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Explore every episode of the podcast Future of Life Institute Podcast
Dive into the complete episode list for Future of Life Institute Podcast. Each episode is cataloged with detailed descriptions, making it easy to find and explore specific topics. Keep track of all episodes from your favorite podcast and never miss a moment of insightful content.
| Title | Pub. Date | Duration | |
|---|---|---|---|
| How Will We Cooperate with AIs? (with Allison Duettmann) | 11 Apr 2025 | 01:36:02 | |
On this episode, Allison Duettmann joins me to discuss centralized versus decentralized AI, how international governance could shape AI’s trajectory, how we might cooperate with future AIs, and the role of AI in improving human decision-making. We also explore which lessons from history apply to AI, the future of space law and property rights, whether technology is invented or discovered, and how AI will impact children. You can learn more about Allison's work at: https://foresight.org Timestamps: 00:00:00 Preview 00:01:07 Centralized AI versus decentralized AI 00:13:02 Risks from decentralized AI 00:25:39 International AI governance 00:39:52 Cooperation with future AIs 00:53:51 AI for decision-making 01:05:58 Capital intensity of AI 01:09:11 Lessons from history 01:15:50 Future space law and property rights 01:27:28 Is technology invented or discovered? 01:32:34 Children in the age of AI | |||
| Brain-like AGI and why it's Dangerous (with Steven Byrnes) | 04 Apr 2025 | 01:13:13 | |
On this episode, Steven Byrnes joins me to discuss brain-like AGI safety. We discuss learning versus steering systems in the brain, the distinction between controlled AGI and social-instinct AGI, why brain-inspired approaches might be our most plausible route to AGI, and honesty in AI models. We also talk about how people can contribute to brain-like AGI safety and compare various AI safety strategies. You can learn more about Steven's work at: https://sjbyrnes.com/agi.html Timestamps: 00:00 Preview 00:54 Brain-like AGI Safety 13:16 Controlled AGI versus Social-instinct AGI 19:12 Learning from the brain 28:36 Why is brain-like AI the most likely path to AGI? 39:23 Honesty in AI models 44:02 How to help with brain-like AGI safety 53:36 AI traits with both positive and negative effects 01:02:44 Different AI safety strategies | |||
| Nick Allardice on Using AI to Optimize Cash Transfers and Predict Disasters | 19 Dec 2024 | 01:09:26 | |
Nick Allardice joins the podcast to discuss how GiveDirectly uses AI to target cash transfers and predict natural disasters. Learn more about Nick's work here: https://www.nickallardice.com Timestamps: 00:00 What is GiveDirectly? 15:04 AI for targeting cash transfers 29:39 AI for predicting natural disasters 46:04 How scalable is GiveDirectly's AI approach? 58:10 Decentralized vs. centralized data collection 1:04:30 Dream scenario for GiveDirectly | |||
| Nicolas Berggruen on the Dynamics of Power, Wisdom, and Ideas in the Age of AI | 01 Jun 2021 | 01:08:16 | |
Nicolas Berggruen, investor and philanthropist, joins us to explore the dynamics of power, wisdom, technology and ideas in the 21st century.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-What wisdom consists of
-The role of ideas in society and civilization
-The increasing concentration of power and wealth
-The technological displacement of human labor
-Democracy, universal basic income, and universal basic capital
-Living an examined life
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/05/31/nicolas-berggruen-on-the-dynamics-of-power-wisdom-technology-and-ideas-in-the-age-of-ai/
Check out Nicolas' thoughts archive here: www.nicolasberggruen.com
Have any feedback about the podcast? You can share your thoughts here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/DRBFZCT
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:45 The race between the power of our technology and the wisdom with which we manage it
5:19 What is wisdom?
8:30 The power of ideas
11:06 Humanity’s investment in wisdom vs the power of our technology
15:39 Why does our wisdom lag behind our power?
20:51 Technology evolving into an agent
24:28 How ideas play a role in the value alignment of technology
30:14 Wisdom for building beneficial AI and mitigating the race to power
34:37 Does Mark Zuckerberg have control of Facebook?
36:39 Safeguarding the human mind and maintaining control of AI
42:26 The importance of the examined life in the 21st century
45:56 An example of the examined life
48:54 Important ideas for the 21st century
52:46 The concentration of power and wealth, and a proposal for universal basic capital
1:03:07 Negative and positive futures
1:06:30 Final thoughts from Nicolas
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Bart Selman on the Promises and Perils of Artificial Intelligence | 20 May 2021 | 01:41:03 | |
Bart Selman, Professor of Computer Science at Cornell University, joins us to discuss a wide range of AI issues, from autonomous weapons and AI consciousness to international governance and the possibilities of superintelligence.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Negative and positive outcomes from AI in the short, medium, and long-terms
-The perils and promises of AGI and superintelligence
-AI alignment and AI existential risk
-Lethal autonomous weapons
-AI governance and racing to powerful AI systems
-AI consciousness
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/05/20/bart-selman-on-the-promises-and-perils-of-artificial-intelligence/
Have any feedback about the podcast? You can share your thoughts here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/DRBFZCT
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:35 Futures that Bart is excited about
4:08 Positive futures in the short, medium, and long-terms
7:23 AGI timelines
8:11 Bart’s research on “planning” through the game of Sokoban
13:10 If we don’t go extinct, is the creation of AGI and superintelligence inevitable?
15:28 What’s exciting about futures with AGI and superintelligence?
17:10 How long does it take for superintelligence to arise after AGI?
21:08 Would a superintelligence have something intelligent to say about income inequality?
23:24 Are there true or false answers to moral questions?
25:30 Can AGI and superintelligence assist with moral and philosophical issues?
28:07 Do you think superintelligences converge on ethics?
29:32 Are you most excited about the short or long-term benefits of AI?
34:30 Is existential risk from AI a legitimate threat?
35:22 Is the AI alignment problem legitimate?
43:29 What are futures that you fear?
46:24 Do social media algorithms represent an instance of the alignment problem?
51:46 The importance of educating the public on AI
55:00 Income inequality, cyber security, and negative futures
1:00:06 Lethal autonomous weapons
1:01:50 Negative futures in the long-term
1:03:26 How have your views of AI alignment evolved?
1:06:53 Bart’s plans and intentions for the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence
1:13:45 Policy recommendations for existing AIs and the AI ecosystem
1:15:35 Solving the parts of the AI alignment that won’t be solved by industry incentives
1:18:17 Narratives of an international race to powerful AI systems
1:20:42 How does an international race to AI affect the chances of successful AI alignment?
1:23:20 Is AI a zero sum game?
1:28:51 Lethal autonomous weapons governance
1:31:38 Does the governance of autonomous weapons affect outcomes from AGI
1:33:00 AI consciousness
1:39:37 Alignment is important and the benefits of AI can be great
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Jaan Tallinn on Avoiding Civilizational Pitfalls and Surviving the 21st Century | 21 Apr 2021 | 01:26:37 | |
Jaan Tallinn, investor, programmer, and co-founder of the Future of Life Institute, joins us to discuss his perspective on AI, synthetic biology, unknown unknows, and what's needed for mitigating existential risk in the 21st century.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Intelligence and coordination
-Existential risk from AI, synthetic biology, and unknown unknowns
-AI adoption as a delegation process
-Jaan's investments and philanthropic efforts
-International coordination and incentive structures
-The short-term and long-term AI safety communities
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/04/20/jaan-tallinn-on-avoiding-civilizational-pitfalls-and-surviving-the-21st-century/
Have any feedback about the podcast? You can share your thoughts here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/DRBFZCT
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:29 How can humanity improve?
3:10 The importance of intelligence and coordination
8:30 The bottlenecks of input and output bandwidth as well as processing speed between AIs and humans
15:20 Making the creation of AI feel dangerous and how the nuclear power industry killed itself by downplaying risks
17:15 How Jaan evaluates and thinks about existential risk
18:30 Nuclear weapons as the first existential risk we faced
20:47 The likelihood of unknown unknown existential risks
25:04 Why Jaan doesn't see nuclear war as an existential risk
27:54 Climate change
29:00 Existential risk from synthetic biology
31:29 Learning from mistakes, lacking foresight, and the importance of generational knowledge
36:23 AI adoption as a delegation process
42:52 Attractors in the design space of AI
44:24 The regulation of AI
45:31 Jaan's investments and philanthropy in AI
55:18 International coordination issues from AI adoption as a delegation process
57:29 AI today and the negative impacts of recommender algorithms
1:02:43 Collective, institutional, and interpersonal coordination
1:05:23 The benefits and risks of longevity research
1:08:29 The long-term and short-term AI safety communities and their relationship with one another
1:12:35 Jaan's current philanthropic efforts
1:16:28 Software as a philanthropic target
1:19:03 How do we move towards beneficial futures with AI?
1:22:30 An idea Jaan finds meaningful
1:23:33 Final thoughts from Jaan
1:25:27 Where to find Jaan
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Joscha Bach and Anthony Aguirre on Digital Physics and Moving Towards Beneficial Futures | 01 Apr 2021 | 01:38:17 | |
Joscha Bach, Cognitive Scientist and AI researcher, as well as Anthony Aguirre, UCSC Professor of Physics, join us to explore the world through the lens of computation and the difficulties we face on the way to beneficial futures.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Understanding the universe through digital physics
-How human consciousness operates and is structured
-The path to aligned AGI and bottlenecks to beneficial futures
-Incentive structures and collective coordination
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/03/31/joscha-bach-and-anthony-aguirre-on-digital-physics-and-moving-towards-beneficial-futures/
You can find FLI's three new policy focused job postings here: futureoflife.org/job-postings/
Have any feedback about the podcast? You can share your thoughts here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/DRBFZCT
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:17 What is truth and knowledge?
11:39 What is subjectivity and objectivity?
14:32 What is the universe ultimately?
19:22 Is the universe a cellular automaton? Is the universe ultimately digital or analogue?
24:05 Hilbert's hotel from the point of view of computation
35:18 Seeing the world as a fractal
38:48 Describing human consciousness
51:10 Meaning, purpose, and harvesting negentropy
55:08 The path to aligned AGI
57:37 Bottlenecks to beneficial futures and existential security
1:06:53 A future with one, several, or many AGI systems? How do we maintain appropriate incentive structures?
