It sounds like the Future of Humanity Institute may be permanently shut down.
Background: FHI went on a hiring freeze/pause back in 2021 with the majority of staff leaving (many left with the spin-off of the Centre for the Governance of AI) and moved to other EA organizations. Since then there has been no public communication regarding its future return, until now…
″...Those were heady years. FHI was a unique place—extremely intellectually alive and creative—and remarkable progress was made. FHI was also quite fertile, spawning a number of academic offshoots, nonprofits, and foundations. It helped incubate the AI safety research field, the existential risk and rationalist communities, and the effective altruism movement. Ideas and concepts born within this small research center have since spread far and wide, and many of its alumni have gone on to important positions in other institutions.
Today, there is a much broader base of support for the kind of work that FHI was set up to enable, and it has basically served out its purpose. (The local faculty administrative bureaucracy has also become increasingly stifling.) I think those who were there during its heyday will remember it fondly. I feel privileged to have been a part of it and to have worked with the many remarkable individuals who flocked around it.”
This language suggests that FHI has officially closed. Can anyone at Trajan/Oxford confirm?
Also curious if there is any project in place to conduct a post mortem on the impact FHI has had on the many different fields and movements? I think it’s important to ensure that FHI is remembered as a significant nexus point for many influential ideas and people who may impact the long term.
In other news, Bostrom’s new book “Deep Utopia” is available for pre-order (coming March 27th).
Further evidence: The 80,000 Hours website footer no longer mentions FHI. Until February 2023, the footer contained the following statement:
We’re affiliated with the Future of Humanity Institute and the Global Priorities Institute at the University of Oxford.
By February 21, that statement was replaced with a paragraph simply stating that 80k is part of EV. The references to GPI, CEA and GWWC were also removed:
EDIT: just confirmed that FHI shut down as of April 16, 2024
It sounds like the Future of Humanity Institute may be permanently shut down.
Background: FHI went on a hiring freeze/pause back in 2021 with the majority of staff leaving (many left with the spin-off of the Centre for the Governance of AI) and moved to other EA organizations. Since then there has been no public communication regarding its future return, until now…
The Director, Nick Bostrom, updated the bio section on his website with the following commentary [bolding mine]:
This language suggests that FHI has officially closed. Can anyone at Trajan/Oxford confirm?
Also curious if there is any project in place to conduct a post mortem on the impact FHI has had on the many different fields and movements? I think it’s important to ensure that FHI is remembered as a significant nexus point for many influential ideas and people who may impact the long term.
In other news, Bostrom’s new book “Deep Utopia” is available for pre-order (coming March 27th).
Further evidence: The 80,000 Hours website footer no longer mentions FHI. Until February 2023, the footer contained the following statement:
By February 21, that statement was replaced with a paragraph simply stating that 80k is part of EV. The references to GPI, CEA and GWWC were also removed:
Yeah, it looks like the FHI website’s news section hasn’t been updated since 2021. Nor are there any publications since 2021.