The Putnam Institute

The internet professionalized attention extraction; AI will professionalize decision mediation. If we carry forward the old incentives, we will automate distrust at scale. The Putnam Institute intervenes at this hinge point: to articulate first principles for trustworthy systems and to convert those principles into standards that cities, colleges, and companies can adopt without sacrificing growth or freedom.

The Institute begins from a simple premise: trust is infrastructure. Just as roads, grids, and networks make prosperity possible, so too do the invisible bonds of reciprocity and legitimacy. Where institutions consume more trust than they return, collapse follows. Where systems return value for attention, reward honesty over manipulation, and provide rules that are predictable and fair, trust compounds. Our task is to ensure that as AI moves into the heart of civic and commercial life, it becomes a builder of trust rather than its extractor.

This requires new frameworks that translate ideals into design. Reciprocity must be engineered into interactions so that users, companies, and cities all share in the benefits of AI mediation. Neutral refereeing must replace hidden manipulation, ensuring that decision-making systems act as fair arbiters rather than merchants of attention. Transparency must be the default, allowing claims and incentives to be seen, tested, and improved. Legitimacy must be measurable, with standards and indices that allow progress to be audited rather than asserted. These are not abstract aspirations but operating rules that make trustworthy growth possible.