AI safety: From the Fence to the Field

Despite the popular notion, AI safety is close to the opposite of doom/luddism - many of the same ideas and people behind it also built the AI breakthroughs we have today.

Ankur will cover various tribes & camps in AI safety — and how the same safety/alignment problems are interpreted differently by various camps. He’ll get into underserved areas / blind spots where India can play a role — a strong build-stuff culture, representing ‘middle powers’, etc. Ankur will cover what one can do in AI safety today! - technical work is only one type, and despite the name, governance work can be pretty technical. He’ll cover the intellectual predecessors of AI safety - Effective Altruism, Rationality, etc. He’ll also discuss economics and the job market in AI safety - how (outside big labs) it’s largely philanthropy-driven. About the speaker: Ankur Pandey was first introduced to proto-AI safety (then called Friendly AI) through interactions with MIRI, the Centre for Effective Altruism, and Singularity University - about 13 years back. At the time, it felt like worrying about overpopulation on Mars.

He spent the years in between in applied ML, and then as a founder across three bootstrapped startups, including LongShot AI. He has Been a fellow at SPAR, AI Safety Camp, and an invited guest at workshops like Principles of Intelligence, ConCon (Digital Minds), and EA Global. He has consulted for Alice on AI security, currently consults/contributes for Groundless.ai on AI dependency risks, and continues independent AI safety work. Perhaps more importantly, he is building a global fellowship around AI safety for builders. Pre-read: Priority AI risks - MIT survey of 272 AI experts ranking which risks are most severe and who's responsible for them The Two Cultures of AI Safety: Catastrophists vs Uniformitarians The Case for a ‘Normal’ AI Future Join online: meet.google.com/mdi-pgne-ume Looking forward to seeing you!

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