I claim we have proof of concept. The people who started the existing AI Safety research orgs did not have AI Safety mentors. Current independent researcher have more support than they had. In a way an org is just a crystalized collaboration of previously independent researchers.
I think that there are some PR reasons why it would be good if most AI Safety researchers where part of academia or other respectable orgs (e.g. DeepMind). But I also think it is good to have a minority of researchers who are disconnected from the particular pressures of that environment.
However, being part of academia is not the same as being part of an AI Safety org. MIRI people are not part of academia, and someone doing AI Safety research as part of their PhD in a “normal” (not AI Safety focused) PhD program, is sorta an independent researcher.
The main way I could see myself getting more excited about long-term independent research is if we saw flourishing communities forming amongst independent researchers.
We are working on that. I’m not optimistic about current orgs keeping up with the growth of the field, and I don’t think it is healthy for the career to be too competitive, since this will lead to goodhearted on career intensives. But I do think a looser structure, built on personal connections rather than formal org employment, can grow in a much more flexible way, and we are experimenting with various methods to make this happen.
I claim we have proof of concept. The people who started the existing AI Safety research orgs did not have AI Safety mentors. Current independent researcher have more support than they had. In a way an org is just a crystalized collaboration of previously independent researchers.
I think that there are some PR reasons why it would be good if most AI Safety researchers where part of academia or other respectable orgs (e.g. DeepMind). But I also think it is good to have a minority of researchers who are disconnected from the particular pressures of that environment.
However, being part of academia is not the same as being part of an AI Safety org. MIRI people are not part of academia, and someone doing AI Safety research as part of their PhD in a “normal” (not AI Safety focused) PhD program, is sorta an independent researcher.
We are working on that. I’m not optimistic about current orgs keeping up with the growth of the field, and I don’t think it is healthy for the career to be too competitive, since this will lead to goodhearted on career intensives. But I do think a looser structure, built on personal connections rather than formal org employment, can grow in a much more flexible way, and we are experimenting with various methods to make this happen.