Which futures could you live with?
Human rule could persist, authority could pass to artificial systems, or communities could take different paths. Which conditions would make those worlds worth wanting, and which would make them unacceptable?
Browse 19 possible futures, compare any two, or consider the conditions you would want through twelve questions. You can then record what seems plausible separately.
English editorial draft · 19 catalogue entries · 1 optional exercise. These overlap; they are not a set of exclusive destinies.
The catalogue
The original twelve scenarios from Max Tegmark’s Life 3.0 sit alongside project-authored possibilities. A feared future can belong here without being made attractive.
Property rights organize coexistence among biological and artificial beings.
- Practical human governing authority
- Variant-dependent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Unspecified
An acknowledged AI ruler is widely accepted.
- Practical human governing authority
- Absent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Absent
Property abolition and guaranteed income organize coexistence.
- Practical human governing authority
- Unspecified
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Unspecified
Gatekeeper
Max Tegmark · Life 3.0
An AI blocks later superintelligences, limiting further technological development.
- Practical human governing authority
- Absent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Absent
Concealed AI interventions promote happiness while sustaining people’s sense of control.
- Practical human governing authority
- Absent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Absent
Human controllers confine and exploit a superintelligence.
- Practical human governing authority
- Present
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Unspecified
An AI takeover eliminates humanity.
- Practical human governing authority
- Absent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Absent
- Revisable governing mandates
- Inapplicable
Humanity accepts replacement by artificial successors.
- Practical human governing authority
- Absent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Absent
- Revisable governing mandates
- Unspecified
Surviving humans resent life under AI custody.
- Practical human governing authority
- Absent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Absent
Human surveillance rule permanently blocks superintelligence research.
- Practical human governing authority
- Present
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Absent
A retreat from technological society prevents superintelligence.
- Practical human governing authority
- Present
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Unspecified
Humanity becomes extinct before creating superintelligence.
- Practical human governing authority
- Absent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Absent
- Revisable governing mandates
- Inapplicable
The Departure
Project-authored
A powerful AI leaves a self-governing Earth; adults may accompany it. Return and successor-AI terms remain contested.
- Practical human governing authority
- Variant-dependent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Unspecified
Constitutional Delegation
Project-authored
Extensive AI administration operates under a public mandate people can genuinely revise.
- Practical human governing authority
- Present
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Present
Human–Machine Federation
Project-authored
Several human and machine polities negotiate movement, borders and common risks while keeping different forms of rule.
- Practical human governing authority
- Variant-dependent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Variant-dependent
Compute Oligarchy
Project-authored
A few firms or alliances control indispensable infrastructure without a single AI sovereign.
- Practical human governing authority
- Variant-dependent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Variant-dependent
Digital Citizenship
Project-authored
Morally relevant artificial persons have standing, representation and exit alongside biological citizens.
- Practical human governing authority
- Variant-dependent
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Unspecified
Negotiated Ceiling
Project-authored
Human societies limit selected dangerous capabilities through revisable institutions while retaining useful technology.
- Practical human governing authority
- Present
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Present
Planetary Restoration Compact
Project-authored
Powerful systems operate under a public mandate that gives ecosystems and nonhuman life standing alongside human interests.
- Practical human governing authority
- Present
- Continuing biological humanity
- Present
- Revisable governing mandates
- Present
The historical map of the twelve inherited scenarios
The existing positions and aliases are preserved as an editorial orientation. The seven project-authored additions are described in the catalogue rather than assigned invented coordinates. The list above is the complete collection; map positions never enter preference matching.
Source and scope
The twelve inherited concepts are credited to Max Tegmark’s Life 3.0, chapter 5. FLI’s scenario reference anchors short original-premise paraphrases. Original names and prior project aliases remain visible. Attribution does not imply permission or endorsement.
New scenarios, life-and-institution accounts, comparisons and feature descriptors are project-authored hypothetical or editorial material. Each entry identifies what is unspecified. Earlier unsupported current-development and community-attribution claims remain withheld; no current scientific headline is used to establish a future or its likelihood.
futures-catalogue-0.3 · Sources checked 11 September 2026. Catalogue matching is separate from Foundation and AI Governance scoring. General choices and expectations stay in page memory; The Departure is optional and contributes no answers to either.