1:19:39 Non-duality and collective coordination
1:22:53 What difficulties are there for an idealist worldview that involves computation?
1:27:20 Which features of mind and consciousness are necessarily coupled and which aren't?
1:36:40 Joscha's final thoughts on AGI
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Roman Yampolskiy on the Uncontrollability, Incomprehensibility, and Unexplainability of AI | 20 Mar 2021 | 01:12:01 | |
Roman Yampolskiy, Professor of Computer Science at the University of Louisville, joins us to discuss whether we can control, comprehend, and explain AI systems, and how this constrains the project of AI safety.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Roman’s results on the unexplainability, incomprehensibility, and uncontrollability of AI
-The relationship between AI safety, control, and alignment
-Virtual worlds as a proposal for solving multi-multi alignment
-AI security
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/03/19/roman-yampolskiy-on-the-uncontrollability-incomprehensibility-and-unexplainability-of-ai/
You can find FLI's three new policy focused job postings here: https://futureoflife.org/job-postings/
Have any feedback about the podcast? You can share your thoughts here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/DRBFZCT
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:35 Roman’s primary research interests
4:09 How theoretical proofs help AI safety research
6:23 How impossibility results constrain computer science systems
10:18 The inability to tell if arbitrary code is friendly or unfriendly
12:06 Impossibility results clarify what we can do
14:19 Roman’s results on unexplainability and incomprehensibility
22:34 Focusing on comprehensibility
26:17 Roman’s results on uncontrollability
28:33 Alignment as a subset of safety and control
30:48 The relationship between unexplainability, incomprehensibility, and uncontrollability with each other and with AI alignment
33:40 What does it mean to solve AI safety?
34:19 What do the impossibility results really mean?
37:07 Virtual worlds and AI alignment
49:55 AI security and malevolent agents
53:00 Air gapping, boxing, and other security methods
58:43 Some examples of historical failures of AI systems and what we can learn from them
1:01:20 Clarifying impossibility results
1:06 55 Examples of systems failing and what these demonstrate about AI
1:08:20 Are oracles a valid approach to AI safety?
1:10:30 Roman’s final thoughts
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Stuart Russell and Zachary Kallenborn on Drone Swarms and the Riskiest Aspects of Autonomous Weapons | 25 Feb 2021 | 01:39:48 | |
Stuart Russell, Professor of Computer Science at UC Berkeley, and Zachary Kallenborn, WMD and drone swarms expert, join us to discuss the highest risk and most destabilizing aspects of lethal autonomous weapons.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The current state of the deployment and development of lethal autonomous weapons and swarm technologies
-Drone swarms as a potential weapon of mass destruction
-The risks of escalation, unpredictability, and proliferation with regards to autonomous weapons
-The difficulty of attribution, verification, and accountability with autonomous weapons
-Autonomous weapons governance as norm setting for global AI issues
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/02/25/stuart-russell-and-zachary-kallenborn-on-drone-swarms-and-the-riskiest-aspects-of-lethal-autonomous-weapons/
You can check out the new lethal autonomous weapons website here: https://autonomousweapons.org/
Have any feedback about the podcast? You can share your thoughts here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/DRBFZCT
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:23 Emilia Javorsky on lethal autonomous weapons
7:27 What is a lethal autonomous weapon?
11:33 Autonomous weapons that exist today
16:57 The concerns of collateral damage, accidental escalation, scalability, control, and error risk
26:57 The proliferation risk of autonomous weapons
32:30 To what extent are global superpowers pursuing these weapons? What is the state of industry's pursuit of the research and manufacturing of this technology
42:13 A possible proposal for a selective ban on small anti-personnel autonomous weapons
47:20 Lethal autonomous weapons as a potential weapon of mass destruction
53:49 The unpredictability of autonomous weapons, especially when swarms are interacting with other swarms
58:09 The risk of autonomous weapons escalating conflicts
01:10:50 The risk of drone swarms proliferating
01:20:16 The risk of assassination
01:23:25 The difficulty of attribution and accountability
01:26:05 The governance of autonomous weapons being relevant to the global governance of AI
01:30:11 The importance of verification for responsibility, accountability, and regulation
01:35:50 Concerns about the beginning of an arms race and the need for regulation
01:38:46 Wrapping up
01:39:23 Outro
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| John Prendergast on Non-dual Awareness and Wisdom for the 21st Century | 09 Feb 2021 | 01:46:16 | |
John Prendergast, former adjunct professor of psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies, joins Lucas Perry for a discussion about the experience and effects of ego-identification, how to shift to new levels of identity, the nature of non-dual awareness, and the potential relationship between waking up and collective human problems. This is not an FLI Podcast, but a special release where Lucas shares a direction he feels has an important relationship with AI alignment and existential risk issues.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The experience of egocentricity and ego-identification
-Waking up into heart awareness
-The movement towards and qualities of non-dual consciousness
-The ways in which the condition of our minds collectively affect the world
-How waking up may be relevant to the creation of AGI
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/02/09/john-prendergast-on-non-dual-awareness-and-wisdom-for-the-21st-century/
Have any feedback about the podcast? You can share your thoughts here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DRBFZCT
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
7:10 The modern human condition
9:29 What egocentricity and ego-identification are
15:38 Moving beyond the experience of self
17:38 The origins and structure of self
20:25 A pointing out instruction for noticing ego-identification and waking up out of it
24:34 A pointing out instruction for abiding in heart-mind or heart awareness
28:53 The qualities of and moving into heart awareness and pure awareness
33:48 An explanation of non-dual awareness
40:50 Exploring the relationship between awareness, belief, and action
46:25 Growing up and improving the egoic structure
48:29 Waking up as recognizing true nature
51:04 Exploring awareness as primitive and primary
53:56 John's dream of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
57:57 The use and value of conceptual thought and the mind
1:00:57 The epistemics of heart-mind and the conceptual mind as we shift levels of identity
1:17:46 A pointing out instruction for inquiring into core beliefs
1:27:28 The universal heart, qualities of awakening, and the ethical implications of such shifts
1:31:38 Wisdom, waking up, and growing up for the transgenerational issues of the 21st century
1:38:44 Waking up and its applicability to the creation of AGI
1:43:25 Where to find, follow, and reach out to John
1:45:56 Outro
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Beatrice Fihn on the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons | 22 Jan 2021 | 01:17:56 | |
Beatrice Fihn, executive director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) and Nobel Peace Prize recipient, joins us to discuss the current risks of nuclear war, policies that can reduce the risks of nuclear conflict, and how to move towards a nuclear weapons free world.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The current nuclear weapons geopolitical situation
-The risks and mechanics of accidental and intentional nuclear war
-Policy proposals for reducing the risks of nuclear war
-Deterrence theory
-The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons
-Working towards the total elimination of nuclear weapons
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/01/21/beatrice-fihn-on-the-total-elimination-of-nuclear-weapons/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
4:28 Overview of the current nuclear weapons situation
6:47 The 9 nuclear weapons states, and accidental and intentional nuclear war
9:27 Accidental nuclear war and human systems
12:08 The risks of nuclear war in 2021 and nuclear stability
17:49 Toxic personalities and the human component of nuclear weapons
23:23 Policy proposals for reducing the risk of nuclear war
23:55 New START Treaty
25:42 What does it mean to maintain credible deterrence
26:45 ICAN and working on the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons
28:00 Deterrence theoretic arguments for nuclear weapons
32:36 The reduction of nuclear weapons, no first use, removing ground based missile systems, removing hair-trigger alert, removing presidential authority to use nuclear weapons
39:13 Arguments for and against nuclear risk reduction policy proposals
46:02 Moving all of the United State's nuclear weapons to bombers and nuclear submarines
48:27 Working towards and the theory of the total elimination of nuclear weapons
1:11:40 The value of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons
1:14:26 Elevating activism around nuclear weapons and messaging more skillfully
1:15:40 What the public needs to understand about nuclear weapons
1:16:35 World leaders' views of the treaty
1:17:15 How to get involved
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Max Tegmark and the FLI Team on 2020 and Existential Risk Reduction in the New Year | 08 Jan 2021 | 01:00:41 | |
Max Tegmark and members of the FLI core team come together to discuss favorite projects from 2020, what we've learned from the past year, and what we think is needed for existential risk reduction in 2021.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-FLI's perspectives on 2020 and hopes for 2021
-What our favorite projects from 2020 were
-The biggest lessons we've learned from 2020
-What we see as crucial and needed in 2021 to ensure and make -improvements towards existential safety
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2021/01/08/max-tegmark-and-the-fli-team-on-2020-and-existential-risk-reduction-in-the-new-year/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
00:52 First question: What was your favorite project from 2020?
1:03 Max Tegmark on the Future of Life Award
4:15 Anthony Aguirre on AI Loyalty
9:18 David Nicholson on the Future of Life Award
12:23 Emilia Javorksy on being a co-champion for the UN Secretary-General's effort on digital cooperation
14:03 Jared Brown on developing comments on the European Union's White Paper on AI through community collaboration
16:40 Tucker Davey on editing the biography of Victor Zhdanov
19:49 Lucas Perry on the podcast and Pindex video
23:17 Second question: What lessons do you take away from 2020?
