TLDR:
- Jaime Sevilla founded Epoch AI, a nonprofit research organization that aims to predict the future of AI by analyzing historical trends in the field.
- The organization has been widely recognized for its work, providing valuable insights to governments and policymakers.
Imagine if the world’s approach to climate change relied solely on speculative predictions. This is the situation with artificial intelligence (AI), with varying opinions about the timeline for the development of human-level AI systems. Jaime Sevilla, a 28-year-old Spanish researcher, founded Epoch AI in 2022 to bring rigor to predicting the future of AI. Sevilla and his team analyze historical trends in AI, documenting the inputs of significant AI models to predict future developments.
The organization has grown to 13 employees and has been instrumental in shaping government policies around AI. Using their database of AI models, Epoch AI has influenced the E.U. AI Act and President Joe Biden’s Executive Order on AI. Researchers at Epoch AI have also published studies predicting the future impacts of AI, such as estimating when AI systems comparable to the industrial revolution may emerge, highlighting the unpredictability of AI’s societal impact.
Despite the uncertainty, Sevilla hopes that Epoch AI will encourage a more rigorous approach to understanding and preparing for the potential drastic changes AI may bring in the coming decades.