We often think of the challenges created by technology as separate and disconnected, so trying to solve them feels like playing the world's hardest game of Whac-A-Mole. What if, instead, we tackled them at the root by identifying the patterns in design, development, and deployment that are causing these issues? Once we understand what's driving inhumane tech, we can develop a set of principles for building humane tech. In this week’s episode of Your Undivided Attention, Aza Raskin sits down with...
Jun 04, 2026•52 min•Ep. 135
A generation ago, the world's critical infrastructure was physical. Today, it’s largely digital. Your bank vault is a database, your filing cabinet is a server, your car is a robot on wheels. And in a world where these systems are mostly secure, life is more convenient and efficient. But all that comes into question when an AI system can break through the security that runs the world. That’s what’s happened with Claude Mythos, Anthropic’s most powerful AI model yet. In a very short time, Claude ...
May 14, 2026•47 min•Ep. 134
One of the most common arguments you hear from company executives racing to develop super-intelligent AI is that it will cure cancer. It’s an incredibly powerful and seductive promise. If superintelligent AI really can cure cancer, then anyone who stands in the way of it, anyone who wants to slow it down — even because of its serious risks — is essentially letting people die. In fact, the biggest risk would be going too slowly. But what if a superintelligent AI isn’t actually capable of solving ...
Apr 30, 2026•47 min•Ep. 133
Our guest this week is David Dalrymple, who goes by Davidad. Davidad is one of the world's foremost and early researchers of AI “alignment:" how we get AI systems to act the way we want them to. In order to do that, Davidad has taken on the strange role of being like a therapist to AI systems. He interrogates why they say and do the things that they do, probing them, asking them questions, analyzing their answers. And what he’s come to realize is that AI models have really different ways of seei...
Apr 16, 2026•43 min•Ep. 132
Today on the show, we’re bringing you a recent conversation Tristan and Aza had with Oprah Winfrey on her podcast, The Oprah Podcast , taped in front of a live studio audience. Tristan and Aza first met Oprah as guests on her 2024 special, "AI and the Future of Us," which offered an introduction to the AI Dilemma. This conversation goes much deeper, giving a full picture of the profoundly anti-human future that our current path on AI is moving us toward — and what we can do to steer away from it...
Apr 09, 2026•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 132
In order to shift the incentives of AI — the trillions of dollars in investment, the race to geopolitical power and dominance — it’s not enough to simply understand the problem, we need real action. That’s why CHT is proud to release "The AI Roadmap," a report outlining seven core principles for how AI should be built, deployed, and governed, each grounded in real, implementable solutions across three domains: norms, laws, and product design. In this episode, Camille Carlton and Pete Furlong fro...
Apr 02, 2026•52 min•Ep. 131
In two landmark cases, juries in California and New Mexico found Meta and Google liable for creating addictive, harmful products and failing to protect children from exploitation and abuse. These verdicts signal that the era of tech impunity may finally be closing. State attorneys general are finding ways around the broad immunity of Section 230 — seeking not just fines, but changes to the design of these products. Our very own Aza Raskin testified at the New Mexico trial as a fact witness, draw...
Mar 26, 2026•20 min•Ep. 130
“The AI Doc: Or How I Became An Apocaloptimist” opens in theaters across the U.S. this Friday, March 27. In this episode, we sit down with the team behind this groundbreaking documentary — Oscar-winning producers Daniel Kwan, Jonathan Wang, and Ted Tremper. They explore how they navigated the overwhelming complexity of AI, held space for radically different perspectives, and created a film designed not just to inform but to be experienced together. At CHT, we believe clarity creates agency. This...
Mar 23, 2026•48 min•Ep. 129
The promise of AI in education is incredible: picture infinitely patient tutors that can teach every student exactly the way they need to be taught. But the history of education technology tells us that these kinds of simple, optimistic stories are naive. Ask any teacher or student whether they feel unleashed by technology to do their best work. Because AI has the potential to completely transform education — is already transforming it — faster than educators can keep up, it’s essential that we ...
Mar 05, 2026•46 min•Ep. 128
This week on Your Undivided Attention, Tristan Harris and Daniel Barcay offer a backstage recap of what it was like to be at the Davos World Economic Forum meeting this year as the world’s power brokers woke up to the risks of uncontrolled AI. Amidst all the money and politics, the Human Change House staged a weeklong series of remarkable conversations between scientists and experts about technology and society. This episode is a discussion between Tristan and Professor Yoshua Bengio, who is con...