23:26 Max Tegmark on human fragility and vulnerability
25:14 Max Tegmark on learning from history
26:47 Max Tegmark on the growing threats of AI
29:45 Anthony Aguirre on the inability of present-day institutions to deal with large unexpected problems
33:00 David Nicholson on the need for self-reflection on the use and development of technology
38:05 Emilia Javorsky on the global community coming to awareness about tail risks
39:48 Jared Brown on our vulnerability to low probability, high impact events and the importance of adaptability and policy engagement
41:43 Tucker Davey on taking existential risks more seriously and ethics-washing
43:57 Lucas Perry on the fragility of human systems
45:40 Third question: What is needed in 2021 to make progress on existential risk mitigation
45:50 Max Tegmark on holding Big Tech accountable, repairing geopolitics, and fighting the myth of the technological zero-sum game
49:58 Anthony Aguirre on the importance of spreading understanding of expected value reasoning and fixing the information crisis
53:41 David Nicholson on the need to reflect on our values and relationship with technology
54:35 Emilia Javorksy on the importance of returning to multilateralism and global dialogue
56:00 Jared Brown on the need for robust government engagement
57:30 Lucas Perry on the need for creating institutions for existential risk mitigation and global cooperation
1:00:10 Outro
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Future of Life Award 2020: Saving 200,000,000 Lives by Eradicating Smallpox | 11 Dec 2020 | 01:54:18 | |
The recipients of the 2020 Future of Life Award, William Foege, Michael Burkinsky, and Victor Zhdanov Jr., join us on this episode of the FLI Podcast to recount the story of smallpox eradication, William Foege's and Victor Zhdanov Sr.'s involvement in the eradication, and their personal experience of the events.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-William Foege's and Victor Zhdanov's efforts to eradicate smallpox
-Personal stories from Foege's and Zhdanov's lives
-The history of smallpox
-Biological issues of the 21st century
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/12/11/future-of-life-award-2020-saving-200000000-lives-by-eradicating-smallpox/
You can watch the 2020 Future of Life Award ceremony here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73WQvR5iIgk&feature=emb_title&ab_channel=FutureofLifeInstitute
You can learn more about the Future of Life Award here: https://futureoflife.org/future-of-life-award/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:13 Part 1: How William Foege got into smallpox efforts and his work in Eastern Nigeria
14:12 The USSR's smallpox eradication efforts and convincing the WHO to take up global smallpox eradication
15:46 William Foege's efforts in and with the WHO for smallpox eradication
18:00 Surveillance and containment as a viable strategy
18:51 Implementing surveillance and containment throughout the world after success in West Africa
23:55 Wrapping up with eradication and dealing with the remnants of smallpox
25:35 Lab escape of smallpox in Birmingham England and the final natural case
27:20 Part 2: Introducing Michael Burkinsky as well as Victor and Katia Zhdanov
29:45 Introducing Victor Zhdanov Sr. and Alissa Zhdanov
31:05 Michael Burkinsky's memories of Victor Zhdanov Sr.
39:26 Victor Zhdanov Jr.'s memories of Victor Zhdanov Sr.
46:15 Mushrooms with meat
47:56 Stealing the family car
49:27 Victor Zhdanov Sr.'s efforts at the WHO for smallpox eradication
58:27 Exploring Alissa's book on Victor Zhdanov Sr.'s life
1:06:09 Michael's view that Victor Zhdanov Sr. is unsung, especially in Russia
1:07:18 Part 3: William Foege on the history of smallpox and biology in the 21st century
1:07:32 The origin and history of smallpox
1:10:34 The origin and history of variolation and the vaccine
1:20:15 West African "healers" who would create smallpox outbreaks
1:22:25 The safety of the smallpox vaccine vs. modern vaccines
1:29:40 A favorite story of William Foege's
1:35:50 Larry Brilliant and people central to the eradication efforts
1:37:33 Foege's perspective on modern pandemics and human bias
1:47:56 What should we do after COVID-19 ends
1:49:30 Bio-terrorism, existential risk, and synthetic pandemics
1:53:20 Foege's final thoughts on the importance of global health experts in politics
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Nathan Labenz on the State of AI and Progress since GPT-4 | 05 Dec 2024 | 03:20:04 | |
Nathan Labenz joins the podcast to provide a comprehensive overview of AI progress since the release of GPT-4. You can find Nathan's podcast here: https://www.cognitiverevolution.ai Timestamps: 00:00 AI progress since GPT-4 10:50 Multimodality 19:06 Low-cost models 27:58 Coding versus medicine/law 36:09 AI agents 45:29 How much are people using AI? 53:39 Open source 01:15:22 AI industry analysis 01:29:27 Are some AI models kept internal? 01:41:00 Money is not the limiting factor in AI 01:59:43 AI and biology 02:08:42 Robotics and self-driving 02:24:14 Inference-time compute 02:31:56 AI governance 02:36:29 Big-picture overview of AI progress and safety | |||
| Sean Carroll on Consciousness, Physicalism, and the History of Intellectual Progress | 02 Dec 2020 | 01:30:33 | |
Sean Carroll, theoretical physicist at Caltech, joins us on this episode of the FLI Podcast to comb through the history of human thought, the strengths and weaknesses of various intellectual movements, and how we are to situate ourselves in the 21st century given progress thus far.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Important intellectual movements and their merits
-The evolution of metaphysical and epistemological views over human history
-Consciousness, free will, and philosophical blunders
-Lessons for the 21st century
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/12/01/sean-carroll-on-consciousness-physicalism-and-the-history-of-intellectual-progress/
You can find the video for this podcast here: https://youtu.be/6HNjL8_fsTk
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:06 The problem of beliefs and the strengths and weaknesses of religion
6:40 The Age of Enlightenment and importance of reason
10:13 The importance of humility and the is--ought gap
17:53 The advantages of religion and mysticism
19:50 Materialism and Newtonianism
28:00 Duality, self, suffering, and philosophical blunders
36:56 Quantum physics as a paradigm shift
39:24 Physicalism, the problem of consciousness, and free will
01:01:50 What does it mean for something to be real?
01:09:40 The hard problem of consciousness
01:14:20 The multiple worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics and utilitarianism
01:21:16 The importance of being charitable in conversation
1:24:55 Sean's position in the philosophy of consciousness
01:27:29 Sean's metaethical position
01:29:36 Where to find and follow Sean
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Mohamed Abdalla on Big Tech, Ethics-washing, and the Threat on Academic Integrity | 17 Nov 2020 | 01:22:21 | |
Mohamed Abdalla, PhD student at the University of Toronto, joins us to discuss how Big Tobacco and Big Tech work to manipulate public opinion and academic institutions in order to maximize profits and avoid regulation.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-How Big Tobacco uses it's wealth to obfuscate the harm of tobacco and appear socially responsible
-The tactics shared by Big Tech and Big Tobacco to preform ethics-washing and avoid regulation
-How Big Tech and Big Tobacco work to influence universities, scientists, researchers, and policy makers
-How to combat the problem of ethics-washing in Big Tech
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/11/17/mohamed-abdalla-on-big-tech-ethics-washing-and-the-threat-on-academic-integrity/
The Future of Life Institute AI policy page: https://futureoflife.org/AI-policy/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:55 How Big Tech actively distorts the academic landscape and what counts as big tech
6:00 How Big Tobacco has shaped industry research
12:17 The four tactics of Big Tobacco and Big Tech
13:34 Big Tech and Big Tobacco working to appear socially responsible
22:15 Big Tech and Big Tobacco working to influence the decisions made by funded universities
32:25 Big Tech and Big Tobacco working to influence research questions and the plans of individual scientists
51:53 Big Tech and Big Tobacco finding skeptics and critics of them and funding them to give the impression of social responsibility
1:00:24 Big Tech and being authentically socially responsible
1:11:41 Transformative AI, social responsibility, and the race to powerful AI systems
1:16:56 Ethics-washing as systemic
1:17:30 Action items for solving Ethics-washing
1:19:42 Has Mohamed received criticism for this paper?
1:20:07 Final thoughts from Mohamed
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Maria Arpa on the Power of Nonviolent Communication | 02 Nov 2020 | 01:12:43 | |
Maria Arpa, Executive Director of the Center for Nonviolent Communication, joins the FLI Podcast to share the ins and outs of the powerful needs-based framework of nonviolent communication.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-What nonviolent communication (NVC) consists of
-How NVC is different from normal discourse
-How NVC is composed of observations, feelings, needs, and requests
-NVC for systemic change
-Foundational assumptions in NVC
-An NVC exercise
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/11/02/maria-arpa-on-the-power-of-nonviolent-communication/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:50 What is nonviolent communication?
4:05 How is NVC different from normal discourse?
18:40 NVC’s four components: observations, feelings, needs, and requests
34:50 NVC for systemic change
54:20 The foundational assumptions of NVC
58:00 An exercise in NVC
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Stephen Batchelor on Awakening, Embracing Existential Risk, and Secular Buddhism | 15 Oct 2020 | 01:39:26 | |
Stephen Batchelor, a Secular Buddhist teacher and former monk, joins the FLI Podcast to discuss the project of awakening, the facets of human nature which contribute to extinction risk, and how we might better embrace existential threats.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The projects of awakening and growing the wisdom with which to manage technologies
-What might be possible of embarking on the project of waking up
-Facets of human nature that contribute to existential risk
-The dangers of the problem solving mindset
-Improving the effective altruism and existential risk communities
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/10/15/stephen-batchelor-on-awakening-embracing-existential-risk-and-secular-buddhism/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:40 Albert Einstein and the quest for awakening
8:45 Non-self, emptiness, and non-duality
25:48 Stephen's conception of awakening, and making the wise more powerful vs the powerful more wise
33:32 The importance of insight
49:45 The present moment, creativity, and suffering/pain/dukkha
58:44 Stephen's article, Embracing Extinction
1:04:48 The dangers of the problem solving mindset
1:26:12 Improving the effective altruism and existential risk communities
1:37:30 Where to find and follow Stephen
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Kelly Wanser on Climate Change as a Possible Existential Threat | 30 Sep 2020 | 01:45:48 | |
Kelly Wanser from SilverLining joins us to discuss techniques for climate intervention to mitigate the impacts of human induced climate change.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
- The risks of climate change in the short-term
- Tipping points and tipping cascades
- Climate intervention via marine cloud brightening and releasing particles in the stratosphere
- The benefits and risks of climate intervention techniques
- The international politics of climate change and weather modification
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/09/30/kelly-wanser-on-marine-cloud-brightening-for-mitigating-climate-change/
Video recording of this podcast here: https://youtu.be/CEUEFUkSMHU
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:30 What is SilverLining’s mission?
4:27 Why is climate change thought to be very risky in the next 10-30 years?
8:40 Tipping points and tipping cascades
13:25 Is climate change an existential risk?
17:39 Earth systems that help to stabilize the climate
21:23 Days where it will be unsafe to work outside
25:03 Marine cloud brightening, stratospheric sunlight reflection, and other climate interventions SilverLining is interested in
41:46 What experiments are happening to understand tropospheric and stratospheric climate interventions?
50:20 International politics of weather modification
53:52 How do efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions fit into the project of reflecting sunlight?
