Two Davos Horizons, Yet No AI Fusion

January 2026 was my fourth Davos, and I have learned that each one is shaped by themes not envisaged beforehand. This year was no different: geopolitics and AI predominated (in that order), but the official “spirit of dialogue” proved elusive.

The repurposed resort is in a valley flanked by two long mountain ridgelines. That means it also has two horizons, depending on whether you look at Parsenn-Weissfluhjoch to the north-east or Jakobshorn-Schatzalp to the south-west.

I know I should have just enjoyed the view, but the landscape reminded me of my favourite German philosopher, Hans-Georg Gadamer, who similarly embraced both a spirit of dialogue and the idea of two horizons.

For him, “horizons” represent the personal histories that form what we would now call “priors” or “preconceptions” – the place we are “coming from”. Although inevitably biased and fallible, Gadamer believed that “fusing” different horizons together through dialogue could generate new understanding about the