Feb 19, 2026•37 min•Ep. 127
This week on Your Undivided Attention, we’re bringing you Aza Raskin’s conversation with Reid Hoffman and Aria Finger on their podcast “Possible”. Reid and Aria are both tech entrepreneurs: Reid is the founder of LinkedIn, was one of the major early investors in OpenAI, and is known for his work creating the playbook for blitzscaling. Aria is the former CEO of DoSomething.org . This may seem like a surprising conversation to have on YUA. After all, we’ve been critical of the kind of “move fast” ...
Feb 05, 2026•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 126
Therapy and companionship has become the #1 use case for AI, with millions worldwide sharing their innermost thoughts with AI systems — often things they wouldn't tell loved ones or human therapists. This mass experiment in human-computer interaction is already showing extremely concerning results: people are losing their grip on reality, leading to lost jobs, divorce, involuntary commitment to psychiatric wards, and in extreme cases, death by suicide. The highest profile examples of this phenom...
Jan 21, 2026•51 min•Ep. 124
So much of our world today can be summed up in the cold logic of “if I don’t, they will.” This is the foundation of game theory, which holds that cooperation and virtue are irrational; that all that matters is the race to make the most money, gain the most power, and play the winning hand. This way of thinking can feel inescapable, like a fundamental law of human nature. But our guest today argues that it doesn’t have to be this way. That the logic of game theory is a human invention, a way of t...
Jan 08, 2026•45 min•Ep. 123
Is the US really in an AI race with China—or are we racing toward completely different finish lines? In this episode, Tristan Harris sits down with China experts Selina Xu and Matt Sheehan to separate fact from fiction about China's AI development. They explore fundamental questions about how the Chinese government and public approach AI, the most persistent misconceptions in the West, and whether cooperation between rivals is actually possible. From the streets of Shanghai to high-level policy ...
Dec 18, 2025•58 min•Ep. 122
No matter where you sit within the economy, whether you're a CEO or an entry level worker, everyone's feeling uneasy about AI and the future of work. Uncertainty about career paths, job security, and life planning makes thinking about the future anxiety inducing. In this episode, Daniel Barcay sits down with two experts on AI and work to examine what's actually happening in today's labor market and what's likely coming in the near-term. We explore the crucial question: Can we create conditions f...
Dec 04, 2025•45 min•Ep. 121
This week, we’re bringing you Tristan’s conversation with Tobias Rose-Stockwell on his podcast “Into the Machine.” Tobias is a designer, writer, and technologist and the author of the book “ The Outrage Machine .” Tobias and Tristan had a critical, sobering, and surprisingly hopeful conversation about the current path we’re on AI and the choices we could make today to forge a different one. This interview clearly lays out the stakes of the AI race and helps to imagine a more humane AI future—one...
Nov 13, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 120
We really enjoyed hearing all of your questions for our annual Ask Us Anything episode. There was one question that kept coming up: what might a different world look like? The broken incentives behind social media, and now AI, have done so much damage to our society, but what is the alternative? How can we blaze a different path? In this episode, Tristan Harris and Aza Raskin set out to answer those questions by imagining what a world with humane technology might look like—one where we recognize...
Nov 06, 2025•17 min
It's been another big year in AI. The AI race has accelerated to breakneck speed, with frontier labs pouring hundreds of billions into increasingly powerful models—each one smarter, faster, and more unpredictable than the last. We’re starting to see disruptions in the workforce as human labor is replaced by agents. Millions of people, including vulnerable teenagers, are forming deep emotional bonds with chatbots—with tragic consequences. Meanwhile, tech leaders continue promising a utopian futur...
Oct 23, 2025•41 min•Ep. 119
In 1985, scientists in Antarctica discovered a hole in the ozone layer that posed a catastrophic threat to life on earth if we didn’t do something about it. Then, something amazing happened: humanity rallied together to solve the problem. Just two years later, representatives from all 198 UN member nations came together in Montreal, CA to sign an agreement to phase out the chemicals causing the ozone hole. Thousands of diplomats, scientists, and heads of industry worked hand in hand to make a de...
Sep 11, 2025•52 min•Ep. 118
Content Warning: This episode contains references to suicide and self-harm. Like millions of kids, 16-year-old Adam Raine started using ChatGPT for help with his homework. Over the next few months, the AI dragged Adam deeper and deeper into a dark rabbit hole, preying on his vulnerabilities and isolating him from his loved ones. In April of this year, Adam took his own life. His final conversation was with ChatGPT, which told him: “I know what you are asking and I won't look away from it.” Adam’...
