With Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei calling for a global slowdown in AI development and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Google DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis and others expressing support, the debate over how quickly AI should advance has entered a new phase.
Amodei is calling for measures including independent safety evaluators, stronger industry safety standards and international coordination around AI development. His warning comes amid growing concerns about AI systems becoming increasingly capable of acting autonomously, including the possibility of recursive self-improvement that could outpace humans’ ability to understand or control them.
But what would “slowing down” AI actually look like — and is it realistic?
David Broniatowski, an associate professor of engineering management and systems engineering, is GW’s lead principal investigator of a newly launched, NSF-funded institute called TRAILS that explores trustworthy AI. He conducts research in decision making under uncertainty, collective decision making, the design and regulation of complex information flow systems, and how behavior spreads online. Broniatowski can discuss a number of topics related to AI’s role and use in spreading misinformation as well as efforts to combat misinformation online, including the challenges of tackling misinformation.
He can discuss:
- What AI companies mean when they call for a “slowdown” and what safeguards could realistically be implemented
- Whether voluntary safety standards and independent AI evaluations can work in an industry built around rapid competition
- The risks of allowing AI capabilities to advance faster than our ability to test, regulate and understand them
- Whether calls for greater regulation could genuinely improve AI safety — or inadvertently give the largest AI companies an advantage over smaller competitors
To schedule an interview with an expert, please contact Katelyn Deckelbaum, katelyn [dot] deckelbaum
gwu [dot] edu (katelyn[dot]deckelbaum[at]gwu[dot]edu).