About
Kester Brewin
Kester Brewin is the author of God-like: a 500-Year History of Artificial Intelligence in Myths, Machines, Monsters, and Associate Director at the Institute for the Future of Work, an independent research and development institute exploring how new technologies are transforming both work and wellbeing.
Based in London, he speaks to schools, universities, festivals and conferences across the UK about AI, work and what it means to be human alongside our most powerful tools.
Why Claude Have Mercy!?
Because the conversation about AI deserves better.
Most talk about AI swings between breathless hype and end-of-the-world doom. Neither helps a fourteen-year-old choosing their options, a teacher planning next term or a team wondering what their jobs will look like.
Claude Have Mercy! is my attempt to do better: to take the research seriously and the audience seriously, without taking myself too seriously. Informed, but informal. It draws on years of writing about the myths and history behind AI, and on my day job thinking about how technology changes work and wellbeing.
The title is a plea and a joke at the same time. We’re handing more of our lives to machines we don’t fully understand. The least we can do is understand the story we’re in.
Day job
Institute for the Future of Work
As Associate Director at IFOW, Kester works with an independent research and development institute exploring how new technologies are transforming both work and wellbeing. That research sits behind everything in Claude Have Mercy!.
Speaking
Where you might have seen him
Parliament
Evidence to the House of Commons Education Select Committee, June 2026.
Festivals
Greenbelt Festival, and Brazen at Bristol Tech Week.
Universities
University of Bristol and Kingston University.
Schools
Assemblies and workshops at leading UK schools.
Book Kester
Let’s talk about your event.
Schools, festivals, conferences or a night in your city. Send a few details and Kester will get back to you.