Alison Gopnik

Two dinosaurs and and the Stand Up For Science Duck mascot stand at the D.C. National Day of Action rally. The dinosaurs have signs reading "Don't let good science go extinct" and "Science saves lives"

The dinos are out for science!! Are you??? Join us in Washington D.C. on the National Mall!!!

Info here! : fight2win.standupforscience.net/DC-March/

Large AI models are cultural and social technologies Implications draw on the history of transformative information systems from the past

And I think there is a strong case to be made that programming and poetics have far more in common than you might think at first glance, building on work with @alisongopnik.bsky.social and @cshalizi.bsky.social www.science.org/stoken/autho... about LLMs as "cultural and social technologies."

Stand up for Science Stand up for Science

Alvy and I will be at this rally for Stand up For Science in San Francisco March 7. Come and join us!

fight2win.standupforscience.net/SF-March/

My day was partly filled with philosophy and cognitive science! Wonderful talk and conversation with @alisongopnik.bsky.social. Thank you, Science and Entertainment Exchange, for a thought-provoking evening.

Exploit, Explore, Empower YouTube video by University of California Television (UCTV)

My distinguished graduate lecture at Berkeley, intelligences of exploration and care in kids, elders and AI

www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3Fx...

In this bonus episode of PsychTalks, Cassie Hayward and Nick Haslam welcome one of the world’s most influential developmental psychologists, Professor Alison Gopnik for an extended conversation on how our minds grow and change over the lifespan.

Listen here: go.unimelb.edu.au/7axe

This is a great new book by the brilliant Tom Griffiths- highly reeccomend

Schedule of speakers for a morning pre-conference workshop at the 2026 meeting of the Cognitive Development Society in Montréal, Québec, Canada.

Attending CDS 2026? Consider joining us at the morning pre-conference workshop on intuitive theories of care and protection in development @cogdevsoc.bsky.social

Just sent you and Henry a new chapter from my upcoming (hah) book outline Gopnikism plus Farrelism too, designed to be easy to read for a popular audience or even Berkeley undergrads

Just sent you and Brad a new chapter from my upcoming (hah) book outline Gopnikism plus Farrelism too

NO KINGS Coalition Responds to Escalating Brutality and Authoritarianism The Next National Mass Mobilization will be on March 28...Mark your calendars and watch this space!

We’re taking to the streets once more to protect our rights, freedoms, and humanity against tyranny.

The next national NO KINGS protest is on March 28.

Join us

🧠 Lancement du Semestre thématique #IVADO sur le Raisonnement et l’IA avec Aaron Courville, @glajoie.bsky.social, @alisongopnik.bsky.social qui ont accueilli ce matin les très nombreux(ses) participant(e) du 1er atelier sur Les bases cognitives du raisonnement (dans l’esprit et l’IA).

You searched for Alison Gopnik - Philosophy Talk

Philosophy Talk, one of my favorite podcasts, now is available for free! You can search the archive of over 600 episodes and here are mine on topics ranging from Imagination to Cruelty to Nature vs Nurture.

philosophytalk.org?s=Alison+Gop...

The relationship between childhood exploration and population-level innovation in cultural evolution Abstract. The societal effects of children’s learning in cultural evolution have been underexplored. Here, we investigate using agent-based models how a pr

Really great new paper using agent-based modelling to show how an exploratory childhood can lead to innovation in the population at large.
royalsocietypublishing.org/rspb/article...

See whole excellent thread, very interesting result, but actually quite similar to the surprising, important way systems can master syntax. "intelligence" is a misguided concept , but question is whether these abilities translate to discovery and exploration of the external world beyond text

Moving forward 🇺🇸. “When asked if the president would sign the bill, the White House directed NBC News to a statement earlier this month from the White House Office of Management and Budget. The statement said that the administration supported the bill.” 🧪🏠 NO MAJOR CUTS

HowTheLightGetsIn Hay 2026 HowTheLightGetsIn Hay 2026 brings a weekend packed with experiences unlike any other UK festival to Hay-on-Wye this May. Join us for a Bank Holiday filled with music, ideas, comedy, and much, much mor...

I'm looking forward to speaking at the How the Light Gets In Festival in May in Hay-on-Wye. How often does a philosophy meeting have a Ferris wheel?

May 22nd-25th
Hay-on-Wye
Website link: howthelightgetsin.org/festivals/ha...

@HTLGIFestival

We said the season was over – but for Prof Alison Gopnik, we made an exception. In this bonus PsychTalks episode, Nick and Cassie had a conversation with one of the world's most influential developmental psychologists about how our minds change across our lives.

Listen here: go.unimelb.edu.au/3axe

Our paper on the "Oneirogen hypothesis" is now up in its revised form on eLife!

This is the hypothesis that psychedelics induce a dream-like state, which we show via modelling could explain a variety of perceptual and learning effects from such drugs.

elifesciences.org/reviewed-pre...

🧠📈 🧪

yes, this is a really great paper, showing how AI can enhance individual science but narrow the general scope.

Against white-knuckle parenting Playing with your kids shouldn't feel like torture

Another great piece from Kelsey Piper about caring for kids. Against white-knuckle parenting open.substack.com/pub/theargum...

Is AI More Like a Mind or a Market? A group of scholars argue we should think of it as a “social technology” akin to a bureaucracy, a democracy or a marketplace.

An excellent essay at Bloomberg by Walter Frick very clearly explaining our ideas about Large Models as a cultural and social technology
bloomberg.com/news/article...

The Social Science of Caregiving - Alison Gopnik, Professor of Psychology & Philosophy UC Berkeley YouTube video by Templeton World Charity Foundation

A beautiful and informative video about our Templeton World Charity Foundation project on the Social Science of Caregiving.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBbG...

(Keynote #4) Alison Gopnik - "Empowerment and Causal Learning in Humans and Machines" YouTube video by MAIN Conference

My talk at the terrific MAIN (Montreal AI and Neuroscience) meeting on cognition, neuroscience and AI linking Bayesian causal learning and empowerment in reinforcement learning.
youtube.com/watch?v=qrwB...

This years Christmas Mantel in celebration of Mary Poppins, Thalo's (and my) favorite mysterious superhero. Note genuine, and only slightly cracked Royal Doulton Bowl. Happy New Year to everybody

A 2025 highlight ⚡

In February, CASBS's project on The Social Science of Caregiving, led by @alisongopnik.bsky.social, guest-edited the Winter 2025 issue of Dædalus, the journal of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.

Learn about the project & read the entire open access issue: bit.ly/3Qm49ha

How getting richer made teenagers less free We value children more than ever. But we're suffocating them.

Excellent piece from Kelsey Piper at The Argument. How getting richer made teenagers less free . I really like The Argument, in general, worth checking out.
open.substack.com/pub/theargum...

Large AI models are cultural and social technologies Implications draw on the history of transformative information systems from the past

I think of AI and LLMs as a new kind of archival access in the sense of @himself.bsky.social and @alisongopnik.bsky.socials take of AI as cultural technology www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Nice thread describing our new study on why kids play

New paper with Junyi Chu, Tomer Ullman et al showing that kids think more difficulty is more fun!
Fun isn't easy: Children selectively manipulate task difficulty when “playing for fun” versus “playing to win”. psycnet.apa.org/record/2027-...