ESP Biography



DUNCAN SABIEN, Lifelong educator now teaching adult rationality



Major: Not available.

College/Employer: Curriculum Director at the Center for Applied Rationality in Berkeley

Year of Graduation: Not available.

Picture of Duncan Sabien

Brief Biographical Sketch:

Duncan first started teaching at age 14, when he began helping assist classes at his Tae Kwon Do academy. Since then, he has spent three years teaching middle schoolers in a project-based charter school in North Carolina, two years running a parkour gym in Seattle, Washington, and two years as the curriculum director at the Center for Applied Rationality in Berkeley.

He enjoys LEGOs, programming, artwork and "makery," parkour, filmmaking, and helping people level up. He's interested in having an impact on the world's largest problems (longevity, artificial intelligence, existential risk), and is easily manipulated by people quoting Ender's Game.



Past Classes

  (Clicking a class title will bring you to the course's section of the corresponding course catalog)

H12100: Making deep friendships - Circling in Spark 2018 (Mar. 17 - 18, 2018)
Most of your Spark classes will be about objects and things. Some of your conversations will involve personal history, where you grew up, what you like and dislike. This class will be a third kind of conversation, about what our present experience is, as we're having it. Access to this level of conversation has a way of facilitating deep connections where you can feel deeply seen and welcomed. Circling is a practice about getting others' worlds, sharing what it's really like to be you, and having that be seen and reflected. Come experience the magic.


H12101: Circling - Intersubjective Mindfulness Meditation in Spark 2018 (Mar. 17 - 18, 2018)
Most of your Spark classes will be about objects and things. Some of your conversations will involve personal history, where you grew up, what you like and dislike. This class will be a third kind of conversation, about what our present experience is, as we're having it. There's a kind of magic to being deeply seen, and to being welcomed as you are. Circling is a practice about getting others' worlds, and sharing what it's really like to be you, and having that be seen and reflected. Come experience the magic


X12158: Winning Arguments with Grownups in Spark 2018 (Mar. 17 - 18, 2018)
Something like half of the disagreements between kids, teens, and their parents and teachers comes from just being on different communication wavelengths, rather than *actually* having incompatible goals. If you can fix the *way* that you're arguing, you can make the argument go away—and often in a way that leaves the grownup understanding what you want, and willing to help you get it.