The Modus Ponens Institute (MPI Education Inc.) is a company founded by two passionate students of Philosophy and Debate, Zach Bloom (MA, University of British Columbia) and Archie Stapleton (MA, Harvard Divinity School). Since its founding in 2024, MPI teaches over 20 online weekly classes in Debate, Philosophy, Psychology, Ethics Olympiads, Public Speaking, and Writing. Recently, they have worked with students at Greenwich Academy in Connecticut to prepare them for the Ethics Olympiad competition and guided students to victory at the NHSDLC Public Forum Debate Nationals in Shanghai, China. Aside from running classes, MPI is the co-founder of the Pan Am Ethics Olympiad, the TKEthics Global Olympiad, and the Global AI Debates, all competitions which foster critical thinking, public speaking, and writing skills in junior, middle, and high school-aged students across Australia, Canada, the USA, Singapore, and South Korea.
External link for MPI Education Inc.
Vancouver, British Columbia, CA
So excited for our first project!
Philosophy grows when communities connect 🤝 Philosium is proud to announce its partnership with MPI Education Inc. — and through them, three international programs shaping the next generation of ethical thinkers: • Ethics Olympiad • TKEthics • Global AI Debates Different formats, different audiences — but one shared conviction: thinking carefully about the world is something worth building together. 🌍 More to come. → www.philosium.com
Register with early bird discount for the fall tournament today! https://lnkd.in/ePiZ_6_9
51 student submissions, 69 students, five countries. The Spring Global AI Debates are a wrap for 2026! The judges were genuinely impressed by how seriously students engaged with the topic, which was "We support the Future of Life Institute (FLI) Statement on Super-intelligence", and we want to congratulation all students who participated! Here are the results: Primary Speech (7–10): Schools should use AI teachers: Gold: Carter Ong Finalists: Alp Mutlu, Ahanika Ghosh Middle Speech (11–13): AI will be bad for the media ecosystem Gold: Haejoon Lim Silver: Sana Vinoth Finalist: Soha Subramanian Senior Speech (14–18): We support the FLI Statement on Superintelligence Gold: Elaine Kim Silver: Eugene Choi Bronze: Rora Kim Essay & Debate Champions: @Daniel Chu, Jemin Jeon, Milo Takemoto (Foothill High School) Finalists: Sahayu Raja, Ameen Patel, Eric Shen, Yaesh Alimchandani, Pranav Elaprolu (Irvington High School) Semifinalists: Keika Hirono and Shion Yagi (Japan); Navneet Prakash, Max Zhang, @Derek Liu (Irvington High School) Quarterfinalists: Three teams from Atheneum Youth (South Africa); Rose & Lesedi Johannah & Maya Mahdiyah & Kitana Elena Mentgen and Armin Rouwet (Alpha School) Huge thanks to our judges. Live finals: Tina Austin, Zach Bloom, Stefan Bauschard, Calvin Xu, Priten Soundar-Shah, John Thomas Connor, Nelson Spence. Preliminary rounds: Jonathan Barry, Paula Boddington, Joseph Getto, Davida Paul, Euthymia Soulanticas. And thank you again to the Future of Life Institute (FLI) Institute for their support of the season. Fall 2026 registration is open at globalaidebates.org.
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Judges make this tournament great. These judges make this tournament the greatest! Euthymia Soulanticas and Joseph Getto are both signed on as judges for our upcoming event! Register by tomorrow, April 1st, and submit essays or speeches by April 15th! www.globalAIdebates.org
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Another phenomenal set of judges for the April Global AI Debates. Tina Austin an expert in Ethical AI in Education and Medicine, and Ben Levinstein alignment researcher at Anthropic and associate professor of philosophy at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Can't wait to have them! Register before April 10th!: https://lnkd.in/eFCECBXr
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Conversations with amazing coaches always give me inspiration to improve my own teaching. This was certainly the case when I met with Luke Calhoun, the coach of multiple champion Ethics Bowl teams at BASIS Charter Schools, Inc. in Flagstaff Arizona. In this conversation, we discuss - how Luke guides students to challenge their initial ethical intuitions - how to build a case - the difference between Debate and Ethics Bowl, - whether AI can be useful for doing ethics Please check it out-- and consider joining the Global AI Debates with registration due April 1st. www.globalaidebates.org Here is the full interview: https://lnkd.in/efDR7M_u
Register by April 1st for a chance to win a prize! $1900 USD prize pool available :)
