Bill von Hippel Keynote Speaker

• The Social Paradox: When Finding What You Want Means Losing What You Need

The two most fundamental human motives are the need for connection and the need for autonomy. These motives are in permanent tension with one another, but many aspects of our modern world have shifted their balance toward autonomy and away from connection, with important costs for our happiness. The good news is that restoring balance to your life is not nearly hard as it might seem.

• The Evolutionary Psychology of Innovation

Technical innovation differentiates us from all other species and has played a major role in creating the safe and comfortable world that we occupy, yet most humans rarely if ever innovate new products. In this talk Bill explains why this is, why highly inventive people don’t create new things, and why neurodivergence is one of the best predictors of invention.

• The Evolution of Happiness

Most of us spend our lives dreaming of achievements that we think will make us permanently happier, only to find that in way less time than it took to achieve our goals, our happiness drops right back to where it started regardless of our success. In this talk Bill explains how happiness evolved and why one of its defining features is its fleeting nature.

• Baboons & Elephants: The Evolution of Moral and Immoral Leadership

The distribution of resources is one of the best predictors of whether the leadership that emerges is despotic or benevolent. In this talk Bill explains why this is and how inequality disrupts trust by incentivizing leaders to favor their own self-interest over that of the groups they lead.

• The Evolution of Tribalism: Understanding Group Conflict

To be a moral person is to treat people equally regardless of group membership, but that was not always the case. Morality evolved to regulate the treatment of members of one’s own group but not members of other groups. In this talk Bill explains how an understanding of the origins of morality help us predict and navigate the emergence of intergroup conflict.

• Why Scientists are the New Censors

Popular narratives suggest that scientific censorship is driven by authoritarians with dark motives, but scientific censorship is more often driven by scientists themselves. In this talk, Bill explains why benevolence leads scientists to censor themselves and others, slowing progress and biasing our understanding of the world.

• Gender Differences in Careers

Why are girls less likely to become scientists? Closing the gender gap in STEM jobs has proved difficult, perhaps because it has more to do with the priorities of men and women than with sexism.

• AI and The Future of Happiness

In this talk Dr. Bill explains what happens when AI in the workplace and in the culture at large collides with human psychology. Dr. Bill discusses evidence based research from psychology, economics, anthropology, and the humanities to show when and how AI will change motivation and behavior and how the fundamental struggle for connection, belonging and authenticity plays a role in these processes. This talk will help audiences face the changes AI brings with confidence by understanding what we need to stay happy, motivated and connected.