Michael Muthukrishna

AI Can Revolutionise Education but Technology Is Not Enough: Human Development Meets Cultural Evolution Artificial Intelligence could dramatically boost educational outcomes and close gaps – but only if policymakers take a human-centred, systems-level approach to AI integration. Cultural evolution, t...

👩‍💻 AI has the power to revolutionise education, but tech alone is not enough

@michael.muthukrishna.com and several brilliant PBS students explore how AI can transform learning - but only if embedded in human-centred, culturally adaptive systems.

#OpenAccess #Research #AI #Education #Teaching

Any recommendations for a good evolution oriented intro psych textbook? Gray & Bjorkland's Psychology isn’t being renewed.

An aspirational approach to planetary futures - Nature The Nature Relationship Index offers a new way to measure and engage human aspirations to shape a better future for people and all life on Earth.

🌎 An aspirational new approach to planetary futures

This new paper, co-authored by @michael.muthukrishna.com
& published in 'Nature', proposes an innovative new framework - the Nature Relationship Index (NRI) - for addressing planetary environmental challenges.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

📢 Just out in @nature.com: Oxford Uni, UNDP‬ & others propose a 'Nature Relationship Index', a bold new metric to track how well people & nature thrive together. A hopeful framework to reimagine progress beyond GDP.
🔗 www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09080-1 #NatureRecovery @ox.ac.uk @undp.org

Positive futures 6.30pm Sat 21 Jun | Roger Highfield, Suhair Khan, Isabel Losada, Michael Muthukrishna | Free event at LSE Festival: Visions for the Future | Ticket required

Today's LSE Festival highlight is our closing event:
Can we be optimistic about the future?
@rogerhighfield.bsky.social, Suhair Khan, @isabel-losada.bsky.social & @michael.muthukrishna.com share some of the ideas, innovations & discoveries to give us hope 💡
FREE tickets (in person/online) 👇

Ticket information Information about booking your free tickets for the LSE Festival 2025: Visions for the future

LSE Festival is taking place 16-21 June, with global leaders, experts & innovators exploring the near & distant future & what a better world could look like.

@michael.muthukrishna.com will join a discussion on 'Positive futures' on 21 June: www.lse.ac.uk/Events/LSE-F...

Full schedule & tickets 👇

I’ve found my people.

LSE Festival: Visions for the Future LSE Festival: Visions for the Future. Join us for a series of free events in London taking place from Monday 16 to Saturday 21 June 2025.

It's May! Which means #LSEFestival is coming up next month. Browse the programme & save the date for events you don't want to miss.

What are the possible worlds to come? 🌎
How will AI, tech & innovation shape society? 💻
How will we confront global challenges? 🌊
Will our political reality change? 🗳️

Fixed in the paperback!

Mutual benefits of social learning and algorithmic mediation for cumulative culture | Journal of The Royal Society Interface The remarkable ecological success of humans is often attributed to our ability to develop complex cultural artefacts that enable us to cope with environmental challenges. The evolution of complex culture (cumulative cultural evolution) is usually ...

New paper

Mutual benefits of social learning and algorithmic mediation for cumulative culture

In this pure modeling paper, we attempt to explore how recommendation algorithms might alter the dynamics of social learning and cumulative cultural evolution.

royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

The @financialtimes.com on our recent @naturehumbehav.bsky.social study on SES and genetics 🧬🌃

ft.pressreader.com/v99c/2025040... (by @anjahuja.bsky.social)

(thread on the study itself is quoted below)

In Genetics, a Tense Coexistence of Mainstream and Fringe Views In an era of open data, genome-wide association studies have become entangled with efforts to prove Black inferiority.

"I wanted to have that be clear — that he’s not on my team and I’m not on his" - me on Emil Kirkegaard in this great piece from @undark.org: undark.org/2025/03/26/u...

In every civilization, people end up sorted into levels of socio-economic status (SES). We explore the history, present, and future of scientific research on the complicated relationship between SES and DNA in @naturehumbehav.bsky.social💰🧬🎓

Link: rdcu.be/efacK

Thread below 👇🏽

Delighted to be part of this paper on the relationship between social economic status and genetics.