57:35 How would you respond to someone who views climate intervention by marine cloud brightening as too dangerous?
59:33 What are the main points of persons skeptical of climate intervention approaches
01:13:21 The international problem of coordinating on climate change
01:24:50 Is climate change a global catastrophic or existential risk, and how does it relate to other large risks?
01:33:20 Should effective altruists spend more time on the issue of climate change and climate intervention?
01:37:48 What can listeners do to help with this issue?
01:40:00 Climate change and mars colonization
01:44:55 Where to find and follow Kelly
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Andrew Critch on AI Research Considerations for Human Existential Safety | 16 Sep 2020 | 01:51:28 | |
In this episode of the AI Alignment Podcast, Andrew Critch joins us to discuss a recent paper he co-authored with David Krueger titled AI Research Considerations for Human Existential Safety. We explore a wide range of issues, from how the mainstream computer science community views AI existential risk, to the need for more accurate terminology in the field of AI existential safety and the risks of what Andrew calls prepotent AI systems. Crucially, we also discuss what Andrew sees as being the most likely source of existential risk: the possibility of externalities from multiple AIs and AI stakeholders competing in a context where alignment and AI existential safety issues are not naturally covered by industry incentives.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
- The mainstream computer science view of AI existential risk
- Distinguishing AI safety from AI existential safety
- The need for more precise terminology in the field of AI existential safety and alignment
- The concept of prepotent AI systems and the problem of delegation
- Which alignment problems get solved by commercial incentives and which don’t
- The threat of diffusion of responsibility on AI existential safety considerations not covered by commercial incentives
- Prepotent AI risk types that lead to unsurvivability for humanity
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/09/15/andrew-critch-on-ai-research-considerations-for-human-existential-safety/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:53 Why Andrew wrote ARCHES and what it’s about
6:46 The perspective of the mainstream CS community on AI existential risk
13:03 ARCHES in relation to AI existential risk literature
16:05 The distinction between safety and existential safety
24:27 Existential risk is most likely to obtain through externalities
29:03 The relationship between existential safety and safety for current systems
33:17 Research areas that may not be solved by natural commercial incentives
51:40 What’s an AI system and an AI technology?
53:42 Prepotent AI
59:41 Misaligned prepotent AI technology
01:05:13 Human frailty
01:07:37 The importance of delegation
01:14:11 Single-single, single-multi, multi-single, and multi-multi
01:15:26 Control, instruction, and comprehension
01:20:40 The multiplicity thesis
01:22:16 Risk types from prepotent AI that lead to human unsurvivability
01:34:06 Flow-through effects
01:41:00 Multi-stakeholder objectives
01:49:08 Final words from Andrew
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Iason Gabriel on Foundational Philosophical Questions in AI Alignment | 03 Sep 2020 | 01:54:48 | |
In the contemporary practice of many scientific disciplines, questions of values, norms, and political thought rarely explicitly enter the picture. In the realm of AI alignment, however, the normative and technical come together in an important and inseparable way. How do we decide on an appropriate procedure for aligning AI systems to human values when there is disagreement over what constitutes a moral alignment procedure? Choosing any procedure or set of values with which to align AI brings its own normative and metaethical beliefs that will require close examination and reflection if we hope to succeed at alignment. Iason Gabriel, Senior Research Scientist at DeepMind, joins us on this episode of the AI Alignment Podcast to explore the interdependence of the normative and technical in AI alignment and to discuss his recent paper Artificial Intelligence, Values and Alignment.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-How moral philosophy and political theory are deeply related to AI alignment
-The problem of dealing with a plurality of preferences and philosophical views in AI alignment
-How the is-ought problem and metaethics fits into alignment
-What we should be aligning AI systems to
-The importance of democratic solutions to questions of AI alignment
-The long reflection
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/09/03/iason-gabriel-on-foundational-philosophical-questions-in-ai-alignment/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:10 Why Iason wrote Artificial Intelligence, Values and Alignment
3:12 What AI alignment is
6:07 The technical and normative aspects of AI alignment
9:11 The normative being dependent on the technical
14:30 Coming up with an appropriate alignment procedure given the is-ought problem
31:15 What systems are subject to an alignment procedure?
39:55 What is it that we're trying to align AI systems to?
01:02:30 Single agent and multi agent alignment scenarios
01:27:00 What is the procedure for choosing which evaluative model(s) will be used to judge different alignment proposals
01:30:28 The long reflection
01:53:55 Where to follow and contact Iason
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Peter Railton on Moral Learning and Metaethics in AI Systems | 18 Aug 2020 | 01:41:46 | |
From a young age, humans are capable of developing moral competency and autonomy through experience. We begin life by constructing sophisticated moral representations of the world that allow for us to successfully navigate our way through complex social situations with sensitivity to morally relevant information and variables. This capacity for moral learning allows us to solve open-ended problems with other persons who may hold complex beliefs and preferences. As AI systems become increasingly autonomous and active in social situations involving human and non-human agents, AI moral competency via the capacity for moral learning will become more and more critical. On this episode of the AI Alignment Podcast, Peter Railton joins us to discuss the potential role of moral learning and moral epistemology in AI systems, as well as his views on metaethics.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Moral epistemology
-The potential relevance of metaethics to AI alignment
-The importance of moral learning in AI systems
-Peter Railton's, Derek Parfit's, and Peter Singer's metaethical views
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/08/18/peter-railton-on-moral-learning-and-metaethics-in-ai-systems/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:05 Does metaethics matter for AI alignment?
22:49 Long-reflection considerations
26:05 Moral learning in humans
35:07 The need for moral learning in artificial intelligence
53:57 Peter Railton's views on metaethics and his discussions with Derek Parfit
1:38:50 The need for engagement between philosophers and the AI alignment community
1:40:37 Where to find Peter's work
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Evan Hubinger on Inner Alignment, Outer Alignment, and Proposals for Building Safe Advanced AI | 01 Jul 2020 | 01:37:05 | |
It's well-established in the AI alignment literature what happens when an AI system learns or is given an objective that doesn't fully capture what we want. Human preferences and values are inevitably left out and the AI, likely being a powerful optimizer, will take advantage of the dimensions of freedom afforded by the misspecified objective and set them to extreme values. This may allow for better optimization on the goals in the objective function, but can have catastrophic consequences for human preferences and values the system fails to consider. Is it possible for misalignment to also occur between the model being trained and the objective function used for training? The answer looks like yes. Evan Hubinger from the Machine Intelligence Research Institute joins us on this episode of the AI Alignment Podcast to discuss how to ensure alignment between a model being trained and the objective function used to train it, as well as to evaluate three proposals for building safe advanced AI.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Inner and outer alignment
-How and why inner alignment can fail
-Training competitiveness and performance competitiveness
-Evaluating imitative amplification, AI safety via debate, and microscope AI
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/07/01/evan-hubinger-on-inner-alignment-outer-alignment-and-proposals-for-building-safe-advanced-ai/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:07 How Evan got into AI alignment research
4:42 What is AI alignment?
7:30 How Evan approaches AI alignment
13:05 What are inner alignment and outer alignment?
24:23 Gradient descent
36:30 Testing for inner alignment
38:38 Wrapping up on outer alignment
44:24 Why is inner alignment a priority?
45:30 How inner alignment fails
01:11:12 Training competitiveness and performance competitiveness
01:16:17 Evaluating proposals for building safe and advanced AI via inner and outer alignment, as well as training and performance competitiveness
01:17:30 Imitative amplification
01:23:00 AI safety via debate
01:26:32 Microscope AI
01:30:19 AGI timelines and humanity's prospects for succeeding in AI alignment
01:34:45 Where to follow Evan and find more of his work
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Barker - Hedonic Recalibration (Mix) | 26 Jun 2020 | 00:43:43 | |
This is a mix by Barker, Berlin-based music producer, that was featured on our last podcast: Sam Barker and David Pearce on Art, Paradise Engineering, and Existential Hope (With Guest Mix). We hope that you'll find inspiration and well-being in this soundscape.
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/06/24/sam-barker-and-david-pearce-on-art-paradise-engineering-and-existential-hope-featuring-a-guest-mix/
Tracklist:
Delta Rain Dance - 1
John Beltran - A Different Dream
Rrose - Horizon
Alexandroid - lvpt3
Datassette - Drizzle Fort
Conrad Sprenger - Opening
JakoJako - Wavetable#1
Barker & David Goldberg - #3
Barker & Baumecker - Organik (Intro)
Anthony Linell - Fractal Vision
Ametsub - Skydroppin’
Ladyfish\Mewark - Comfortable
JakoJako & Barker - [unreleased]
Where to follow Sam Barker :
Soundcloud: @voltek
Twitter: twitter.com/samvoltek
Instagram: www.instagram.com/samvoltek/
Website: www.voltek-labs.net/
Bandcamp: sambarker.bandcamp.com/
Where to follow Sam's label, Ostgut Ton:
Soundcloud: @ostgutton-official
Facebook: www.facebook.com/Ostgut.Ton.OFFICIAL/
Twitter: twitter.com/ostgutton
Instagram: www.instagram.com/ostgut_ton/
Bandcamp: ostgut.bandcamp.com/
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Connor Leahy on Why Humanity Risks Extinction from AGI | 22 Nov 2024 | 01:58:50 | |
Connor Leahy joins the podcast to discuss the motivations of AGI corporations, how modern AI is "grown", the need for a science of intelligence, the effects of AI on work, the radical implications of superintelligence, open-source AI, and what you might be able to do about all of this. Here's the document we discuss in the episode: https://www.thecompendium.ai Timestamps: 00:00 The Compendium 15:25 The motivations of AGI corps 31:17 AI is grown, not written 52:59 A science of intelligence 01:07:50 Jobs, work, and AGI 01:23:19 Superintelligence 01:37:42 Open-source AI 01:45:07 What can we do? | |||
| Sam Barker and David Pearce on Art, Paradise Engineering, and Existential Hope (With Guest Mix) | 24 Jun 2020 | 01:42:14 | |
Sam Barker, a Berlin-based music producer, and David Pearce, philosopher and author of The Hedonistic Imperative, join us on a special episode of the FLI Podcast to spread some existential hope. Sam is the author of euphoric sound landscapes inspired by the writings of David Pearce, largely exemplified in his latest album — aptly named "Utility." Sam's artistic excellence, motivated by blissful visions of the future, and David's philosophical and technological writings on the potential for the biological domestication of heaven are a perfect match made for the fusion of artistic, moral, and intellectual excellence. This podcast explores what significance Sam found in David's work, how it informed his music production, and Sam and David's optimistic visions of the future; it also features a guest mix by Sam and plenty of musical content.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The relationship between Sam's music and David's writing
-Existential hope
-Ideas from the Hedonistic Imperative
-Sam's albums
-The future of art and music
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/06/24/sam-barker-and-david-pearce-on-art-paradise-engineering-and-existential-hope-featuring-a-guest-mix/
You can find the mix with no interview portion of the podcast here: https://soundcloud.com/futureoflife/barker-hedonic-recalibration-mix
Where to follow Sam Barker :
Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/voltek
Twitter: https://twitter.com/samvoltek
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/samvoltek/
Website: https://www.voltek-labs.net/
Bandcamp: https://sambarker.bandcamp.com/
Where to follow Sam's label, Ostgut Ton:
Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/ostgutton-official
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Ostgut.Ton.OFFICIAL/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ostgutton
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ostgut_ton/
Bandcamp: https://ostgut.bandcamp.com/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
5:40 The inspiration around Sam's music
17:38 Barker - Maximum Utility
20:03 David and Sam on their work
23:45 Do any of the tracks evoke specific visions or hopes?
