A Survey of Artificial General Intelligence Projects for Ethics, Risk, and Policy

Post Date November 12, 2017
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Category artificial intelligence, publications

View the paper “A Survey of Artificial General Intelligence Projects for Ethics, Risk, and Policy”

Artificial general intelligence (AGI) is AI that can reason across a wide range of domains. While most AI research and development (R&D) is on narrow AI, not AGI, there is some dedicated AGI R&D. If AGI is built, its impacts could be profound. Depending on how it is designed and used, it could either help solve the world’s problems or cause catastrophe, possibly even human extinction.

This paper presents the first-ever survey …

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On the Promotion of Safe and Socially Beneficial Artificial Intelligence

Post Date October 10, 2017
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Category artificial intelligence, publications

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As AI becomes more and more capable, its impacts on society are also getting larger. AI is now being used in medicine, transportation (self-driving cars), the military (drones), and many other sectors. The impacts of AI on society depend a lot on how the AI is designed. To improve AI design, two challenges must be met. There is the technical challenge of developing safe and beneficial technology designs, and there is the social …

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Liability Law for Present and Future Robotics Technology

Post Date October 10, 2017
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Category artificial intelligence, law & policy, publications

View the paper “Liability Law for Present and Future Robotics Technology”

Advances in robotics technology are causing major changes in manufacturing, transportation, medicine, and a number of other sectors. While many of these changes are beneficial, there will inevitably be some harms. Who or what is liable when a robot causes harm? This paper addresses how liability law can and should account for robots, including robots that exist today and robots that potentially could be built at some point in the near or distant future. Already, …

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October Newsletter: How To Reduce Risk

Post Date October 06, 2017
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Dear friends,

As we speak, a group of researchers is meeting in Gothenburg, Sweden on the theme of existential risk. I joined it earlier in September. My commendations to Olle Häggström and Anders Sandberg for hosting an excellent event.

My talk in Gothenburg focused on how to find the best opportunities to reduce risk. The best opportunities are often a few steps removed from academic risk and policy analysis. For example, there is a large research literature on climate change policy, much of which factors in catastrophic risk. However, the …

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Towards an Integrated Assessment of Global Catastrophic Risk

Post Date October 06, 2017
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Category integrated assessment, publications

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Integrated assessment is an analysis of a topic that integrates multiple lines of research. Integrated assessments are thus inherently interdisciplinary. They are generally oriented toward practical problems, often in the context of public policy, and frequently concern topics in science and technology. This paper presents a concept for and some initial work towards an integrated assessment of global catastrophic risk (GCR). Generally speaking, GCR is the risk of significant harm to global human civilization. More …

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Social Choice Ethics in Artificial Intelligence

Post Date September 16, 2017
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Category artificial intelligence, ethics, publications

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A major approach to the ethics of artificial intelligence (AI) is to use social choice, in which the AI is designed to act according to the aggregate views of society. This is found in the AI ethics of “coherent extrapolated volition” and “bottom-up ethics”. This paper shows that the normative basis of AI social choice ethics is weak due to the fact that there is no one single aggregate ethical view of society. Instead, the design of …

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September Newsletter: 2017 Society for Risk Analysis Meeting

Post Date September 07, 2017
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Dear friends,

Each year, GCRI hosts sessions on global catastrophic risk at the annual meeting of the Society for Risk Analysis, which is the leading academic and professional society for all things risk. This year, we have gotten three full sessions accepted for the meeting, our most ever. SRA is competitive and we are honored to have three sessions.

Likewise, for those of you who are interested in SRA but haven’t come to the meeting before, this would be a good year to come. SRA has a …

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Value of GCR Information: Cost Effectiveness-Based Approach for Global Catastrophic Risk (GCR) Reduction

Post Date August 24, 2017
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View the paper  “Value of GCR Information: Cost Effectiveness-Based Approach for Global Catastrophic Risk (GCR) Reduction”

In this paper, we develop and illustrate a framework for determining the potential value of global catastrophic risk (GCR) research in reducing uncertainties in the assessment of GCR risk levels and the effectiveness of risk-reduction options. The framework uses the decision-analysis concept of the expected value of perfect information (EVPI) in terms of the cost-effectiveness of GCR reduction. We illustrate these concepts using available information on impact risks from two types …

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July Newsletter: Summer Talks and Presentations

Post Date July 07, 2017
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Integrated Assessment

GCRI Executive Director Seth Baum gave a talk on “Integrated Assessment of Global Catastrophic Risk and Artificial Intelligence” at the Cambridge University Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER) on June 28. Dr. Baum will also participate in a Tech2025 workshop on future AI risk on July 11 in New York City.

GCRI Director of Research Tony Barrett gave a talk on integrated assessment, nuclear war, AI, and risk reduction opportunities at an Effective Altruism DC event on global catastrophic risks on June 17.

Artificial Intelligence

GCRI Associate …

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June Newsletter: Nuclear Weapons Ban Treaty

Post Date June 15, 2017
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Dear friends,

This past May, a draft treaty to ban nuclear weapons was released at the United Nations. Nuclear weapons are a major global catastrophic risk, one that GCRI has done extensive work on. At first glance, the nuclear ban treaty would seem like something to wholeheartedly support. However, upon closer inspection, its merits are ambiguous.

The treaty is not expected to eliminate nuclear weapons because the nuclear-armed countries won’t sign it. Instead, it seeks to strengthen the norm against nuclear weapons and increase pressure for disarmament. …

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