AGI Strategies

person

Robin Hanson

Robin Hanson

GMU economist; Age of Em author

Economist known for predicting a future dominated by mind-uploaded ems (emulated humans). Publicly skeptical of the standard AI-doom framing; argues gradualism and economic analysis should dominate over 'foom' scenarios.

current Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University
homepagewikipedia@robinhanson

Profile

expertise

External-domain expert

Recognised expert outside AI (philosophy, economics, biology, journalism) who weighs in on AI consequences from that vantage.

George Mason economist. 'Age of Em' (2016) was an early formal economic treatment of post-AGI futures. Long publication record on prediction markets and futarchy.

recognition

Field-leading

Widely known inside the AI and AI-safety community. Appears repeatedly in top venues, podcasts, or governance forums. Not a household name to outsiders.

Recognised in EA, rationalist, and economics circles. Less mainstream press.

vintage

Pre-deep-learning

Active before AlexNet. The existential-risk frame matures (FHI, OpenPhil, EA). Public AI commentary still rare; deep learning not yet dominant.

PhD 1997 (Caltech). Overcoming Bias from 2006. Age of Em 2016 builds on pre-deep-learning frame.

Hand-classified. See the board for the criteria and the full grid.

Strategy positions

AI skepticmixed

AGI risk narratives overstated; real harms are mundane and current

Argues against 'foom' scenarios; AI progress will be gradual and economically driven, favouring existing market and regulatory equilibria.

Foom scenarios are extremely unlikely. AI will progress by ordinary competitive dynamics.
✍ blogRobin Hanson, Overcoming Bias· Overcoming Bias· 2023· loose paraphrase

Digital mindsendorses

Mind-uploading or digital people as strategic horizon

Author of The Age of Em (2016), which sketches an economy dominated by emulated humans.

If we create whole-brain emulations before de novo AGI, the resulting em economy would doubles every month, with wages falling to subsistence.
❧ bookThe Age of Em: Work, Love, and Life when Robots Rule the Earth· Oxford University Press· 2016-05-20· faithful paraphrase

Closest strategy neighbours

by jaccard overlap

Other people whose strategy tags overlap with Robin Hanson's. Overlap is on tag identity, not stance; opposites can show up if they reference the same tags.

  • Abhijit Banerjee

    Abhijit Banerjee

    shared 1 · J=0.50

    MIT economist; 2019 Nobel laureate

  • Ada Lovelace

    Ada Lovelace

    shared 1 · J=0.50

    First programmer; analytical engine theorist (1815–1852)

  • Aidan Gomez

    Aidan Gomez

    shared 1 · J=0.50

    CEO of Cohere; 'Attention Is All You Need' co-author

  • Alan Kay

    Alan Kay

    shared 1 · J=0.50

    Object-oriented programming and personal computing pioneer

  • Alex Hanna

    Alex Hanna

    shared 1 · J=0.50

    Director of Research at DAIR; Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000

  • Andriy Burkov

    shared 1 · J=0.50

    ML engineer; 'The Hundred-Page Machine Learning Book' author

Record last updated 2026-04-24.