24:40 Barker - Die-Hards Of The Darwinian Order
28:15 Barker - Paradise Engineering
31:20 Barker - Hedonic Treadmill
33:05 The future and evolution of art
54:03 David on how good the future can be
58:36 Guest mix by Barker
Tracklist:
Delta Rain Dance – 1
John Beltran – A Different Dream
Rrose – Horizon
Alexandroid – lvpt3
Datassette – Drizzle Fort
Conrad Sprenger – Opening
JakoJako – Wavetable#1
Barker & David Goldberg – #3
Barker & Baumecker – Organik (Intro)
Anthony Linell – Fractal Vision
Ametsub – Skydroppin’
Ladyfish\Mewark – Comfortable
JakoJako & Barker – [unreleased]
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Steven Pinker and Stuart Russell on the Foundations, Benefits, and Possible Existential Threat of AI | 15 Jun 2020 | 01:52:42 | |
Over the past several centuries, the human condition has been profoundly changed by the agricultural and industrial revolutions. With the creation and continued development of AI, we stand in the midst of an ongoing intelligence revolution that may prove far more transformative than the previous two. How did we get here, and what were the intellectual foundations necessary for the creation of AI? What benefits might we realize from aligned AI systems, and what are the risks and potential pitfalls along the way? In the longer term, will superintelligent AI systems pose an existential risk to humanity? Steven Pinker, best selling author and Professor of Psychology at Harvard, and Stuart Russell, UC Berkeley Professor of Computer Science, join us on this episode of the AI Alignment Podcast to discuss these questions and more.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The historical and intellectual foundations of AI
-How AI systems achieve or do not achieve intelligence in the same way as the human mind
-The rise of AI and what it signifies
-The benefits and risks of AI in both the short and long term
-Whether superintelligent AI will pose an existential risk to humanity
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/06/15/steven-pinker-and-stuart-russell-on-the-foundations-benefits-and-possible-existential-risk-of-ai/
You can take a survey about the podcast here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/W8YLYD3
You can submit a nominee for the Future of Life Award here: https://futureoflife.org/future-of-life-award-unsung-hero-search/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
4:30 The historical and intellectual foundations of AI
11:11 Moving beyond dualism
13:16 Regarding the objectives of an agent as fixed
17:20 The distinction between artificial intelligence and deep learning
22:00 How AI systems achieve or do not achieve intelligence in the same way as the human mind
49:46 What changes to human society does the rise of AI signal?
54:57 What are the benefits and risks of AI?
01:09:38 Do superintelligent AI systems pose an existential threat to humanity?
01:51:30 Where to find and follow Steve and Stuart
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable, consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Sam Harris on Global Priorities, Existential Risk, and What Matters Most | 01 Jun 2020 | 01:32:46 | |
Human civilization increasingly has the potential both to improve the lives of everyone and to completely destroy everything. The proliferation of emerging technologies calls our attention to this never-before-seen power — and the need to cultivate the wisdom with which to steer it towards beneficial outcomes. If we're serious both as individuals and as a species about improving the world, it's crucial that we converge around the reality of our situation and what matters most. What are the most important problems in the world today and why? In this episode of the Future of Life Institute Podcast, Sam Harris joins us to discuss some of these global priorities, the ethics surrounding them, and what we can do to address them.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The problem of communication
-Global priorities
-Existential risk
-Animal suffering in both wild animals and factory farmed animals
-Global poverty
-Artificial general intelligence risk and AI alignment
-Ethics
-Sam’s book, The Moral Landscape
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/06/01/on-global-priorities-existential-risk-and-what-matters-most-with-sam-harris/
You can take a survey about the podcast here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/W8YLYD3
You can submit a nominee for the Future of Life Award here: https://futureoflife.org/future-of-life-award-unsung-hero-search/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:52 What are the most important problems in the world?
13:14 Global priorities: existential risk
20:15 Why global catastrophic risks are more likely than existential risks
25:09 Longtermist philosophy
31:36 Making existential and global catastrophic risk more emotionally salient
34:41 How analyzing the self makes longtermism more attractive
40:28 Global priorities & effective altruism: animal suffering and global poverty
56:03 Is machine suffering the next global moral catastrophe?
59:36 AI alignment and artificial general intelligence/superintelligence risk
01:11:25 Expanding our moral circle of compassion
01:13:00 The Moral Landscape, consciousness, and moral realism
01:30:14 Can bliss and wellbeing be mathematically defined?
01:31:03 Where to follow Sam and concluding thoughts
Photo by Christopher Michel: https://www.flickr.com/photos/cmichel67/
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| FLI Podcast: On the Future of Computation, Synthetic Biology, and Life with George Church | 15 May 2020 | 01:13:24 | |
Progress in synthetic biology and genetic engineering promise to bring advancements in human health sciences by curing disease, augmenting human capabilities, and even reversing aging. At the same time, such technology could be used to unleash novel diseases and biological agents which could pose global catastrophic and existential risks to life on Earth. George Church, a titan of synthetic biology, joins us on this episode of the FLI Podcast to discuss the benefits and risks of our growing knowledge of synthetic biology, its role in the future of life, and what we can do to make sure it remains beneficial. Will our wisdom keep pace with our expanding capabilities?
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Existential risk
-Computational substrates and AGI
-Genetics and aging
-Risks of synthetic biology
-Obstacles to space colonization
-Great Filters, consciousness, and eliminating suffering
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/05/15/on-the-future-of-computation-synthetic-biology-and-life-with-george-church/
You can take a survey about the podcast here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/W8YLYD3
You can submit a nominee for the Future of Life Award here: https://futureoflife.org/future-of-life-award-unsung-hero-search/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:58 What are the most important issues in the world?
12:20 Collective intelligence, AI, and the evolution of computational systems
33:06 Where we are with genetics
38:20 Timeline on progress for anti-aging technology
39:29 Synthetic biology risk
46:19 George's thoughts on COVID-19
49:44 Obstacles to overcome for space colonization
56:36 Possibilities for "Great Filters"
59:57 Genetic engineering for combating climate change
01:02:00 George's thoughts on the topic of "consciousness"
01:08:40 Using genetic engineering to phase out voluntary suffering
01:12:17 Where to find and follow George
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| FLI Podcast: On Superforecasting with Robert de Neufville | 30 Apr 2020 | 01:20:22 | |
Essential to our assessment of risk and ability to plan for the future is our understanding of the probability of certain events occurring. If we can estimate the likelihood of risks, then we can evaluate their relative importance and apply our risk mitigation resources effectively. Predicting the future is, obviously, far from easy — and yet a community of "superforecasters" are attempting to do just that. Not only are they trying, but these superforecasters are also reliably outperforming subject matter experts at making predictions in their own fields. Robert de Neufville joins us on this episode of the FLI Podcast to explain what superforecasting is, how it's done, and the ways it can help us with crucial decision making.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-What superforecasting is and what the community looks like
-How superforecasting is done and its potential use in decision making
-The challenges of making predictions
-Predictions about and lessons from COVID-19
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/04/30/on-superforecasting-with-robert-de-neufville/
You can take a survey about the podcast here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/W8YLYD3
You can submit a nominee for the Future of Life Award here: https://futureoflife.org/future-of-life-award-unsung-hero-search/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
5:00 What is superforecasting?
7:22 Who are superforecasters and where did they come from?
10:43 How is superforecasting done and what are the relevant skills?
15:12 Developing a better understanding of probabilities
18:42 How is it that superforecasters are better at making predictions than subject matter experts?
21:43 COVID-19 and a failure to understand exponentials
24:27 What organizations and platforms exist in the space of superforecasting?
27:31 Whats up for consideration in an actual forecast
28:55 How are forecasts aggregated? Are they used?
31:37 How accurate are superforecasters?
34:34 How is superforecasting complementary to global catastrophic risk research and efforts?
39:15 The kinds of superforecasting platforms that exist
43:00 How accurate can we get around global catastrophic and existential risks?
46:20 How to deal with extremely rare risk and how to evaluate your prediction after the fact
53:33 Superforecasting, expected value calculations, and their use in decision making
56:46 Failure to prepare for COVID-19 and if superforecasting will be increasingly applied to critical decision making
01:01:55 What can we do to improve the use of superforecasting?
01:02:54 Forecasts about COVID-19
01:11:43 How do you convince others of your ability as a superforecaster?
