Brendan McCord

Brendan McCord is the Founder and Chair of the Cosmos Institute, an academy cultivating philosopher-builders to guide artificial intelligence toward human flourishing. Launched in 2024, the institute established the Human-Centered AI Lab at the University of Oxford, alongside fellowship and fast grants programs supporting a new generation of builders, researchers, and thought leaders.

In the private sector, McCord was the founding CEO of two AI startups acquired for a combined $400 million. He served as President of an AI lab within an investment holding company that returned billions to its investors and later joined the executive team of a 15,000-person enterprise, leading data and AI strategy at the fastest-growing company in its market’s history.

In the public sector, McCord founded the Department of Defense’s first applied AI organisation and authored the DoD’s inaugural AI strategy. He played a central role in developing the Department’s ethical AI principles with senior leadership and drafted the first prototype of what would become the CHIPS and Science Act. His work has spanned from military AI planning based on imperfect information game-solving, to deployments in remote regions such as Zamboanga and the Arctic. A former submarine officer, McCord spent 610 days underwater in operations around the globe.

McCord teaches a graduate seminar on AI and philosophy at the University of Oxford, where he was also a Visiting Fellow at St Catherine’s College. He serves on the Board of the Mercatus Center and the Advisory Board of the Harvard Data Science Review. He holds degrees from MIT and Harvard Business School and writes at the intersection of technology, ethics, and philosophical inquiry.

He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife and two children.