RHODES
LARSON
Rhodes Larson is a competitive athlete with passions for political science, economics, and physics who believes that using innovation to facilitate open and honest communication between “different” populations is critical to making the world a better place.
My Story
Rhodes enjoys following current events. He used to primarily watch CNN. However, when he changed the channel to Fox News, he noticed that the two channels framed events in very different ways. In fact, the two channels were oftentimes covering completely different events. This introduced Rhodes to the political polarization that characterizes American and international politics today. Rhodes became intrigued by the blurred line between fact and opinion. He had thought he was hearing facts on CNN, only to hear a contradictory set of “facts” on Fox News. Rhodes believes that the framing of an opinion as an indisputable fact is a threat to the free and open debate that produces good ideas and that technology could be used to either exacerbate or ameliorate this threat.
Rhodes started a debate club at his school in order to practice and promote robust and open-minded dialogue. He likes that debate forces students to meaningfully consider each side of an issue. He loves learning about novel theories of politics and science and has recently been inspired by reading Sapiens, The Order of Time and Dead Aid, among other books. He’s currently enrolled in the course “Moral Foundations of Politics” offered by Yale University and is writing a research paper on the dangers of new countries developing nuclear weapons in today’s climate of uncertainty and shifting alliances. He has been a competitive junior golfer for several years and recently started training to run track competitively.
Rhodes looks forward to bridging the future of diplomacy with the innovation of AI and physics at the UN Science Technology and Innovation Forum 2025 . For his college and beyond, he aims to explore the impact of new technologies on society and government.