01:13:55 Expanding the kinds of questions we do forecasting on
01:15:49 How to utilize subject experts and superforecasters
01:17:54 Where to find and follow Robert
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| AIAP: An Overview of Technical AI Alignment in 2018 and 2019 with Buck Shlegeris and Rohin Shah | 15 Apr 2020 | 02:21:27 | |
Just a year ago we released a two part episode titled An Overview of Technical AI Alignment with Rohin Shah. That conversation provided details on the views of central AI alignment research organizations and many of the ongoing research efforts for designing safe and aligned systems. Much has happened in the past twelve months, so we've invited Rohin — along with fellow researcher Buck Shlegeris — back for a follow-up conversation. Today's episode focuses especially on the state of current research efforts for beneficial AI, as well as Buck's and Rohin's thoughts about the varying approaches and the difficulties we still face. This podcast thus serves as a non-exhaustive overview of how the field of AI alignment has updated and how thinking is progressing.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Rohin's and Buck's optimism and pessimism about different approaches to aligned AI
-Traditional arguments for AI as an x-risk
-Modeling agents as expected utility maximizers
-Ambitious value learning and specification learning/narrow value learning
-Agency and optimization
-Robustness
-Scaling to superhuman abilities
-Universality
-Impact regularization
-Causal models, oracles, and decision theory
-Discontinuous and continuous takeoff scenarios
-Probability of AI-induced existential risk
-Timelines for AGI
-Information hazards
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/04/15/an-overview-of-technical-ai-alignment-in-2018-and-2019-with-buck-shlegeris-and-rohin-shah/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:48 Traditional arguments for AI as an existential risk
5:40 What is AI alignment?
7:30 Back to a basic analysis of AI as an existential risk
18:25 Can we model agents in ways other than as expected utility maximizers?
19:34 Is it skillful to try and model human preferences as a utility function?
27:09 Suggestions for alternatives to modeling humans with utility functions
40:30 Agency and optimization
45:55 Embedded decision theory
48:30 More on value learning
49:58 What is robustness and why does it matter?
01:13:00 Scaling to superhuman abilities
01:26:13 Universality
01:33:40 Impact regularization
01:40:34 Causal models, oracles, and decision theory
01:43:05 Forecasting as well as discontinuous and continuous takeoff scenarios
01:53:18 What is the probability of AI-induced existential risk?
02:00:53 Likelihood of continuous and discontinuous take off scenarios
02:08:08 What would you both do if you had more power and resources?
02:12:38 AI timelines
02:14:00 Information hazards
02:19:19 Where to follow Buck and Rohin and learn more
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| FLI Podcast: Lessons from COVID-19 with Emilia Javorsky and Anthony Aguirre | 09 Apr 2020 | 01:26:36 | |
The global spread of COVID-19 has put tremendous stress on humanity’s social, political, and economic systems. The breakdowns triggered by this sudden stress indicate areas where national and global systems are fragile, and where preventative and preparedness measures may be insufficient. The COVID-19 pandemic thus serves as an opportunity for reflecting on the strengths and weaknesses of human civilization and what we can do to help make humanity more resilient. The Future of Life Institute's Emilia Javorsky and Anthony Aguirre join us on this special episode of the FLI Podcast to explore the lessons that might be learned from COVID-19 and the perspective this gives us for global catastrophic and existential risk.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The importance of taking expected value calculations seriously
-The need for making accurate predictions
-The difficulty of taking probabilities seriously
-Human psychological bias around estimating and acting on risk
-The massive online prediction solicitation and aggregation engine, Metaculus
-The risks and benefits of synthetic biology in the 21st Century
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/04/08/lessons-from-covid-19-with-emilia-javorsky-and-anthony-aguirre/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:35 How has COVID-19 demonstrated weakness in human systems and risk preparedness
4:50 The importance of expected value calculations and considering risks over timescales
10:50 The importance of being able to make accurate predictions
14:15 The difficulty of trusting probabilities and acting on low probability high cost risks
21:22 Taking expected value calculations seriously
24:03 The lack of transparency, explanation, and context around how probabilities are estimated and shared
28:00 Diffusion of responsibility and other human psychological weaknesses in thinking about risk
38:19 What Metaculus is and its relevance to COVID-19
45:57 What is the accuracy of predictions on Metaculus and what has it said about COVID-19?
50:31 Lessons for existential risk from COVID-19
58:42 The risk of synthetic bio enabled pandemics in the 21st century
01:17:35 The extent to which COVID-19 poses challenges to democratic institutions
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| FLI Podcast: The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity with Toby Ord | 01 Apr 2020 | 01:10:50 | |
Toby Ord’s “The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity" has emerged as a new cornerstone text in the field of existential risk. The book presents the foundations and recent developments of this budding field from an accessible vantage point, providing an overview suitable for newcomers. For those already familiar with existential risk, Toby brings new historical and academic context to the problem, along with central arguments for why existential risk matters, novel quantitative analysis and risk estimations, deep dives into the risks themselves, and tangible steps for mitigation. "The Precipice" thus serves as both a tremendous introduction to the topic and a rich source of further learning for existential risk veterans. Toby joins us on this episode of the Future of Life Institute Podcast to discuss this definitive work on what may be the most important topic of our time.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-An overview of Toby's new book
-What it means to be standing at the precipice and how we got here
-Useful arguments for why existential risk matters
-The risks themselves and their likelihoods
-What we can do to safeguard humanity's potential
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/03/31/he-precipice-existential-risk-and-the-future-of-humanity-with-toby-ord/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
03:35 What the book is about
05:17 What does it mean for us to be standing at the precipice?
06:22 Historical cases of global catastrophic and existential risk in the real world
10:38 The development of humanity’s wisdom and power over time
15:53 Reaching existential escape velocity and humanity’s continued evolution
22:30 On effective altruism and writing the book for a general audience
25:53 Defining “existential risk”
28:19 What is compelling or important about humanity’s potential or future persons?
32:43 Various and broadly appealing arguments for why existential risk matters
50:46 Short overview of natural existential risks
54:33 Anthropogenic risks
58:35 The risks of engineered pandemics
01:02:43 Suggestions for working to mitigate x-risk and safeguard the potential of humanity
01:09:43 How and where to follow Toby and pick up his book
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| AIAP: On Lethal Autonomous Weapons with Paul Scharre | 16 Mar 2020 | 01:16:20 | |
Lethal autonomous weapons represent the novel miniaturization and integration of modern AI and robotics technologies for military use. This emerging technology thus represents a potentially critical inflection point in the development of AI governance. Whether we allow AI to make the decision to take human life and where we draw lines around the acceptable and unacceptable uses of this technology will set precedents and grounds for future international AI collaboration and governance. Such regulation efforts or lack thereof will also shape the kinds of weapons technologies that proliferate in the 21st century. On this episode of the AI Alignment Podcast, Paul Scharre joins us to discuss autonomous weapons, their potential benefits and risks, and the ongoing debate around the regulation of their development and use.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-What autonomous weapons are and how they may be used
-The debate around acceptable and unacceptable uses of autonomous weapons
-Degrees and kinds of ways of integrating human decision making in autonomous weapons
-Risks and benefits of autonomous weapons
-Whether there is an arms race for autonomous weapons
-How autonomous weapons issues may matter for AI alignment and long-term AI safety
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/03/16/on-lethal-autonomous-weapons-with-paul-scharre/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:50 Why care about autonomous weapons?
4:31 What are autonomous weapons?
06:47 What does “autonomy” mean?
09:13 Will we see autonomous weapons in civilian contexts?
11:29 How do we draw lines of acceptable and unacceptable uses of autonomous weapons?
24:34 Defining and exploring human “in the loop,” “on the loop,” and “out of loop”
31:14 The possibility of generating international lethal laws of robotics
36:15 Whether autonomous weapons will sanitize war and psychologically distance humans in detrimental ways
44:57 Are persons studying the psychological aspects of autonomous weapons use?
47:05 Risks of the accidental escalation of war and conflict
52:26 Is there an arms race for autonomous weapons?
01:00:10 Further clarifying what autonomous weapons are
01:05:33 Does the successful regulation of autonomous weapons matter for long-term AI alignment considerations?
01:09:25 Does Paul see AI as an existential risk?
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| FLI Podcast: Distributing the Benefits of AI via the Windfall Clause with Cullen O'Keefe | 28 Feb 2020 | 01:04:32 | |
As with the agricultural and industrial revolutions before it, the intelligence revolution currently underway will unlock new degrees and kinds of abundance. Powerful forms of AI will likely generate never-before-seen levels of wealth, raising critical questions about its beneficiaries. Will this newfound wealth be used to provide for the common good, or will it become increasingly concentrated in the hands of the few who wield AI technologies? Cullen O'Keefe joins us on this episode of the FLI Podcast for a conversation about the Windfall Clause, a mechanism that attempts to ensure the abundance and wealth created by transformative AI benefits humanity globally.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-What the Windfall Clause is and how it might function
-The need for such a mechanism given AGI generated economic windfall
-Problems the Windfall Clause would help to remedy
-The mechanism for distributing windfall profit and the function for defining such profit
-The legal permissibility of the Windfall Clause
-Objections and alternatives to the Windfall Clause
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/02/28/distributing-the-benefits-of-ai-via-the-windfall-clause-with-cullen-okeefe/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:13 What is the Windfall Clause?
4:51 Why do we need a Windfall Clause?
