AF - PIBBSS is hiring in a variety of roles (alignment research and incubation program) by Nora Ammann

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Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: PIBBSS is hiring in a variety of roles (alignment research and incubation program), published by Nora Ammann on April 9, 2024 on The AI Alignment Forum.
PIBBSS is looking to expand its team and is running work trials for new team members (primarily) in April, May and early June. If you're interested in joining a nimble team focused on AI safety research, field-building and incubation of new agendas, consider letting us know by filling in
this form.
The form is meant to be a low effort means for gauging interests. We don't guarantee getting back to everyone, but will reach out to you if we think you might be a good fit for the team. We would then aim to get to know you better (e.g. via call) before deciding whether it seems valuable (and worth our respective time) to do a trial. Work trials will look different depending on circumstances, including your interests and availability. We intend to reimburse people for the work they do for us.
About PIBBSS
PIBBSS (pibbss.ai) is a research initiative aimed at extracting insights in the parallels between natural and artificial intelligent systems, with the purpose of making progress on important questions about the safety and design of superintelligent artificial systems.
Since its inception in 2021, PIBBSS supported ~50 researchers for 3-month full-time fellowships, is currently supporting 5 in-house, long-term research affiliates, and has organized 15+ AI safety research events/workshops on topics with participants from both academia and industry. We currently have three full-time staff: Nora Ammann (Co-Founder), Lucas Teixeira (Programs), Dušan D. Nešić (Operations).
Over the past number of months, and in particular with the launch of our affiliate program at the start of 2024, we have started focusing more of our resources towards identifying, testing and developing specific research bets we find promising on our inside-view.
This also means we have been directionally moving away from more generic field-building or talent-interventions (though we still do some of this, and might continue doing so, where this appears sufficiently synergetic and counterfactually compelling). We expect to continue and potentially accelerate this trend over the course of 2024 and beyond, and will likely rebrand our efforts soon such as to better reflect the evolving scope and nature of our vision.
Our
affiliate program selects scholars from disciplines which study intelligence from a naturalized lens, as well as independent alignment researchers with established track records, and provides them with the necessary support to quickly test, develop, and iterate on high upside research directions. The lacunas in the field which we are trying to address:
(Field-building intervention) "Reverse-MATS": Getting established academics with deep knowledge in areas of relevant but as-of-yet neglected expertise into AI safety
(Research intervention) Creating high-quality research output which is theoretically-ambitious as well as empirically-grounded, ultimately leading to the counterfactual incubation of novel promising research agendas in AI safety
What we're looking for in a new team member
We don't have a specific singular job description that we're trying to hire for. Instead, there is a range of skill sets/profiles that we believe could valuable enhance our team. These tend to range from research to engineering, organizational and management/leadership profiles. Importantly, we seek to hire someone who becomes part of the core team, implying potential for a significant ability to co-create the vision and carve your own niche based on your strengths and interests.
We expect to hire one or more people who fit an interesting subset of the below list of interests & aptitudes:
Ability to manage projects (people, timelines, milestones, deliverables, etc) a...