July 2025 issue
Daron Acemoglu reveals what tech bros won’t say about AI, while Peter Hoskin explains how gaming made the future. Plus, Neil Kinnock on Labour’s “paralytic caution”, Alona Ferber tours settler Jerusalem & Atul Dev on US universities’ capitulation to Trump
Past issues
A white robot puts a finger to its lips. Illustration by Justin Metz
Technology
AI’s biggest secret: we can shape it
Artificial intelligence is poised to transform the world. Tech bros want it to subjugate us—but it doesn’t have to be that way
Daron Acemoglu
Editor’s Picks
A helicopter flies overhead through grey skies, next to the Butler Library. Image: Indy Scholtens-Getty Images
When students protested, Columbia capitulated
Atul Dev
Jerusalem deputy mayor, Arieh King. Illustration by Elizabeth Sanduvete
The Englishman on a crusade to ban UNRWA
Alona Ferber
Anti-Brexit campaigner Steve Bray in London in September 2019. Image: Shakeyjon / Alamy
The strange death of the Rejoin campaign
Ben Ansell
Image: Qilai Shen / Bloomberg via Getty Images
The ghosts who took vengeance for China’s polluting past
Isabel Hilton
Illustration by Björn Griesbach
Confronting the enigma of Muriel Spark
Rhodri Lewis
Image: Alamy
Deborah Levy: ‘At the close of a novel, the world must become bigger’
Rebecca Swirsky
People
Image: John Watson
Diane Abbott: ‘Party leaders want MPs that keep quiet’
Imaan Irfan
Image: Alamy
Deborah Levy: ‘At the close of a novel, the world must become bigger’
Rebecca Swirsky
Image: Gavin Rodgers / Alamy Stock Photo
Naga Munchetty: The BBC mustn’t stop trying to earn trust
Graeme Green
Antony Gormley’s sculpture For Derry’s Walls. Image: Studio 70SN / Alamy Stock Photo
Antony Gormley: ‘If we carry on as usual, we won’t have a world’
Lara Olszowska
Simon Armitage
Simon Armitage: ‘I went into poetry because it was alternative’
Tom Clark
Regulars
Letters: July 2025
Stephen Collins’s cartoon: Starmer’s Farage tribute
Illustratio: Michael Rea
William Dalrymple: How Victorian Britain undermined Indian culture
Prospect Team
Columns
Illustration: Vincent Kilbride
AI isn’t magic. It’s just weird
Ethan Zuckerman
A May Day rally in New York. Image: Sipa US /Alamy
The uncomfortable truth about progressive groupthink
Sasha Mudd
The day we ran for our lives in Gaza
Youmna El Sayed
Anti-Brexit campaigner Steve Bray in London in September 2019. Image: Shakeyjon / Alamy
The strange death of the Rejoin campaign
Ben Ansell
Illustration by Andy Smith
Only chatbots use em dashes—or do they?
Sarah Ogilvie
Features
A white robot puts a finger to its lips. Illustration by Justin Metz
AI’s biggest secret: we can shape it
Daron Acemoglu
How video games wrote the future
Peter Hoskin
Jerusalem deputy mayor, Arieh King. Illustration by Elizabeth Sanduvete
The Englishman on a crusade to ban UNRWA
Alona Ferber
A helicopter flies overhead through grey skies, next to the Butler Library. Image: Indy Scholtens-Getty Images
When students protested, Columbia capitulated
Atul Dev
Image: Sarah Lee
Neil Kinnock: Labour is ‘100 per cent wrong’ on Reform
Alan Rusbridger
Culture
Illustration by Gregori Saavedra
The founding fathers of Trumpism
Tom Clark
Image: Qilai Shen / Bloomberg via Getty Images
The ghosts who took vengeance for China’s polluting past
Isabel Hilton
Illustration by David McAllister
Painting by numbers: the magnificent ties between maths and art
Daniel Rey
On my mind: a doctor measure the brainwaves of a patient at Sutton Emergency Hospital in the 1940s. Image: Fox Photos / Getty Images
Mental problems: the overdiagnosis of overdiagnosis
Sarah Collins
Illustration by Björn Griesbach
Confronting the enigma of Muriel Spark
Rhodri Lewis
Books in brief: what to read this June
“The criticism felt as though people weren’t giving the building the opportunity to be contemporarily valid.” Annabelle Selldorf. Image: National Gallery
“I have an enormous amount of respect for this building.” Annabelle Selldorf on her National Gallery redesign
David McAllister
Rumour mill: Siena Kelly, Tanya Reynolds and Liv Hill in “1536”. Image: Helen Murray
Our Boleyn: how gen Z is recasting Henry VIII’s second wife
Kate Maltby
We love Hamm really, but he could do to be a bit less talkative in his latest series. Image: FlixPix / Alamy
Oh, do shut up, Jon Hamm
Imogen West-Knights
Absolutely electrifying: baritone Dietrich Fischer Dieskau in 1969. Image: United Archives GmbH / Alamy
Classical notes: The song of history
Ian Bostridge
Lives
Illustration by Clara Nicoll
Mindful life: I’m reclaiming crying in public as mysterious and chic
Sarah Collins
Illustration by Clara Nicholl
Second life: A Soviet-era meal of eggs and flies nearly killed me
Vitali Vitaliev
Illustration of Tilly Lawless by Clara Nicoll
Sex life: The first time I orgasmed with a client was intimacy overload
Tilly Lawless
Illustration by Clara Nicoll
Long life: I’m sick of wretched pop music being played wherever I go
Sheila Hancock
My ‘big’ life in rural Wales
Kiran Sidhu
Illustration by Clara Nicoll
The strange ritual of confirmation
Alice Goodman
Illustration by Clara Nicoll
Young life: Why I’ll be getting my pooch out this summer
Alice Garnett
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