Ajeya Cotra

This cross-post from the 80,000 Hours podcast features Ajeya Cotra in conversation with Rob Wiblin about AI timelines, recursive self-improvement, and the “crunch time” window when AI could rapidly accelerate its own development. Ajeya explains why widespread, compounding automation may face fewer bottlenecks than many expect, and what that could mean for the world by 2050. They also discuss transparency, early warning systems, and the emerging strategy of using each generation of AI to align and control its successors. LINKS: Ajeya Cotra podcast episode Sponsors: AvePoint: AvePoint is building the control layer for AI agents so you can securely govern, audit, and recover every action at scale. Design trusted agentic outcomes from day one at https://avpt.co/tcr VCX: VCX, by Fundrise, is the public ticker for private tech, giving everyday investors access to high-growth private companies in AI, space, defense tech, and more. Learn how to invest at https://getvcx.com Claude: Claude is the AI collaborator that understands your entire workflow, from drafting and research to coding and complex problem-solving. Start tackling bigger problems with Claude and unlock Claude Pro’s full capabilities at https://claude.ai/tcr Tasklet: Build your own Cognitive Revolution monitoring agent in one click. Try it for free and use code COGREV for 50% off your first month at https://tasklet.ai CHAPTERS: (00:00) About the Episode (04:17) AI inside safety plans (06:49) AGI growth expectations (Part 1) (18:32) Sponsors: AvePoint | VCX (20:54) AGI growth expectations (Part 2) (21:56) Disagreement and measurement (Part 1) (37:28) Sponsors: Claude | Tasklet (41:19) Disagreement and measurement (Part 2) (41:19) Transparency before takeoff (58:00) Redirecting AI labor (01:09:06) Defense plans and limits (01:25:26) Pausing versus redirecting (01:35:22) Open Phil and compute (01:50:16) Bottlenecks and preparation (01:57:42) From research to grants (02:13:03) Burnout and sabbatical (02:23:22) What EA offered (02:36:43) EA and religion (02:47:56) Next career steps (02:57:35) EA's future niche (03:08:15) Episode Outro (03:12:11) Outro PRODUCED BY: https://aipodcast.ing

Ajeya Cotra

Senior Research Analyst

Open Philanthropy

Platformer's Casey Newton moderates a conversation at Code 2023 on ethics in artificial intelligence, with Ajeya Cotra, Senior Program Officer at Open Philanthropy, and Helen Toner, Director of Strategy at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology. The panel discusses the risks and rewards of the technology, as well as best practices and safety measures. Recorded on September 27th in Los Angeles. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ajeya Cotra

Senior Research Analyst

Open Philanthropy

Helen Toner

Director of Strategy

CSETGeorgetown University Center for Security and Emerging TechnologyOpenAI

The U.S. surgeon general, Dr. Vivek Murthy, says social media poses a “profound risk of harm” to young people. Why do some in the tech industry disagree? Then, Ajeya Cotra, an A.I. researcher, on how A.I. could lead to a doomsday scenario. Plus: Pass the hat. Kevin and Casey play a game they call HatGPT. On today’s episode: Ajeya Cotra is a senior research analyst at Open Philanthropy Additional reading: The surgeon general issued an advisory about the risks of social media for young people. Ajeya Cotra has researched the existential risks that A.I. poses unless countermeasures are taken. Binance commingled customer funds and company revenue, former insiders told Reuters. BuzzFeed announced Botatouille, an A.I.-powered kitchen assistant. A Twitter bug caused the platform to restore deleted tweets. Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida announced his presidential campaign in a Twitter Spaces event rife with glitches. Two former rivals, Uber and Waymo, are teaming up to bring driverless ride-hailing to Phoenix. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Ajeya Cotra

Senior Research Analyst

Open Philanthropy