A three-year, US$3.6M project co-led by SRI Research Leads Karina Vold and Ashton Anderson with Purdue University’s Louis Tay explores how AI systems might be designed to support long-term human well-being, not just short-term user satisfaction.

Organized by SRI’s 2025–26 graduate fellows, “Designing Responsible Futures” examined how AI can be shaped through operational safety, community participation, worker-led governance, and democratic principles.

As part of the programming for the Department for the Study of Religion’s 50th anniversary, SRI co-hosted an interdisplinary panel of scholars working in the study of religion, history of science, media theory, and computer science to consider how the religious pasts of AI shape the foretelling of its future.

SRI’s annual conference explored how increasingly capable AI systems are reshaping public discourse, institutional trust, and the boundaries between technical systems and social life.

As part of the CBC Ideas series, the Schwartz Reisman Institute welcomed journalist Karen Hao to the University of Toronto to discuss the political economy of AI development, the need for stronger accountability, and the importance of building alternative, less resource-intensive approaches to AI systems.

The Schwartz Reisman Institute’s annual academic conference Absolutely Interdisciplinary explores interdisciplinary approaches to AI governance, risk, and safety on May 13, 2026, at U of T’s Schwartz Reisman Innovation Campus. Registration is now open.

A new partnership co-led by Karina Vold is confronting racism in AI systems—highlighting how tools like facial recognition and LLMs disproportionately harm Black and racialized communities, and calling for greater public awareness and equitable governance of AI in Canada.

The SRI Seminar Series continues in winter 2026 with leading scholars examining AI governance, democratic values, and human-centred technology in the public interest.

A new Radical Talks podcast episode features Geoffrey Hinton and Google Chief Scientist Jeff Dean in a live conversation recorded at NeurIPS 2025, reflecting on the past, present, and future of artificial intelligence—alongside the announcement of the new Hinton Chair at the University of Toronto.

AI visionaries Geoffrey Hinton and Fei-Fei Li headlined Who’s Afraid of AI?, a landmark University of Toronto conference exploring how artificial intelligence is reshaping culture, creativity, and collective imagination. Presented in part by the Schwartz Reisman Institute, the event brought together artists, technologists, and scholars to envision more human-centered futures of intelligence.

How can we stay in control when AI systems surpass human intelligence? In a recent SRI Seminar, Schwartz Reisman Chair David Duvenaud explored the frontier of AI safety, alignment, and governance, introducing new research on “dangerous capability” evaluations and control protocols designed to detect when AI models become too powerful to oversee.

SRI Chair David Duvenaud shares reflections from the Post-AGI workshop, highlighting the value of diverse perspectives and the challenges of envisioning post-AGI trajectories.