06:01 When we might reach windfall profit and what that profit looks like
08:01 Motivations for the Windfall Clause and its ability to help with job loss
11:51 How the Windfall Clause improves allocation of economic windfall
16:22 The Windfall Clause assisting in a smooth transition to advanced AI systems
18:45 The Windfall Clause as assisting with general norm setting
20:26 The Windfall Clause as serving AI firms by generating goodwill, improving employee relations, and reducing political risk
23:02 The mechanism for distributing windfall profit and desiderata for guiding it’s formation
25:03 The windfall function and desiderata for guiding it’s formation
26:56 How the Windfall Clause is different from being a new taxation scheme
30:20 Developing the mechanism for distributing the windfall
32:56 The legal permissibility of the Windfall Clause in the United States
40:57 The legal permissibility of the Windfall Clause in China and the Cayman Islands
43:28 Historical precedents for the Windfall Clause
44:45 Objections to the Windfall Clause
57:54 Alternatives to the Windfall Clause
01:02:51 Final thoughts
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| Suzy Shepherd on Imagining Superintelligence and "Writing Doom" | 08 Nov 2024 | 01:03:08 | |
Suzy Shepherd joins the podcast to discuss her new short film "Writing Doom", which deals with AI risk. We discuss how to use humor in film, how to write concisely, how filmmaking is evolving, in what ways AI is useful for filmmakers, and how we will find meaning in an increasingly automated world. Here's Writing Doom: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfMQ7hzyFW4 Timestamps: 00:00 Writing Doom 08:23 Humor in Writing Doom 13:31 Concise writing 18:37 Getting feedback 27:02 Alternative characters 36:31 Popular video formats 46:53 AI in filmmaking 49:52 Meaning in the future | |||
| AIAP: On the Long-term Importance of Current AI Policy with Nicolas Moës and Jared Brown | 18 Feb 2020 | 01:11:10 | |
From Max Tegmark's Life 3.0 to Stuart Russell's Human Compatible and Nick Bostrom's Superintelligence, much has been written and said about the long-term risks of powerful AI systems. When considering concrete actions one can take to help mitigate these risks, governance and policy related solutions become an attractive area of consideration. But just what can anyone do in the present day policy sphere to help ensure that powerful AI systems remain beneficial and aligned with human values? Do today's AI policies matter at all for AGI risk? Jared Brown and Nicolas Moës join us on today's podcast to explore these questions and the importance of AGI-risk sensitive persons' involvement in present day AI policy discourse.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-The importance of current AI policy work for long-term AI risk
-Where we currently stand in the process of forming AI policy
-Why persons worried about existential risk should care about present day AI policy
-AI and the global community
-The rationality and irrationality around AI race narratives
You can find the page for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/02/17/on-the-long-term-importance-of-current-ai-policy-with-nicolas-moes-and-jared-brown/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
4:58 Why it’s important to work on AI policy
12:08 Our historical position in the process of AI policy
21:54 For long-termists and those concerned about AGI risk, how is AI policy today important and relevant?
33:46 AI policy and shorter-term global catastrophic and existential risks
38:18 The Brussels and Sacramento effects
41:23 Why is racing on AI technology bad?
48:45 The rationality of racing to AGI
58:22 Where is AI policy currently?
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| FLI Podcast: Identity, Information & the Nature of Reality with Anthony Aguirre | 31 Jan 2020 | 01:45:20 | |
Our perceptions of reality are based on the physics of interactions ranging from millimeters to miles in scale. But when it comes to the very small and the very massive, our intuitions often fail us. Given the extent to which modern physics challenges our understanding of the world around us, how wrong could we be about the fundamental nature of reality? And given our failure to anticipate the counterintuitive nature of the universe, how accurate are our intuitions about metaphysical and personal identity? Just how seriously should we take our everyday experiences of the world? Anthony Aguirre, cosmologist and FLI co-founder, returns for a second episode to offer his perspective on these complex questions. This conversation explores the view that reality fundamentally consists of information and examines its implications for our understandings of existence and identity.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
- Views on the nature of reality
- Quantum mechanics and the implications of quantum uncertainty
- Identity, information and description
- Continuum of objectivity/subjectivity
You can find the page and transcript for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/01/31/fli-podcast-identity-information-the-nature-of-reality-with-anthony-aguirre/
Timestamps:
3:35 - General history of views on fundamental reality
9:45 - Quantum uncertainty and observation as interaction
24:43 - The universe as constituted of information
29:26 - What is information and what does the view of reality as information have to say about objects and identity
37:14 - Identity as on a continuum of objectivity and subjectivity
46:09 - What makes something more or less objective?
58:25 - Emergence in physical reality and identity
1:15:35 - Questions about the philosophy of identity in the 21st century
1:27:13 - Differing views on identity changing human desires
1:33:28 - How the reality as information perspective informs questions of identity
1:39:25 - Concluding thoughts
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| AIAP: Identity and the AI Revolution with David Pearce and Andrés Gómez Emilsson | 16 Jan 2020 | 02:03:19 | |
In the 1984 book Reasons and Persons, philosopher Derek Parfit asks the reader to consider the following scenario: You step into a teleportation machine that scans your complete atomic structure, annihilates you, and then relays that atomic information to Mars at the speed of light. There, a similar machine recreates your exact atomic structure and composition using locally available resources. Have you just traveled, Parfit asks, or have you committed suicide?
Would you step into this machine? Is the person who emerges on Mars really you? Questions like these –– those that explore the nature of personal identity and challenge our commonly held intuitions about it –– are becoming increasingly important in the face of 21st century technology. Emerging technologies empowered by artificial intelligence will increasingly give us the power to change what it means to be human. AI enabled bio-engineering will allow for human-species divergence via upgrades, and as we arrive at AGI and beyond we may see a world where it is possible to merge with AI directly, upload ourselves, copy and duplicate ourselves arbitrarily, or even manipulate and re-program our sense of identity. Are there ways we can inform and shape human understanding of identity to nudge civilization in the right direction?
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Identity from epistemic, ontological, and phenomenological perspectives
-Identity formation in biological evolution
-Open, closed, and empty individualism
-The moral relevance of views on identity
-Identity in the world today and on the path to superintelligence and beyond
You can find the page and transcript for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2020/01/15/identity-and-the-ai-revolution-with-david-pearce-and-andres-gomez-emilsson/
Timestamps:
0:00 - Intro
6:33 - What is identity?
9:52 - Ontological aspects of identity
12:50 - Epistemological and phenomenological aspects of identity
18:21 - Biological evolution of identity
26:23 - Functionality or arbitrariness of identity / whether or not there are right or wrong answers
31:23 - Moral relevance of identity
34:20 - Religion as codifying views on identity
37:50 - Different views on identity
53:16 - The hard problem and the binding problem
56:52 - The problem of causal efficacy, and the palette problem
1:00:12 - Navigating views of identity towards truth
1:08:34 - The relationship between identity and the self model
1:10:43 - The ethical implications of different views on identity
1:21:11 - The consequences of different views on identity on preference weighting
1:26:34 - Identity and AI alignment
1:37:50 - Nationalism and AI alignment
1:42:09 - Cryonics, species divergence, immortality, uploads, and merging.
1:50:28 - Future scenarios from Life 3.0
1:58:35 - The role of identity in the AI itself
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| On Consciousness, Morality, Effective Altruism & Myth with Yuval Noah Harari & Max Tegmark | 31 Dec 2019 | 01:00:58 | |
Neither Yuval Noah Harari nor Max Tegmark need much in the way of introduction. Both are avant-garde thinkers at the forefront of 21st century discourse around science, technology, society and humanity’s future. This conversation represents a rare opportunity for two intellectual leaders to apply their combined expertise — in physics, artificial intelligence, history, philosophy and anthropology — to some of the most profound issues of our time. Max and Yuval bring their own macroscopic perspectives to this discussion of both cosmological and human history, exploring questions of consciousness, ethics, effective altruism, artificial intelligence, human extinction, emerging technologies and the role of myths and stories in fostering societal collaboration and meaning. We hope that you'll join the Future of Life Institute Podcast for our final conversation of 2019, as we look toward the future and the possibilities it holds for all of us.
Topics discussed include:
-Max and Yuval's views and intuitions about consciousness
-How they ground and think about morality
-Effective altruism and its cause areas of global health/poverty, animal suffering, and existential risk
-The function of myths and stories in human society
-How emerging science, technology, and global paradigms challenge the foundations of many of our stories
-Technological risks of the 21st century
You can find the page and transcript for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2019/12/31/on-consciousness-morality-effective-altruism-myth-with-yuval-noah-harari-max-tegmark/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:14 Grounding morality and the need for a science of consciousness
11:45 The effective altruism community and it's main cause areas
13:05 Global health
14:44 Animal suffering and factory farming
17:38 Existential risk and the ethics of the long-term future
23:07 Nuclear war as a neglected global risk
24:45 On the risks of near-term AI and of artificial general intelligence and superintelligence
28:37 On creating new stories for the challenges of the 21st century
32:33 The risks of big data and AI enabled human hacking and monitoring
47:40 What does it mean to be human and what should we want to want?
52:29 On positive global visions for the future
59:29 Goodbyes and appreciations
01:00:20 Outro and supporting the Future of Life Institute Podcast
This podcast is possible because of the support of listeners like you. If you found this conversation to be meaningful or valuable consider supporting it directly by donating at futureoflife.org/donate. Contributions like yours make these conversations possible. | |||
| FLI Podcast: Existential Hope in 2020 and Beyond with the FLI Team | 28 Dec 2019 | 01:39:02 | |
As 2019 is coming to an end and the opportunities of 2020 begin to emerge, it's a great time to reflect on the past year and our reasons for hope in the year to come. We spend much of our time on this podcast discussing risks that will possibly lead to the extinction or the permanent and drastic curtailing of the potential of Earth-originating intelligent life. While this is important and useful, much has been done at FLI and in the broader world to address these issues in service of the common good. It can be skillful to reflect on this progress to see how far we've come, to develop hope for the future, and to map out our path ahead. This podcast is a special end of the year episode focused on meeting and introducing the FLI team, discussing what we've accomplished and are working on, and sharing our feelings and reasons for existential hope going into 2020 and beyond.
Topics discussed include:
-Introductions to the FLI team and our work
-Motivations for our projects and existential risk mitigation efforts
-The goals and outcomes of our work
-Our favorite projects at FLI in 2019
-Optimistic directions for projects in 2020
-Reasons for existential hope going into 2020 and beyond
You can find the page and transcript for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2019/12/27/existential-hope-in-2020-and-beyond-with-the-fli-team/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:30 Meeting the Future of Life Institute team
18:30 Motivations for our projects and work at FLI
30:04 What we strive to result from our work at FLI
44:44 Favorite accomplishments of FLI in 2019
01:06:20 Project directions we are most excited about for 2020
01:19:43 Reasons for existential hope in 2020 and beyond
01:38:30 Outro | |||
| AIAP: On DeepMind, AI Safety, and Recursive Reward Modeling with Jan Leike | 16 Dec 2019 | 00:58:05 | |
Jan Leike is a senior research scientist who leads the agent alignment team at DeepMind. His is one of three teams within their technical AGI group; each team focuses on different aspects of ensuring advanced AI systems are aligned and beneficial. Jan's journey in the field of AI has taken him from a PhD on a theoretical reinforcement learning agent called AIXI to empirical AI safety research focused on recursive reward modeling. This conversation explores his movement from theoretical to empirical AI safety research — why empirical safety research is important and how this has lead him to his work on recursive reward modeling. We also discuss research directions he's optimistic will lead to safely scalable systems, more facets of his own thinking, and other work being done at DeepMind.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Theoretical and empirical AI safety research
-Jan's and DeepMind's approaches to AI safety
-Jan's work and thoughts on recursive reward modeling
-AI safety benchmarking at DeepMind
-The potential modularity of AGI
-Comments on the cultural and intellectual differences between the AI safety and mainstream AI communities
-Joining the DeepMind safety team
You can find the page and transcript for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2019/12/16/ai-alignment-podcast-on-deepmind-ai-safety-and-recursive-reward-modeling-with-jan-leike/
Timestamps:
0:00 intro
2:15 Jan's intellectual journey in computer science to AI safety
7:35 Transitioning from theoretical to empirical research
11:25 Jan's and DeepMind's approach to AI safety
17:23 Recursive reward modeling
29:26 Experimenting with recursive reward modeling
32:42 How recursive reward modeling serves AI safety
34:55 Pessimism about recursive reward modeling
38:35 How this research direction fits in the safety landscape
42:10 Can deep reinforcement learning get us to AGI?