Led by @dr-appie.bsky.social and co-authored with @hilarycmartin.bsky.social
@martinkolk.bsky.social
@adamrutherford.bsky.social
@fctropf.bsky.social
@melindacmills.bsky.social

Professor Michael Muthukrishna

📣 We are delighted to share that @michael.muthukrishna.com has been promoted to Professor of Economic Psychology! 👏

Congratulations Michael! We are exceptionally proud to have you in our department! 💥

#Professor #EconomicPsychology #PartofLSE #LSEPBS #Promotion

ACE Lab: Applied Cultural Evolution Laboratory culture, evolution, cooperation, and sustainability

Fully-funded PhD position on the cultural evolution of environmental management!

Link evolution, ecology and behavioral science in the ACE Lab timwaring.info Details: forms.gle/gZWK9BpwYfoG...
@culturalevolsoc.bsky.social @alexmesoudi.com @hyperadapthyrax.bsky.social @michael.muthukrishna.com

Looking forward to continuing the discussion! 4/4

With this government’s support and the UK’s strengths on AI talent, research, and commercial activity, we can lead the world in our children using AI for learning rather than plagiarism or in ways that harm their social and cognitive, and intellectual development.3/

The UK ranks among the Top 5 globally in AI talent, research, and commercial AI activity. But we lag behind on infrastructure, development, and government strategy.2/

At least 9 out of 10 children are already using AI with little to no guidance or support. It’s great to see this government recognize the need to support teachers, parents, and students in using these new technologies safely, ethically, and effectively to enhance learning and address inequalities.1/

The Return of Realpolitik Ukraine, America, and What The Zelensky-Trump-Vance Blow-up Means for the World

New post on the Return of Realpolitik (thoughts on Friday's Zelensky-Trump-Vance Whitehouse meeting)

www.lab.muthukrishna.com/p/the-return...

Abstract: Vision science largely ignores the fact that rural visual environments typical of our species’ history differ radically from urban zones from which almost all samples are drawn: Only a handful of paradigms have been used to investigate rural-urban differences in visual perception, and some show limited effects or suffer from limited methodologies. Here we more than double the total number of paradigms in this literature, including visual illusions assumed to rely on universal mechanisms (e.g. Gestalt shapes, Cafe wall, curvature blindness). Results reveal profound differences in visual phenomenology, with rural Namibian participants often failing to see percepts obvious to UK/US participants and vice versa. In sum, what is universal and what is culturally-constructed in human visual perception remains a wide-open area of research.

Does cultural experience shape visual perception?

New research finds "profound differences in visual phenomenology, with rural Namibian participants often failing to see percepts obvious to UK/US participants and vice versa."

Preprint: doi.org/10.31234/osf...

Evolution takes multiple paths to evolvability when facing environmental change | PNAS Life at all scales is surprisingly effective at exploiting new opportunities, as demonstrated by the rapid emergence of antimicrobial resistance an...

Our Evolution of Evolvability work is finally* out!

*technically it has been out for a bit, but all of ~this~ bullshit was happening

www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1...

Reminder of this #culturalevolution starter pack

go.bsky.app/6mZJyQq

A timely reminder that we are all related. From "A Theory of Everyone", by @michael.muthukrishna.com

Very enjoyable and stimulating evening with @michael.muthukrishna.com discussing his great book ‘A Theory of Everyone’ at the inaugural IGP Book Club at The Gilded Acorn bookshop. Thank you Michael.

IGP Book Club — Fast Forward 2030 Join us at IGP BookClub: A Theory of Everyone as we dive into the pages of this captivating story together!

I'm giving the last public book talk & signing of the year tomorrow (Thursday Dec 5) at the Institute for Global Prosperity Book Club, Gilded Acorn at 6:30pm.

The discussion will be hosted by Angus Armstrong. Hope to see you there!

@angusarmstrong.bsky.social

fastforward2030.com/events/2024/...

The reactions to the Biden pardon on Bluesky vs the other place are revealing. Anyone got a proper analysis?