The theme of the Artificiality Summit 2026 is Unknowing. We start with five speakers—David Wolpert, Caleb Scharf, Wakanyi Macharia-Hoffman, Gašper Beguš, and Nina Beguš—whose work converges on a single finding: the uncertainty surrounding AI is permanent, not a phase.
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Ball, Philip
Ball, Philip. The Book of Minds: How to Understand Ourselves and Other Beings, from Animals to Aliens. University of Chicago Press, 2022.
How Life Works: A User’s Guide to the New Biology. University of Chicago Press, 2023.
Birch, Jonathan
Birch, Jonathan. The Edge of Sentience. Oxford University Press, 2024.
Hidalgo, Cesar
Hidalgo, Cesar. Why Information Grows: The Evolution of Order, from Atoms to Economies. Basic Books, 2015.
Chater, Nick, and Morten H. Christiansen
Christiansen, Morten H., and Nick Chater. The Language Game: How Improvisation Created Language and Changed the World. Basic Books, 2022.
Clark, Andy
Clark, Andy. Surfing Uncertainty: Prediction, Action, and the Embodied Mind. Oxford University Press, 2015.
The Experience Machine: How Our Minds Predict and Shape Reality. Pantheon Books, 2023.
Christian, Brian
Christian, Brian. The Alignment Problem: Machine Learning and Human Values. W. W. Norton & Company, 2020.
Dunbar, Robin, Tracey Camilleri and Samantha Rockey
Dunbar, Robin, Tracey Camilleri and Samantha Rockey. The Social Brain: The Psychology of Successful Groups. Penguin Books, 2023.
Eagleman, David
Eagleman, David. Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain. Vintage, 2012.
Livewired: The Inside Story of the Ever‑Changing Brain. Vintage, 2020.
Gopnik, Alison
Gopnik, Alison. The Gardener and the Carpenter: What the New Science of Child Development Tells Us about the Relationship Between Parents and Children. Macmillan Publishers, 2017.
The Philosophical Baby: What Children’s Minds Tell Us about Truth, Love, and the Meaning of Life. Macmillan Publishers, 2010.
Heyes, Cecilia
Heyes, Cecilia. Cognitive Gadgets: The Cultural Evolution of Thinking. Harvard University Press, 2018.
Hoffman, Donald
Hoffman, Donald. The Case Against Reality: How Evolution Hid the Truth from Our Eyes. Penguin Books, 2020.
Hoel, Erik
Hoel, Erik. The World Behind the World: Consciousness, Free Will, and the Limits of Science. Avid Reader Press, 2023.
Juarrero, Alicia
Juarrero, Alicia. Context Changes Everything: How Constraints Create Coherence. MIT Press, 2023.
Krakauer, David, ed.
Krakauer, David, ed. Complexity: A Primer. SFI Press, 2024.
LeDoux, Joseph
LeDoux, Joseph. The Deep History of Ourselves: The Four‑Billion‑Year Story of How We Got Conscious Brains. Viking, 2019.
May, Todd
May, Todd. Death The Art of Living: Routledge, 2014.
Mitchell, Kevin
Mitchell, Kevin. Free Agents: How Evolution Gave Us Free Will. Princeton University Press, 2024.
Norman, Don
Norman, Don. The Design of Everyday Things. MIT Press, 2014 (revised edition).
Parr, Thomas, Giovanni Pezzulo and Karl Friston**
Parr, Thomas, Giovanni Pezzulo and Karl Friston. Active Inference: The Free Energy Principle in Mind, Brain and Behavior. MIT Press, 2023.
Raihani, Nicola
Raihani, Nicola. The Social Instinct: How Cooperation Shaped the World. St Martins Press, 2021.
Russell, Stuart
Russell, Stuart. Human Compatible: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Control. Penguin, 2020.
Sapolsky, Robert M.
Sapolsky, Robert M. Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst. Penguin Press, 2017.
Scharf, Caleb
Scharf, Caleb. The Ascent of Information: Books, Bits, Genes, Machines, and Life’s Unending Algorithm. Riverhead Books, 2021.
Seth, Anil
Seth, Anil. Being You: A New Science of Consciousness. Dutton (Penguin Random House), 2021.
Sloman, Steven, and Philip Fernbach
Sloman, Steven, and Philip Fernbach. The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone. Riverhead Books, 2018.
Solms, Mark
Solms, Mark. The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness. W. W. Norton & Company, 2021.
Summerfield, Chris
Summerfield, Chris. Natural General Intelligence. MIT Press, 2022.
Summerfield, Chris. These Strange New Minds. MIT Press, 2025.
Tomlinson, Gary
Tomlinson, Gary. The Machines of Evolution and the Scope of Meaning. Zone Books, 2024.
Tomasello, Michael
Tomasello, Michael. The Evolution of Agency: Behavioral Organization from Lizards to Humans. MIT Press, 2022.
Tversky, Barbara
Tversky, Barbara. Mind in Motion: How Action Shapes Thought. Basic Books, 2019.
Walker, Sara
Walker, Sara Imari. Life as No One Knows It: The Physics of Life's Emergence. Riverhead Books, 2024.
West, Geoffrey
West, Geoffrey. Scale: The Universal Laws of Life, Growth, and Death in Organisms, Cities, and Companies. Penguin Press, 2018.
Helen Edwards is a Co-Founder of Artificiality. She previously co-founded Intelligentsia.ai (acquired by Atlantic Media) and worked at Meridian Energy, Pacific Gas & Electric, Quartz, and Transpower.
