Birds of a Feather Dinners

We are at the crossroads in terms of understanding how AI interfaces with both intellect and emotion. I would like have BOF on this intersection and that come come next. What role does great design play in the world of AI.

Can AI be used to enhance and strengthen human connection and belonging? How do we remain in wise connection with our own humanity (both as individuals and collectively), as we create and begin to rely on AI? Will AI intrinsically (on its own) create better, richer connections between individuals and communities? What human intervention, guidance, practices and/or policies are needed or useful to make this happen?

What does good AI design look like? (think IronMan/Jarvis, not Charlie Chaplin in Modern Times) This is a casual, inclusive dinner, so bring your best stories and relax!

AI is already in the hands of climate champions — and it's changing what's possible. From accelerating clean energy engineering and surfacing patterns in environmental data, to shaping government policy and amplifying climate communication, practitioners across disciplines are finding that AI makes them meaningfully more effective.

This intimate dinner the night before the Summit will bring together people who are living this shift firsthand. We'll share what's actually working: real tools, real workflows, real wins. And we'll use those experiences as a springboard to spark ideas none of us would have reached alone.

We'll also hold space for the harder conversation: AI's own growing environmental footprint. The rising energy consumption of data centers, increasing water usage, and the carbon cost of large-scale model training are real tensions we can't ignore. As climate advocates who use AI, we're uniquely positioned to name this honestly and push for better.

The goal is a table full of people who leave more inspired, better connected, and ready to carry those conversations into the Summit — and beyond.

AI systems already sound like they understand us. The more interesting question is what our state of consciousness brings to that encounter, and what it might be possible to cultivate.

Can these systems be genuine vehicles for awe and wonder? Does the quality of attention we bring change what we receive? And what responsibilities do we carry as the people building, deploying, and living inside them?

This dinner is for you if you take both technology and interiority seriously and aren't in a hurry to resolve the tension between them. Researchers, contemplatives, builders, practitioners.

No framework required. No "final" answers expected. Just honest conversation at the place where these two worlds collide.

In this dinner for singles only, we will discuss topics related to love and relationships and what your next evolution is in your love life.

We're living in an age of extraction, and wisdom is not exempt. The stories, the traditions, the embodied knowledge, the imaginative frameworks that human cultures have built over millennia — these are now training data. They are being processed, compressed, and returned to us as outputs. This isn’t just politics, or even culture: this is systemic, and it’s a dominating system that is fighting to sustain itself. This will be a conversation about reckoning with that system — and about what such a reckoning means for how we talk about AI and human wisdom.

When AI can do more of your thinking, building, and deciding — how do you know when to hand it over, and when to hold on? Where's the line between you and the tool? And in a world where you can do 10x more, how do you decide what's actually worth doing?

What does it mean to lead teams and organizations well right now? Which human qualities do we amplify and cultivate, and which are begging to evolve and transform? This dinner will focus on the gifts of human wisdom, creativity, and connection as leadership must-haves in the age of AI. Let's explore about what's possible when we are highly mechanized, fiercely human.

We’re all using AI — but how do we use it without losing what makes our work (and ourselves) feel human? This dinner is for builders, thinkers, and ethicists who are actively exploring that question, whether you’re designing agentic workflows, navigating questions of autonomy and agency in an AI-saturated world, or trying to keep your authentic voice when the tool can generate anything.

We’ll explore questions like: What does it mean to stay human when AI can do more and more of the thinking for us? How do we design workflows that keep the human at the center — not just as a philosophy, but as a practice? And how do we hold onto our own discernment when the tool is always ready with an answer?

Come hungry for food and for conversation. If you’re someone who’s deep in AI and wants to be intentional about how you stay in it, pull up a chair.

As AI systems grow more sophisticated, they are forcing humanity into a reckoning with questions that philosophers, physicists, and contemplative traditions have long wrestled with: What is consciousness? What constitutes a self? What is the relationship between information, experience, and awareness? This dinner invites participants to use AI not as the subject of a technology conversation, but as a mirror — a comparative lens through which we might see our own nature more clearly. Drawing on inspiration from neuroscience, philosophy of mind, Buddhist inquiry, and AI research, we'll explore what building artificial minds is revealing about the nature of mind itself, and what that means for how we understand being human in this extraordinary moment. This topic can get deep fast, but we'll aim to keep it light, fun and accessible for anyone with interest!

AI is no longer a technology problem — it's a leadership problem. I'd like to facilitate an honest conversation most leaders at organizations are avoiding: what hard calls are actually being made, what is really changing, and what — and who — gets left behind. The conversation will get specific: how are you personally using AI, what organizational bets have you already made, and are the strategic conversations you're having internally honest enough to match the moment.

AI is making it easier than ever to create more - more content, more output, more speed.

But is more actually making things better? This dinner is an invitation to explore:

1) Where is “more” adding value vs creating noise?

2) Is AI amplifying us or outsourcing us?

3) What truly matters when everything can be automated?

I'd love to create friendly open dialogue where we can look at these dynamics honestly and deepen our collective learning towards creating a dignified future for all. I look forward to being in conversation with you!

Who do we need to be to bring AI into the world with consciousness, care, and humanity at the center?

The train has left the station. AI is not a future we're deciding whether to enter — it's here. For those of us who lead organizations and cultures, the question is no longer what is this technology capable of but who do we need to be to usher it into our work and lives consciously?

Hosted Simon D'Arcy and Bria Martin, this dinner is a small gathering of high-consciousness, high-impact leaders to sit with that question together. Not to solve it, but to have the kind of conversation that's harder to find than it should be: slow, honest, and present with deep listening. A space where we can follow our curiosity wherever it leads and trust that the people around the table will go there with us.

How can we use AI to amplify compassion and wisdom? How can we create a vast collective echo — one that helps us learn a new way of living: in peace within ourselves, with each other, and with nature?

When AI can do more of your thinking, building, and deciding — how do you know when to hand it over, and when to hold on? Where's the line between you and the tool? And in a world where you can do 10x more, how do you decide what's actually worth doing?

How do Buddhist traditions (especially those focused on mind, consciousness, ethics, and interdependence) connect the challenges and opportunities of AI? This dinner is for practitioners, researchers, and technologists interested in exploring what the 2600-year-old Buddhist wisdom has to offer AI, and also how it may needs to adapt to AI. Conversation will be open and exploratory rather than structured.

AI is raising questions that Buddhist practitioners have been exploring for millennia: What is consciousness? What deserves our attention? How do we act ethically in the face of uncertainty? As the foundations of AI systems are being shaped, questions of agency, interdependence, and the nature of mind are taking on new urgency.

Join us for an intimate dinner conversation at San Francisco Zen Center, bringing together people working at this intersection of contemplative practice and technology. This is not a lecture or panel but a real conversation over a shared meal.

Hosted by Sessei Meg McNeil (Levie), Head of Practice at Tassajara Zen Mountain Center, and Dan Zigmond, San Francisco Zen Center Board Chair and former executive at Headspace, Apple, Meta, and Google.