Hello, and welcome back to The Cognitive Revolution.
This is going to be part two of the Nathan Goes to China series, and we're calling it AI Safety with Chinese Characteristics. Part one, if you haven't heard that, is up on the feed. It's been up for a few days. And in that part one of the series, I really just laid out the tech setup for going to China — what you would need to do if you want to get a cell phone ready, the apps that you'd need to download. I also shared some of my experience using Chinese AIs on the ground there, and then just shared a bunch of observations based on my two weeks in China and the many conversations I had. I appreciate the kind comments that I've gotten in response to that one, including at least one from a listener in China, which was probably the one that mattered to me the most. I think if you've been to China in the last few years, you can probably skip that one. But if you're interested in this, you might also be interested in that, though I do think they should be pretty self-contained. So part one is a little bit closer to a travelogue and tech review, and this episode is going to be really focused on the Chinese AI safety ecosystem and trying to just describe it and, as much as possible, understand it on its own terms. As we saw last time, there are a lot of similarities. Just as there are major similarities between American big tech and Chinese big tech, there are a lot of similarities between American AI safety and Chinese AI safety communities, and the work that they're producing. But there are also some differences, and I think it will definitely be helpful if we have a better understanding of those. Before I really get into it, just a couple quick disclaimers again. I will again be following a Chatham House rule for this episode, not because I was asked to do that, but just because I want to keep things simple for myself and make sure that I'm protecting everyone that I talk to from being misrepresented by me and put in an uncomfortable position. So I won't be naming any names or attributing things to the organizations or institutions that people are affiliated with. The one exception to that for this particular episode will be when I'm citing published papers or reports — those I can give you the name for, because those are out there in the public domain. And there are some good sources that I'll mention and we can link to in the show notes of this episode for anybody who wants to go deeper, which of course is always recommended. The other point of order or clarification, just in case anyone is wondering: I have no financial conflicts on this matter. I took this trip paying my own way — flights and hotels, all that stuff. The biggest thing that I did accept from some of my gracious hosts were a number of meals, probably half a dozen meals over the course of the two weeks. And I think if you've listened to me this far, you can probably feel pretty confident, as I do, that accepting those meals has not overly colored my take on what is going on in the Chinese AI safety community. So with that, let's get into it.
Watch now!
Thank you for being part of The Cognitive Revolution,
Nathan Labenz