Updates from the Singularity Institute:

$400,000 Matching Challenge.

What would the money be used for?

  • SIAI R&D Program (Ph.D. Scholarship, Postdoctoral Fellowship, Research Programmer)
  • The Singularity Summit II (September 8-9, Palace of Fine Arts Theatre, San Francisco, CA)
  • SIAI Research Fellowship Program & Fund (to Support Present & Future Research Fellows)
  • SIAI Fund Development (Roundtable Dinners, Special Events, Foundation Grant Proposals)
  • SIAI Educational Outreach & Marketing (Website, Blog, Newsletter, Media, Online Marketing)

If half of the challenge ($200,000) is met by May 21st, Peter Thiel will pledge an additional $50,000 in matching funds.

Ray Kurzweil has joined the Board of Directors for SIAI.

New interview with Barney Pell. Dr. Pell has an impressive background in AI.

SIAI has proposed an AI Impact Initiative.

Ben Goertzel and Bruce Klein have joined SIAI’s team. Ben, Eliezer, Marcello, and others will be working towards Friendly AI as a more unified group.

SIAI matters for two reasons. First, they encourage discussion of the Singularity by holding the annual Singularity Summit. The Singularity, the creation of smarter-than-human intelligence, is the defining event of the coming century, and it could happen in as soon as one or two decades. Second, SIAI is the only organization that takes the problem of Friendly AI seriously. Friendly AI is not an automatic thing. It’s something you need to think about and work towards. That’s what SIAI is doing.

Self-improving Friendly AI could accomplish a tremendous amount of good. It doesn’t matter whether it takes 10 years, or 100 years - benevolent superintelligence in the form of Friendly AI could solve literally all of our problems. Creating such an AI successfully will not be easy. We could mess up and create minds that don’t care about us. That’s why the field is so important. The earlier we start, the better.