Princeton economist uses AI to stage a talk with John Maynard Keynes

In short: A Princeton economist held an online event where an AI-generated “John Maynard Keynes” answered questions about today’s AI and the future of work.

What happened

Markus Brunnermeier, an economist at Princeton University, ran a webinar called “A Conversation with John Maynard AI Keynes: About AI, Generated by AI.” Princeton’s Bendheim Center for Finance listed it as part of Brunnermeier’s “Markus’ Academy” series. The event took place on December 30, 2025, and Princeton’s economics department posted an event page on January 7, 2026.

In the webinar, Brunnermeier used an AI-generated version of John Maynard Keynes, a famous economist who died in 1946. Think of it like a chatbot that speaks in the style of Keynes by drawing on what he wrote, rather than a real person brought back to life.

The conversation revisited Keynes’s older ideas in light of modern artificial intelligence. It focused in part on his 1930 essay “Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren,” and touched on themes like technological progress, how economies recover from shocks, and financial bubbles.

Why it matters

Keynes once predicted that technology could make people so productive that many might only need to work about 15 hours a week to meet their basic material needs. That has not become the standard workweek, but the question behind it still matters. If AI and other tools reduce the amount of human labor needed, who benefits, and how people use the extra time and wealth becomes a real policy and social issue.

The event description also makes clear that the AI “Keynes” is not a final authority. Its answers should be treated as AI-made interpretations of Keynes’s published ideas, not proof of what he would truly say about technologies he never saw.

Source: NYTimes