discuss results from the previous session, including challenges of interacting with others’ systems and benefits of networked knowledge discovery.

Early Studies is a signals intelligence company dedicated to understanding the complexities of human behavior, attitudes, and societal change. At the heart of their approach is the Future Perfect Methodology, a framework that combines first principles thinking, social circle polling, and the triple tense technique to explore not just what people think, but why they think it, and how their beliefs evolve over time. They specialize in areas where understanding human behavior is critical, from geopolitics and public policy to consumer behavior and brand strategy.

Early Studies invites you to its first working group, an moderated open discussion with a revolutionary concept; everyone has to generalise and predict what they believe people feel, the first forum focusing on your understanding of others instead of your opinion. The working group content and ideas will result in studies and research to quantify the concepts discussed and further discourse in society.

Early Studies will also launch “Inaugural”, an exhaustive representative dataset of American identity, values, dynamics, dreams, life and influence to form the basis of a discussion about where the country is heading under Trump’s second presidency. Three speakers will present their analysis on this data.

​This session is part of the Introduction to Political Technology course at Newspeak House, open to faculty and fellowship candidates only.

​Welcome back fellowship candidates!

​In this session you will be given the instructions for your major group project this term, the Political Technology Grantmaking Exercise, and we will discuss strategies for how you can approach it successfully.

​A key purpose of this exercise is to help you start thinking strategically about your fellowship prototypes. In this session, we will also go over the schedule for the prototype module, and review how your prototypes will be assessed.

​This information is important for your success in the course. If you cannot attend this session, please let me know and I will organise an additional one, or go through these things with you one to one.

This session is part of the Introduction to Political Technology course at Newspeak House, open to faculty and fellowship candidates only.

In 2020, the Covid pandemic necessitated the urgent design and build of a brand new vaccination service, in order to protect every eligible person as quickly as possible.

​The effort included teams from across the NHS, many different agencies and consultancies, multiple health software providers, even the military got involved!

​Developing and releasing technology in the health sector is notoriously difficult and slow. How did a cast of thousands mobilise as a team, and deploy a critical national programme under emergency conditions?

​Reading: Emma Parnell, Let’s talk about sex*

Are you an engineer, developer, or someone passionate about building AI for the public good? Then come and join us for our second Building AI for Good Showcase & Meetup!

​We’re building a community of technologists and innovators committed to leveraging AI for social good.. Our events aim to be exciting (show, not tell!), technically focused (but accessible) and highly participatory – and we’re looking for speakers!

​🎤 Call for Speakers

​Whether you have:

• A 20-minute showcase of your kick-ass demo
• A 5-minute pitch for an idea you’d like feedback on
• Anything in between!

​We want to hear from you! Polish not required – we’re all about sharing ideas and fostering collaboration.

​Talks should be short (ideally well under 30 minutes), but punchy, and focused on showing not telling - show us the cool thing you’re working on, or come ask for collaborators on that one mad idea you’ve had!

​⏰ Schedule

18:30 - Doors Open
19:00 - Demo 1
19:25 - Demo 2
19:50 - Demo 3
20:15 - Community notices and mingling
22:00 - Close

​🤝 Support

​This event is kindly supported by the Incubator for AI and Newspeak House

💡 Want to Help?

​We believe great engineering happens with:

• Good food (ideally pizza 🍕, but we’re flexible)
• Great spaces (got a venue to share? 🏢)
• Amazing people (that’s you! 👋)

​📢 Submit a talk or offer support

​💬 Continue the Conversation

​Want to keep chatting? So do we! You can find us…

• On the CivicAI Community on Whatsapp
• On our (brand new) Building AI for Good Discord community

We (a motley crew of Civil Servants) are hosting another Civil Service Social. Networks and community can help make many things easier when working across government - the Civil Service Socials are a chance to catch up with old friends and meet new colleagues.

​This is an ideal chance to meet new folks - one of the team will greet you at the door to welcome you to the space and answer any questions. ​We’re looking forward to seeing you!

