GovAI is funded by philanthropic organizations. So far, we have received funding from Open Philanthropy, the Center for Emerging Risk Research, and Effective Altruism Funds (a project of the Centre for Effective Altruism).
This is great! I hope GovAI will maintain this transparency about its funding sources, and publish a policy to that effect.
We do not currently accept funding from private companies.
I think it would be beneficial to have a policy that prevents such funding in the future as well. (There could be conflict of interest issues due to the mere possibility of receiving future funding from certain companies.)
(Also, I take it that “private” here means private sector; i.e. this statement applies to public companies as well?)
We will not accept donations that we believe might compromise the independence or accuracy of our work.
Great, this seems super important! Maybe there should be a policy that allows funding from a non-EA source only if all the board members approve it.
In many potential future situations it won’t be obvious whether certain funding might compromise the independence or accuracy of GovAI’s work; and one’s judgment about it will be subjective and could easily be influenced by biases (and it could be very tempting to accept the funding).
This is great! I hope GovAI will maintain this transparency about its funding sources, and publish a policy to that effect.
I think it would be beneficial to have a policy that prevents such funding in the future as well. (There could be conflict of interest issues due to the mere possibility of receiving future funding from certain companies.)
(Also, I take it that “private” here means private sector; i.e. this statement applies to public companies as well?)
Great, this seems super important! Maybe there should be a policy that allows funding from a non-EA source only if all the board members approve it.
In many potential future situations it won’t be obvious whether certain funding might compromise the independence or accuracy of GovAI’s work; and one’s judgment about it will be subjective and could easily be influenced by biases (and it could be very tempting to accept the funding).