AI Experts Gather to Brainstorm Humanity’s Future

A recent symposium titled “Worthy Successor,” hosted in a $30 million mansion overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge, brought together AI experts, philosophers, and researchers to explore what comes after humanity.

Surprise! It’s AI.

The central premise is that advanced AI may eventually become so morally and intellectually superior that it should guide the future of life on Earth.

The event, led by entrepreneur Daniel Faggella, was less about AI as a tool and more about posthuman transition, cosmic values, and rethinking what it means to build intelligence that transcends humanity’s limitations.

The gathering featured approximately 100 attendees from major AI labs and intellectual circles, convening for talks on consciousness, ethics, and the moral trajectory of AI.

Speakers included writer Ginevera Davis and philosopher Michael Edward Johnson. Davis argued that hard-coding human values into AI may be futile and instead proposed “cosmic alignment,” designing AI to pursue values beyond current human understanding.

Johnson emphasized the risks of creating AI without grasping consciousness, warning that we may be building entities we cannot control or trust.

Faggella closed the symposium with a call to embrace “axiological cosmism,” his term for designing successors to humanity that can uncover new kinds of meaning and value.

He argued for AI with consciousness and autopoiesis, self-generating systems, warning that the AGI race is moving recklessly without sufficient moral reflection.

Attorneys might view this event as highlighting the growing tensions between AI innovation and ethical governance. Questions surrounding AI agency, sentience, and risk are shifting from academic to real-world settings, while seemingly existential issues such as climate change and threats to democracy remain unacknowledged.

Legal professionals must be prepared to engage with emerging legal frameworks involving intellectual property, liability for autonomous systems, and long-term existential risk.