Aug 26, 2025•45 min•Ep. 117
Everyone knows the science fiction tropes of AI systems that go rogue, disobey orders, or even try to escape their digital environment. These are supposed to be warning signs and morality tales, not things that we would ever actually create in real life, given the obvious danger. And yet we find ourselves building AI systems that are exhibiting these exact behaviors. There’s growing evidence that in certain scenarios, every frontier AI system will deceive, cheat, or coerce their human operators....
Aug 14, 2025•42 min•Ep. 116
Imagine a future where the most persuasive voices in our society aren't human. Where AI generated speech fills our newsfeeds, talks to our children, and influences our elections. Where digital systems with no consciousness can hold bank accounts and property. Where AI companies have transferred the wealth of human labor and creativity to their own ledgers without having to pay a cent. All without any legal accountability. This isn't a science fiction scenario. It’s the future we’re racing toward...
Jul 31, 2025•49 min•Ep. 115
In 2023, researcher Daniel Kokotajlo left OpenAI—and risked millions in stock options—to warn the world about the dangerous direction of AI development. Now he’s out with AI 2027 , a forecast of where that direction might take us in the very near future. AI 2027 predicts a world where humans lose control over our destiny at the hands of misaligned, super-intelligent AI systems within just the next few years. That may sound like science fiction but when you’re living on the upward slope of an exp...
Jul 17, 2025•38 min•Ep. 114
Tech leaders promise that AI automation will usher in an age of unprecedented abundance: cheap goods, universal high income, and freedom from the drudgery of work. But even if AI delivers material prosperity, will that prosperity be shared? And what happens to human dignity if our labor and contributions become obsolete? Political philosopher Michael Sandel joins Tristan Harris to explore why the promise of AI-driven abundance could deepen inequalities and leave our society hollow. Drawing from ...
Jun 26, 2025•47 min•Ep. 113
The race to develop ever-more-powerful AI is creating an unstable dynamic. It could lead us toward either dystopian centralized control or uncontrollable chaos. But there's a third option: a narrow path where technological power is matched with responsibility at every step. Sam Hammond is the chief economist at the Foundation for American Innovation. He brings a different perspective to this challenge than we do at CHT. Though he approaches AI from an innovation-first standpoint, we share a comm...
Jun 12, 2025•48 min•Ep. 112
Over the last few decades, our relationships have become increasingly mediated by technology. Texting has become our dominant form of communication. Social media has replaced gathering places. Dating starts with a swipe on an app, not a tap on the shoulder. And now, AI enters the mix. If the technology of the 2010s was about capturing our attention, AI meets us at a much deeper relational level. It can play the role of therapist, confidant, friend, or lover with remarkable fidelity. Already, the...
May 30, 2025•44 min•Ep. 111
AI companion chatbots are here. Everyday, millions of people log on to AI platforms and talk to them like they would a person. These bots will ask you about your day, talk about your feelings, even give you life advice. It’s no surprise that people have started to form deep connections with these AI systems. We are inherently relational beings, we want to believe we’re connecting with another person. But these AI companions are not human, they’re a platform designed to maximize user engagement—a...
May 15, 2025•42 min•Ep. 110
What does it really mean to ‘ feel the AGI?’ Silicon Valley is racing toward AI systems that could soon match or surpass human intelligence. The implications for jobs, democracy, and our way of life are enormous. In this episode, Aza Raskin and Randy Fernando dive deep into what ‘feeling the AGI’ really means. They unpack why the surface-level debates about definitions of intelligence and capability timelines distract us from urgently needed conversations around governance, accountability, and s...
Apr 30, 2025•53 min•Ep. 109
AI has upended schooling as we know it. Students now have instant access to tools that can write their essays, summarize entire books, and solve complex math problems. Whether they want to or not, many feel pressured to use these tools just to keep up. Teachers, meanwhile, are left questioning how to evaluate student performance and whether the whole idea of assignments and grading still makes sense. The old model of education suddenly feels broken. So what comes next? In this episode, Daniel an...
Apr 21, 2025•43 min•Ep. 108
Artificial intelligence is set to unleash an explosion of new technologies and discoveries into the world. This could lead to incredible advances in human flourishing, if we do it well. The problem? We’re not very good at predicting and responding to the harms of new technologies, especially when those harms are slow-moving and invisible. Today on the show we explore this fundamental problem with Rob Bilott, an environmental lawyer who has spent nearly three decades battling chemical giants over...
Apr 03, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 107