Global AI Debates Spring 2026 registration closes soon! Students aged 7–18 tackle real questions in AI safety, governance, and the future of advanced systems. This year we received a $10,000 grant from the Future of Life Institute (FLI). It funds prizes and expands access for students worldwide. Max Tegmark, the founder, is doing much to support AI safety, and we think having students debate these questions is part of the solution. Prize pool: • $600 — Essay & Debate champion • $300 — Primary speech winner • $300 — Middle school speech winner • $300 — High school speech winner • $100 awards for top Urban Debate League students in each division Two tracks: • Speech (solo) • Essay + Debate (teams of 2–5) Judges include AI experts, including: Priten Soundar-Shah, Ayantola Alayande, and Arik Karim! If you work with students interested in AI and debate, please send them this post, and if you want to judge, just reach out! Details and registration: https://lnkd.in/eZSCC-vq Stefan Bauschard Archibald Stapleton Connor Aidan Stewart Hunter Anthropic OpenAI National Speech & Debate Association (NSDA) New York City Urban Debate League
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We’re proud to spotlight the first series of the DOE Training Program in Ethics and Philosophy. In this training program, students engaged deeply with questions around AI, morality, and responsibility while learning how to think clearly, argue thoughtfully, and navigate complex ideas with confidence. The sessions were rigorous, collaborative, and energising; exactly the kind of environment where purposeful leaders are shaped. We’re grateful to our training team Davida, Archibald, and Zach for bringing expertise, depth and global perspective to this first series. This is only the beginning! #TheDOEFoundation #EthicsAndPhilosophy #DebateTraining #YouthLeadership #CriticalThinking #PurposefulLeaders
What an incredible day of philosophical discourse and ethical reasoning! 🌟 A massive congratulations to all the coaches and "ethletes" who participated in the TKEthics Invitational Spring 2026. Our judges were blown away by the thoughtful insights and strong analytical skills every team brought to these complex cases. Join us in celebrating our Top 8 teams, all of whom have officially qualified for the 2026 International Grand Final on August 29th: 🥇 1st (Gold): Confucius (Archimedean Upper Conservatory) 🥈 2nd (Silver): Marx (The Nueva School School) 🥉 3rd (Bronze): Locke (Nueva School) 🏅 4th: Mencius (Nueva School) 🏅 5th: De Beauvoir (WLSA Shanghai Academy) 🏅 6th: Zhuxi (Dwight-Englewood School) 🏅 7th: Arendt (GE Elite) 🏅 8th: Aristotle (@Central East High School) 👏 We also want to recognize our Junior Spark Award winners—Arendt, Diogenes (Harvard-Westlake School), and Aquinas (GE Elite)—for their incredible courage in competing against senior opponents, as well as our Honorable Mentions: Confucius, Aristotle, Descartes (Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts), and Plato (Sydney Boys High School). Looking for another shot at the finals? Registration is still open for our upcoming qualifiers: 🇺🇸 Senior USA Ethics Olympiad (April 4) 🇨🇦 Senior Canada Ethics Olympiad (April 11) (Links in the comments!) Thank you to our amazing community for making this event a success. Follow us on Instagram (@mpi_ethicsolympiad) and TikTok (@archie.stapleton) for more updates. #TKEthics #EthicsOlympiad #PhilosophyEducation #EthicalReasoning #MarcSandersFoundation #FutureLeaders #CriticalThinking
Please join us, and reach out if you think you know any school that would benefit from philosophy training, and wouldn't otherwise be able to afford it!!
I'm very pleased to say that TKEthics and MPI Education Inc. has been awarded a grant from The Marc Sanders Foundation to the tune of $15,000 to support Philosophy education around the world. Here's how we're using the funds: 1) Scholarships and training: - Free and heavily subsidised training and scholarships for under-resourced schools preparing for our Ethics Olympiads or TKEthics Invitationals. - There is still time to prepare for the US, Canadian, or European Olympiad in April if we start soon! 2) A case writing prize! - We will open a case writing prize for students around the world! - The winners (up to 3) will have their cases used in our competition, and their school will receive a share of $1000 USD, earmarked to help build their philosophy program at their school. - The student/s who wrote the case will separately be awarded a share of $500 USD as prize money too! 3) Promotional budget: I have been travelling around US and Canada, attending ethics bowls, judging and promoting our programs! I have so far been at the Rhode Island Ethics Bowl at Brown University (National High School Ethics Bowl), the Lower Mainland British Columbia Ethics Bowl at Simon Fraser University (Cem Erkli, Nic Fillion, Ethics Bowl Canada), and the McGill University Montreal High School Ethics Bowl, and next week, I'm off to Kent Place School for the New Jersey Middle School Ethics Bowl this Saturday. It has been an absolute blast. I will continue to do this work, as well as find novel ways to promote public philosophy, including through my Tiktok and Instagram! I could use your help: if you know schools or institutions who would appreciate introductions to Ethics, Philosophy, or Olympiads-- I would love to chat. Thanks to everyone (especially the Marc Sanders Foundation!) who has contributed to the growth of the programs so far, we can't wait to continue the mission.