BlueDot Impact (Dewi Erwan)
Founding ambitious AI safety and field-building projects.
Stream overview
I'd like to help you 1) found an AI safety/security company, or 2) launch an ambitious field-building project.
For 1), you'd start by doing scenario planning and threat modeling. Once you've narrowed down onto one threat, you'd analyse what interventions are most promising for mitigating that threat, and which overlap the best with your skills. You'd finish MATS with a v1 strategy for your startup which you use to build your founding team and raise money.
For 2), your goal would be to get more exceptional people working on high-impact AI safety work. Your project could take a wide range of shapes, including (a) convincing a specific high-value group of people to go all-in on AI safety (e.g. elite military units, maths olympiad winners, PMs at fast-growing startups), (b) designing and running a series of workshops for policymakers about AI risks and what the government could be doing about it, and (c) figuring out how to accelerate the growth of a specific AI safety sub-field (like mitigating gradual disempowerment).
Mentors
Dewi, originally from Wales, is the CEO of BlueDot Impact and has a focus on attracting top talent into AI safety, helping them figure out how they can have the most impact, and enabling them to do so as fast as possible.
Mentorship style
Minimum support = 2x 30-min meetings per week. We could scale this up as appropriate.
I'll be based in SF. If the fellows want to work in BlueDot's office for some periods of time, I could collaborate with them daily.
I'm available for quick calls anytime, and am responsive on Slack.
Fellows we are looking for
I'm open to people with a wide range of backgrounds. Though you need to be willing to work very hard, be great at communicating, and have a burning desire to make AI go well.
I work best with people who are intense, communicate and reason clearly, and are mission-driven.
Project selection
We'll work together to design the project. You'll have a lot of freedom to figure out what the best shape of thing to do is, and I'll provide lots of regular feedback and make relevant introductions to help you refine the proposal.
Your first 1-2 weeks will be focused on figuring out what to do, and the rest of the fellowship will be focused on execution.