​Creatives for Ukraine, launched in January 2024, unites the creative community to promote cultural advocacy, celebrate contemporary art, and inspire global audiences to support Ukraine.

We are inviting you to celebrate one year of Creatives for Ukraine with an evening of live music, inspiring presentations, meaningful connections, and a DJ! ​We’ll reflect on the initiative’s achievements and share an exciting vision for the future.

​🌐 Website: www.creativesforukraine.uk
📸 Instagram: @creatives_for_ukraine
💬 Community WhatsApp Group: Join Here

Science Futures is for anyone passionate about the future of research and its societal impact, a series of events uniting artists, philosophers, engineers, & scientists exploring future directions of science.

In tensions between the collective and the individual, who can we rely on to drive the frontier of research?

​Why is it that in some scientific fields, an individual can make breakthrough discoveries with just a laptop and access to the internet, while in others you require whole teams with access to huge amounts of resource just to make marginal amounts progress?

​How do these dynamics change how science is carried out in these fields? What is lost when fields move between these paradigms, and how does this influence what research we choose to priortise next?

​Mahmoud Ghanem, the cyber misuse team lead at the UK government’s AI Safety Institute, will explore these questions through the lens of cyberpunk speculative fiction, using variety of examples, including from his own experience working in cybersecurity and AI research.

​While Ghanem is currently employed as researcher, he identifies more as a technician than a scientist. He has spent most of his career building things, ranging from tools to help scientists run more experiments, to platforms that help detectives solve more crimes.

​His current job is building virtual environments which evaluate the risks caused by AI-enabled hackers. He does this in his role as head of the cyber research team at the AI Safety Institute, which is a research-focused directorate based out of the UK Government’s Department of Science Innovation and Technology.

​Ghanem trained as an analytic philosopher and still occasionally blogs about topics related to moral progress, aesthetics and the philosophy of computation.

Class Wargames will be hosting a collective playing of Commands & Colors: Medieval using the Crusades Expansion.

The rise and fall of aṣabiyyah

“Wars and different kinds of fighting have always occurred in the world since Allah created it. The origin of war is the desire of certain human beings to take revenge on others. Each side is supported by the people sharing its group feeling. When they have sufficiently excited each other for the purpose and the two sides confront each other, one seeking revenge and the other trying to defend itself, there is war. It is something natural among human beings. No nation and no generation is free from it.” - Muḥammad ibn Khaldūn, Muqaddimah.

Class Wargames
puts on participatory performances of Guy Debord’s The Game of War and other subversive politico-military games;
investigates gaming as a metaphor for social relations under repressive neoliberalism;
celebrates the craft skills of gamers as artistic expression;
creates a social space where lefties can meet & play with each other;
re-enacts the proletarian struggles of the past in ludic form;
trains the militants of the cybernetic communist revolution to come.

​For more information about Class Wargames, see our website or join our Facebook Group to join the discussion.

TxP is a community focused on emerging talent in tech and policy: startups, policymakers, PhDs, VCs, think tankers, software engineers and anyone working to accelerate progress.

Restless Egg is the incubator for artist-founders: creators who treat technology as their canvas.

TxP x Restless Egg present Art Made AI:

​Going beyond the zero-sum lens of copyright/IP debates, Art Made AI will unpack how art is a space for AI R&D, i.e. an institution to test AI in ways that aren’t possible elsewhere.

​Art Made AI will bring together artists, engineers, policymakers, and investors for an evening exploring the stakes of artistic methods in AI development.

​Through demos, discussion, DJs and dance, you are invited to help define what the AI products of the future may look like.

​A panel of practitioners who are building technology products from artistic vantages will showcase current projects and address pressing questions that have emerged along their journeys.

• What precedents exist for technology to be built artistically?
• What are the affordances of building technology from an artistic position?
• To build technology, can/should artists strive for the technical rigour of computer science?
• What policy/IP infrastructure do we need to enable these emergent possibilities to thrive?

​The panel will be followed by an evening of DJs and visual art, continuing until late.

