[Update 10/11: I have not received a response to this letter, but On the night of October 9th, Harvard's leadership released a statement, and president Gay added her own statement on October 10th; you can read both here. These partially address what I raised in the letter, but still fall short of condemning, rather than … Continue reading Letter to Harvard President Claudine Gay
Author: Boaz Barak
Reflections on “Making the Atomic Bomb”
[Cross posted on lesswrong; see here for my prior writings ; update: 8/25/23: added a paragraph on secrecy] [it appears almost certain that in the immediate future, it would be] possible to set up a nuclear chain reaction in a large mass of uranium by which vast amounts of power and large quantities of new radium-like elements would … Continue reading Reflections on “Making the Atomic Bomb”
Cartesian Cafe podcast interviews me on cryptography
[Unrelated announcement: Yael Kalai, Ran Raz, Salil Vadhan, Nisheeth Vishnoi and I recently completed our survey of Avi Wigderson's work for the volume on Abel prize winners. Given the breadth and depth of Avi's work, our survey could only cover a small sample of it, but we still hope it can. be a useful resource … Continue reading Cartesian Cafe podcast interviews me on cryptography
The shape of AGI: Cartoons and back of envelope
[Cross posted on lesswrong; see here for my prior writings] There have been several studies to estimate the timelines for artificial general intelligence (aka AGI). Ajeya Cotra wrote a report in 2020 (see also 2022 update) forecasting AGI based on comparisons with “biological anchors.” That is, comparing the total number of FLOPs invested in a training run or inference with … Continue reading The shape of AGI: Cartoons and back of envelope
Metaphors for AI, and why I don’t like them
Photo from National Photo Company Collection; see also (Sobel, 2017) [Cross posted in lesswrong and windows on theory see here for my prior writings]“computer, n. /kəmˈpjuːtə/. One who computes; a calculator, reckoner; specifically a person employed to make calculations in an observatory, in surveying, etc”, Oxford English Dictionary “There is no reason why mental as well as bodily labor should not … Continue reading Metaphors for AI, and why I don’t like them
The (local) unit of intelligence is FLOPs
[Crossposting again on Lesswrong and Windowsontheory, with the hope I am not overstaying my welcome in LW.] Wealth can be measured by dollars. This is not a perfect measurement: it’s hard to account for purchasing power and circumstances when comparing people across varying countries or time periods. However, within a particular place and time, one can measure … Continue reading The (local) unit of intelligence is FLOPs
GPT as an “Intelligence Forklift.”
[See my post with Edelman on AI takeover and Aaronson on AI scenarios. This is a rough, with various fine print, caveats, and other discussions missing. Cross-posted on Windows on Theory.] One challenge for considering the implications of “artificial intelligence,” especially of the “general” variety, is that we don’t have a consensus definition of intelligence. The Oxford Companion … Continue reading GPT as an “Intelligence Forklift.”
5 worlds of AI
Scott Aaronson and I wrote a post about 5 possible worlds for (the progress of) Artificial Intelligence. See Scott's blog for the post itself and discussions. The post was, of course, inspired by the classic essay on the 5 worlds of computational complexity by Russell Impagliazzo who will be turning 60 soon - Happy birthday!
Thoughts on AI safety
Last week, I gave a lecture on AI safety as part of my deep learning foundations course. In this post, I’ll try to write down a few of my thoughts on this topic. (The lecture was three hours, and this blog post will not cover all of what we discussed or all the points that … Continue reading Thoughts on AI safety
TCS for all travel grants and speaker nominations (guest post by Elena Grigorescu)
TCS for All (previously TCS Women) Spotlight Workshop at STOC 2023/Theory Fest: Travel grants and call for speaker nominations You are cordially invited to our TCS for All Spotlight Workshop! The workshop will be held on Thursday, June 22nd, 2023 (2-4pm), in Orlando, Florida, USA, as part of the 54th Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC) and TheoryFest! The workshop … Continue reading TCS for all travel grants and speaker nominations (guest post by Elena Grigorescu)
