AI and policy leaders debate web of effective altruism in AI security
VentureBeat
VB is obsessed with transformative technology — including exhaustive coverage of AI and the gaming industry.
Welcome to another edition of ?? The AI Beat ??!
Last month, I reported on the widening web of connections between the effective altruism (EA) movement and AI security policy circles — from top AI startups like Anthropic to DC think tanks like RAND Corporation. These are linking EA, with its laser-focus on preventing what its adherents say are catastrophic risks to humanity from future AGI, to a wide swath of DC think tanks, government agencies and congressional staff.?
Critics of the EA focus on this existential risk, or ‘x-risk,’?say it is happening?to the detriment of a necessary focus on current, measurable AI risks — including bias, misinformation, high-risk applications and traditional cybersecurity.?
Since then, I’ve been curious about what other AI and policy leaders outside the effective altruism movement —?but who are also not aligned with the polar opposite belief system, effective accelerationism (e/acc) — really think about this. Do other LLM companies feel equally concerned about the risk of LLM model weights getting into the wrong hands, for example? Do DC policy makers and watchers fully understand EA influence on AI security efforts??
At a moment when Anthropic, well known for its wide range of EA ties, is publishing new research about “sleeper agent” AI models that dupe safety checks meant to catch harmful behavior, and even Congress has expressed concerns about a potential AI research partnership between the National Institute of Standards and Safety (NIST) and RAND, this seems to me to be an important question.?
In addition, EA made worldwide headlines most recently in connection with the firing of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, as its?non-employee nonprofit board members?all had EA connections.?
What I discovered in my latest interviews is an interesting mix of deep concern about EA’s billionaire-funded ideological bent and its growing reach and influence over the AI security debate in Washington DC, as well as an acknowledgement by some that AI risks that go beyond the short-term are an important part of the DC policy discussion.?
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