42:50 How modular will AGI be?
44:25 Efforts at DeepMind for AI safety benchmarking
49:30 Differences between the AI safety and mainstream AI communities
55:15 Most exciting piece of empirical safety work in the next 5 years
56:35 Joining the DeepMind safety team | |||
| FLI Podcast: The Psychology of Existential Risk and Effective Altruism with Stefan Schubert | 02 Dec 2019 | 00:58:39 | |
We could all be more altruistic and effective in our service of others, but what exactly is it that's stopping us? What are the biases and cognitive failures that prevent us from properly acting in service of existential risks, statistically large numbers of people, and long-term future considerations? How can we become more effective altruists? Stefan Schubert, a researcher at University of Oxford's Social Behaviour and Ethics Lab, explores questions like these at the intersection of moral psychology and philosophy. This conversation explores the steps that researchers like Stefan are taking to better understand psychology in service of doing the most good we can.
Topics discussed include:
-The psychology of existential risk, longtermism, effective altruism, and speciesism
-Stefan's study "The Psychology of Existential Risks: Moral Judgements about Human Extinction"
-Various works and studies Stefan Schubert has co-authored in these spaces
-How this enables us to be more altruistic
You can find the page and transcript for this podcast here: https://futureoflife.org/2019/12/02/the-psychology-of-existential-risk-and-effective-altruism-with-stefan-schubert/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:31 Stefan's academic and intellectual journey
5:20 How large is this field?
7:49 Why study the psychology of X-risk and EA?
16:54 What does a better understanding of psychology here enable?
21:10 What are the cognitive limitations psychology helps to elucidate?
23:12 Stefan's study "The Psychology of Existential Risks: Moral Judgements about Human Extinction"
34:45 Messaging on existential risk
37:30 Further areas of study
43:29 Speciesism
49:18 Further studies and work by Stefan | |||
| Not Cool Epilogue: A Climate Conversation | 27 Nov 2019 | 00:04:39 | |
In this brief epilogue, Ariel reflects on what she's learned during the making of Not Cool, and the actions she'll be taking going forward. | |||
| Not Cool Ep 26: Naomi Oreskes on trusting climate science | 26 Nov 2019 | 00:51:13 | |
It’s the Not Cool series finale, and by now we’ve heard from climate scientists, meteorologists, physicists, psychologists, epidemiologists and ecologists. We’ve gotten expert opinions on everything from mitigation and adaptation to security, policy and finance. Today, we’re tackling one final question: why should we trust them? Ariel is joined by Naomi Oreskes, Harvard professor and author of seven books, including the newly released "Why Trust Science?" Naomi lays out her case for why we should listen to experts, how we can identify the best experts in a field, and why we should be open to the idea of more than one type of "scientific method." She also discusses industry-funded science, scientists’ misconceptions about the public, and the role of the media in proliferating bad research.
Topics discussed include:
-Why Trust Science?
-5 tenets of reliable science
-How to decide which experts to trust
-Why non-scientists can't debate science
-Industry disinformation
-How to communicate science
-Fact-value distinction
-Why people reject science
-Shifting arguments from climate deniers
-Individual vs. structural change
-State- and city-level policy change | |||
| Not Cool Ep 25: Mario Molina on climate action | 21 Nov 2019 | 00:35:10 | |
Most Americans believe in climate change — yet far too few are taking part in climate action. Many aren't even sure what effective climate action should look like. On Not Cool episode 25, Ariel is joined by Mario Molina, Executive Director of Protect our Winters, a non-profit aimed at increasing climate advocacy within the outdoor sports community. In this interview, Mario looks at climate activism more broadly: he explains where advocacy has fallen short, why it's important to hold corporations responsible before individuals, and what it would look like for the US to be a global leader on climate change. He also discusses the reforms we should be implementing, the hypocrisy allegations sometimes leveled at the climate advocacy community, and the misinformation campaign undertaken by the fossil fuel industry in the '90s.
Topics discussed include:
-Civic engagement and climate advocacy
-Recent climate policy rollbacks
-Local vs. global action
-Energy and transportation reform
-Agricultural reform
-Overcoming lack of political will
-Creating cultural change
-Air travel and hypocrisy allegations
-Individual vs. corporate carbon footprints
-Collective action
-Divestment
-The unique influence of the US | |||
| Andrea Miotti on a Narrow Path to Safe, Transformative AI | 25 Oct 2024 | 01:28:09 | |
Andrea Miotti joins the podcast to discuss "A Narrow Path" — a roadmap to safe, transformative AI. We talk about our current inability to precisely predict future AI capabilities, the dangers of self-improving and unbounded AI systems, how humanity might coordinate globally to ensure safe AI development, and what a mature science of intelligence would look like. Here's the document we discuss in the episode: https://www.narrowpath.co Timestamps: 00:00 A Narrow Path 06:10 Can we predict future AI capabilities? 11:10 Risks from current AI development 17:56 The benefits of narrow AI 22:30 Against self-improving AI 28:00 Cybersecurity at AI companies 33:55 Unbounded AI 39:31 Global coordination on AI safety 49:43 Monitoring training runs 01:00:20 Benefits of cooperation 01:04:58 A science of intelligence 01:25:36 How you can help | |||
| Not Cool Ep 24: Ellen Quigley and Natalie Jones on defunding the fossil fuel industry | 19 Nov 2019 | 00:54:24 | |
Defunding the fossil fuel industry is one of the biggest factors in addressing climate change and lowering carbon emissions. But with international financing and powerful lobbyists on their side, fossil fuel companies often seem out of public reach. On Not Cool episode 24, Ariel is joined by Ellen Quigley and Natalie Jones, who explain why that’s not the case, and what you can do — without too much effort — to stand up to them. Ellen and Natalie, both researchers at the University of Cambridge’s Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER), explain what government regulation should look like, how minimal interactions with our banks could lead to fewer fossil fuel investments, and why divestment isn't enough on its own. They also discuss climate justice, Universal Ownership theory, and the international climate regime.
Topics discussed include:
-Divestment
-Universal Ownership theory
-Demand side and supply side regulation
-Impact investing
-Nationally determined contributions
-Low greenhouse gas emission development strategies
-Just transition
-Economic diversification
For more on universal ownership: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3457205 | |||
| AIAP: Machine Ethics and AI Governance with Wendell Wallach | 15 Nov 2019 | 01:12:36 | |
Wendell Wallach has been at the forefront of contemporary emerging technology issues for decades now. As an interdisciplinary thinker, he has engaged at the intersections of ethics, governance, AI, bioethics, robotics, and philosophy since the beginning formulations of what we now know as AI alignment were being codified. Wendell began with a broad interest in the ethics of emerging technology and has since become focused on machine ethics and AI governance. This conversation with Wendell explores his intellectual journey and participation in these fields.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-Wendell’s intellectual journey in machine ethics and AI governance
-The history of machine ethics and alignment considerations
-How machine ethics and AI alignment serve to produce beneficial AI
-Soft law and hard law for shaping AI governance
-Wendell’s and broader efforts for the global governance of AI
-Social and political mechanisms for mitigating the risks of AI
-Wendell’s forthcoming book
You can find the page and transcript here: https://futureoflife.org/2019/11/15/machine-ethics-and-ai-governance-with-wendell-wallach/
Important timestamps:
0:00 intro
2:50 Wendell's evolution in work and thought
10:45 AI alignment and machine ethics
27:05 Wendell's focus on AI governance
34:04 How much can soft law shape hard law?
37:27 What does hard law consist of?
43:25 Contextualizing the International Congress for the Governance of AI
45:00 How AI governance efforts might fail
58:40 AGI governance
1:05:00 Wendell's forthcoming book | |||
| Not Cool Ep 23: Brian Toon on nuclear winter: the other climate change | 15 Nov 2019 | 01:03:02 | |
Though climate change and global warming are often used synonymously, there’s a different kind of climate change that also deserves attention: nuclear winter. A period of extreme global cooling that would likely follow a major nuclear exchange, nuclear winter is as of now — unlike global warming — still avoidable. But as Cold War era treaties break down and new nations gain nuclear capabilities, it's essential that we understand the potential climate impacts of nuclear war. On Not Cool Episode 23, Ariel talks to Brian Toon, one of the five authors of the 1983 paper that first outlined the concept of nuclear winter. Brian discusses the global tensions that could lead to a nuclear exchange, the process by which such an exchange would drastically reduce the temperature of the planet, and the implications of this kind of drastic temperature drop for humanity. He also explains how nuclear weapons have evolved since their invention, why our nuclear arsenal doesn't need an upgrade, and why modern building materials would make nuclear winter worse.
Topics discussed include:
-Causes and impacts of nuclear winter
-History of nuclear weapons development
-History of disarmament
-Current nuclear arsenals
-Mutually assured destruction
-Fires and climate
-Greenhouse gases vs. aerosols
-Black carbon and plastics
-India/Pakistan tensions
-US/Russia tensions
-Unknowns
-Global food storage and shortages
For more:
https://futureoflife.org/2016/10/31/nuclear-winter-robock-toon-podcast/
https://futureoflife.org/2017/04/27/climate-change-podcast-toon-trenberth/ | |||
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