On September 30, 2026, Murmuration brought together researchers, organizers, journalists, and civic leaders in Boston for More Human: Life, Democracy, and Connection in the Age of AI, an exploration of how artificial intelligence is changing the ways we learn, connect, organize, and participate in civic life. Across a series of lightning talks, speakers Sarah Stamper, Abby Binder, Danielle Allen, and Susan Page examined AI’s implications for human connection, trust, learning, and democracy. Grounded in Murmuration’s research supported by the Walton Family Foundation, AI and the Human Future: Americans’ Views on Artificial Intelligence Across Life, Society, and Democracy, the conversations challenged us to look beyond what technology can do and consider what we want it to help us build—and how we can keep people, relationships, and communities at the center of our future.
About Abby Binder:
Abby works to strengthen community wellbeing by centering young people’s lived experiences—especially Gen Z’s digital-native perspective—in conversations about our collective future. With a background in developmental psychology and societal trends, she brings both research and lived experience to advancing intergenerational collaboration and providing young leaders with the support they need to create change.
As Director of People and Partnerships at Civics Unplugged, she guides young people as they find purposeful work and builds the partnerships that help them shape a future rooted in care, community, and connection. She is also a fellow with The Rithm Project.
Continue reading for the full transcript
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
I'm Abby Binder, and I am a leader in the Rithm Project Changemaker Network. The Rithm Project is on a mission to build the intergenerational leadership force needed to reclaim and evolve human connection in the age of AI.
I'm also a researcher, and I've been working with young people for my career–I'm technically a young person myself. I'm Elder Gen Z, as the youth I work with call me.
What I see in my work is that young people are more disconnected than ever, even more than seniors. They're in the years of their lives where they are asking, "Who am I? What do I value? What am I good at?" And generative AI is making finding those answers a lot more complicated. Sixty-one percent of young people say their parents rarely talk to them about AI, and if they do, it's mostly about cheating in school.
So I just want to paint a picture for a moment. All of us know that feeling of being at the beach, jumping in the waves, and you're like, "Ugh, I'm hungry. I'm ready to go in." And you turn around only to see that your umbrella is all the way down on the other end of the beach, and you wonder, "How did I get all the way over here?" This, the moment we're in with AI. We're drifting into new places without actively choosing that direction. So today, I'm gonna talk to you about some of the currents that are moving young people today.
Current number one: we're moving from building relationships through technology to having relationships with technology. Young people tell us that they turn to AI companions because they're accessible, and they don't judge them. These are understandable reasons, and when they do turn to an AI companion, they're five times more likely to choose that AI companion over a human moving forward.
Current number two: AI is shifting the culture of what's real and authentic. We're writing texts, emails, birthday cards, LinkedIn posts with AI. We are creating images of each other. We're actively renegotiating what it is to be authentic, to be human, and what we're okay to outsource to AI.
Current number three: AI is impacting our inner voice, actively shaping our identity and how we understand ourselves. Young people are choosing AI wearables to gather data on themselves, figure out their preferences and patterns, and build an identity. In that way, it can also hurt our self-confidence.
Earlier this year, when I started my Substack, I was constantly fighting the urge to run my writing through AI. I had spent years learning how to write and being told I was good at it, and so why all of a sudden was I thinking, "Is my voice good enough?" If that can happen in your twenties, imagine the pressure at 15.
The Rhythm project created a card game called the AI Effect, and each card asks us, "Does this use of AI support, erode, or depend on our human connection?" So here's a card. Talking to an AI-preserved version of a beloved relative who has passed away. We're gonna do a quick raising of hands to show support for each scenario. Do we think this supports human connection? Does it erode human connection? Or what about it might depend? Yeah. So in this room, we all had a lot of different opinions, and these are the conversations that we need to start having.
AI and big tech don't get to decide what remains human. We do, and we have to set the norms together, especially with our young people. We have to make this moment more talkable and less black and white. So ask the young people in your life, "How are you using AI? What is coming up with your friends in conversation? How do you feel about using AI?" And then actively listen. Don't jump to conclusions, judge, or bring shame into the conversation.
Finally, we're already in the water. AI is already here, so we need to help young people build discernment and understand their agency so they can figure out when to swim and when it's time to get out of the water. We can shape the future we want to live in, but we have to build it together.