​Speakers and Artists:

• Mat Dryhurst: Artist and Founder, The Call and Spawning
• Flora Weil: Designer and Founder, NYU Shanghai and Nephila
• Sarah Drinkwater: Founder and General Partner, Common Magic
• Sylvan Rackham: Founder, Restless Egg
• Will Freudenheim: Game Designer and Founder, Laser Days Studio and Blue Leaf
• More TBA

​This session is part of the Introduction to Political Technology course at Newspeak House, open to faculty and fellowship candidates only.

In this hack night, we’ll explore the inner workings of an MP’s office, focusing on how its processes operate and identifying opportunities where technology can streamline and improve efficiency. This session will provide practical insights into the daily functions of an MP’s office, with a forward-looking view on innovation.

​This session is part of the Introduction to Political Technology course at Newspeak House, open to faculty and fellowship candidates only.

​The second seminar of the Public Sector Innovation module.

​Getting funding and support for ideas, in the public sector and beyond, will often rely on showing (hopefully robust) evidence about what effect you’re having, and how that’s helping people. We’ll run through what a good product evaluation looks like, a few interesting approaches, and good examples on how they can be used to generate funding and support (or whenever they just get ignored)

​Case study: GOV.UK Chat, a new and experimental AI-powered chatbot created by the Government Digital Service that hopefully allows users to get quick, personalised answers to their questions based on GOV.UK guidance. We’ll do a bit of a deep dive retrospective into the service, what worked, what didn’t, why it got created, and how you can apply that knowledge to making change happen.

How can we bolster society against growing risks posed by the widespread diffusion of AI, while staying optimistic about its benefits?

​Join us as we explore defensive acceleration – a strategy introduced by Vitalik Buterin in “My Techno Optimism“. Defensive acceleration is about developing technologies that protect us from the biggest threats we face, including pandemics, cybercrime, advanced AI, and nuclear war. It reconciles technological optimism with a serious approach to handling potentially dangerous capabilities, focusing on developing technology that mitigates risks and reliably makes the world better.

​This is your chance to contribute your ideas, and to meet others interested in the growing community surrounding defensive acceleration. What technologies are most vital to develop? What policies do we need in place to make it happen?

​Speakers:

• James Richards, def/acc Investor at Entrepreneur First
• Jamie Bernardi, AI governance researcher and author of A Policy Agenda for Defensive Acceleration
• More TBA

​Event Format:

18:00 - Arrival and networking
18:30 - Brief introductions and talks by our speakers
19:30 - Casual networking with drinks and light snacks

​Hosted by:

• Foresight Institute: Supporting the development of transformative technologies to make great futures more likely.
• AI Governance Talks: Bringing together London’s community of policymakers, academics and professionals working on the governance of frontier AI systems.

FEED is a Nordic-style LARP for 15-20 players by journalist, screenwriter and game designer Laurie Penny.

​It’s 2084. Probably. You have been trapped on a popular reality television game show for many months. Outside, a despotic neo-feudalist government may or may not be collapsing. Outside, your friends and family may or may not be alive. Inside, you’ve got to keep the show on the road - which means completing a series of silly tasks for stupidly high stakes. Every month, the audience votes on which of you is up for eviction. But the final vote is up to the housemates. If you can last a year without being murdered on live television by your closest friends, you get to go home.

You do not have to prepare anything in advance. Dress in plain black clothing. We’ll provide a small amount of snacks and drinks, but we’d love it if you could bring some, too.

Content note: this larp touches on themes of oppression, surveillance, bullying, physical violence and terminal illness.

​This session is part of the Introduction to Political Technology course at Newspeak House, open to faculty and fellowship candidates only.

​In this session, we’ll dive into the world of political technology, exploring what makes certain tools effective. We’ll examine three key campaign technologies, discussing their successes and weaknesses and the reasons behind them. We’ll also cover how to identify opportunities for innovation within campaign processes. This is a great opportunity to understand what works in political tech and how innovation shapes the future of campaigning.