Effective Altruism Forum
EA Forum

Hide table of contents
by JorgeTorresC, Guillem Bas, JuanGarcia
8 min read 0

33

AI safetyBiosecurityExistential riskPolicyGlobal catastrophic riskOrganization updatesResearchResilient foodAI governanceAnnouncements and updatesFood securityGlobal catastrophic biological riskPandemic preparedness
Frontpage
This is a linkpost for https://www.orcg.info/articulos/nuestro-2024-un-ao-de-consolidacin

Executive summary

2024 has been a year of significant growth and consolidation for Observatorio de Riesgos Catastróficos Globales (ORCG), marked by impactful advancements across our four core workstreams. We've expanded our research initiatives and strengthened international collaborations, solidifying our role as a leading voice in understanding and mitigating catastrophic risks.

From the outset, ORCG has championed proactive and collaborative approaches to navigating the complex challenges of potential global catastrophes. This commitment fueled a diverse range of activities in 2024, with highlights including:

These endeavors have not only deepened our understanding of global risks but also fostered crucial partnerships with organizations and experts worldwide. We've collaborated with leading institutions and initiatives such as ALLFED, Global Shield, CSER, GCRI, CLTR, and AMexBio. Furthermore, by participating in several working groups of the EU GPAI Code of Practice, we've engaged with several civil society organizations in the field of AI safety and governance. Our work has also involved stakeholder engagement with OECD, EuroHPC, OEI, AESIA, IMSS, UNAM, and UANL. We are working on defining collaborative projects across our workstreams with some of these institutions, starting in 2025.  We invite you to stay tuned for our updates next year.

In this recap, we'll delve into the key activities and accomplishments that have shaped ORCG's 2024 journey. We'll explore the impact of our research, the progress made in our key programs, and the valuable connections we've forged. Join us as we review our milestones—especially our key products—that have defined this chapter in our ongoing commitment to safeguarding humanity's future.

Looking ahead, securing comprehensive funding remains a critical challenge. While our AI initiatives are funded through 2025, other vital areas face resource limitations that could jeopardize our continued progress. We invite you to partner with us by donating to help sustain our work across all areas of our mission.

Products 

 

Reports

 

ORCG in press

Academic papers

  • The EU AI Act: A pioneering effort to regulate frontier AI? This paper, published in IberamIA journal, examines the EU AI Act, the first attempt to regulate frontier models. It concludes the Parliament’s draft was a good step toward adequately addressing the risks posed by these models, though some of its provisions were insufficiently defined in some areas and lacking in others. The final version of the Act improved in many of the aspects outlined.
  • "Systematic Review of Risk Taxonomies Associated with Artificial Intelligence": This article systematically reviewed 36 studies on AI risks, resulting in a taxonomy of threats and risk vectors. Our research found a need to consider emerging risks, bridge gaps between present and future harms, and further explore the potential pathways to an AI catastrophe
  • "Resilient Food Solutions to Avoid Mass Starvation During a Nuclear Winter in Argentina": This research explores potential food sources and production methods that could help ensure food security in Argentina during a nuclear winter scenario, describing how timely food system adaptation could flip a situation of national famine to a situation in which the country could not only feed itself but also continue to make significant exports to neighbors.
  • “The Securitization of Artificial Intelligence: An Analysis of its Drivers and Consequences”; submitted to Revista de Estudios Sociales by Universidad de los Andes. This article analyzes how the US is framing AI as a national security issue, revealing tensions between politicization and securitization, national and global security concerns, and threat-based versus risk-based approaches. It argues that effective AI governance requires balancing national interests with global security, favoring a risk-based approach that acknowledges uncertainties and promotes multilateral solutions instead of focusing solely on threats and nationalistic competition.
  • “Training and Education: What are the essential elements necessary for biosafety and biosecurity training programs for researchers and professionals?”, in submission process. To address the needs and challenges identified by Latin American researchers and professionals, effective biosafety and biosecurity training programs must prioritize formalized competency-based training, continuous professional development, accessibility, practical application, and intersectoral collaboration.  By incorporating these elements, training programs can empower individuals to mitigate biological risks, foster responsible conduct, and strengthen regional biosecurity and public health.

Policy Brief

Research notes

Events presence

Join us in building a safer and more resilient future. Your contribution to ORCG will help us address the full spectrum of global catastrophic risks and ensure that humanity is prepared for the challenges that lie ahead.

Donate to ORCG today and help us protect humanity's future. Read here about our current plans.   

In addition to financial contributions, you can support ORCG by:

  • Spreading the word: Share this Recap and our website (https://orcg.info) with your networks.
  • If you are an expert interested in our work: you can contribute by sending suggestions, providing feedback, and sharing academic and funding opportunities with us, among others (info@orcg.info).
  • Connecting us with potential partners: Introduce us to individuals or organizations who can support our work.

Together, we can build a safer future for all.

33

0
0

Reactions

0
0

More posts like this

Comments


No comments on this post yet.
Be the first to respond.
More from JorgeTorresC
48
Don't Let Other Global Catastrophic Risks Fall Behind: Support ORCG in 2024
3 authors
· · 4m read
1
1
157
Global catastrophic risks law approved in the United States
7 authors
· · 1m read
7
7
75
Observatorio de Riesgos Catastróficos Globales (ORCG) Recap 2023
7 authors
· · 3m read
0
0
View more
Curated and popular this week
 ·  · 5m read
 · 
[Cross-posted from my Substack here] If you spend time with people trying to change the world, you’ll come to an interesting conundrum: Various advocacy groups reference previous successful social movements as to why their chosen strategy is the most important one. Yet, these groups often follow wildly different strategies from each other to achieve social change. So, which one of them is right? The answer is all of them and none of them. This is because many people use research and historical movements to justify their pre-existing beliefs about how social change happens. Simply, you can find a case study to fit most plausible theories of how social change happens. For example, the groups might say: * Repeated nonviolent disruption is the key to social change, citing the Freedom Riders from the civil rights Movement or Act Up! from the gay rights movement. * Technological progress is what drives improvements in the human condition if you consider the development of the contraceptive pill funded by Katharine McCormick. * Organising and base-building is how change happens, as inspired by Ella Baker, the NAACP or Cesar Chavez from the United Workers Movement. * Insider advocacy is the real secret of social movements – look no further than how influential the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights was in passing the Civil Rights Acts of 1960 & 1964. * Democratic participation is the backbone of social change – just look at how Ireland lifted a ban on abortion via a Citizen’s Assembly. * And so on… To paint this picture, we can see this in action below: Source: Just Stop Oil which focuses on…civil resistance and disruption Source: The Civic Power Fund which focuses on… local organising What do we take away from all this? In my mind, a few key things: 1. Many different approaches have worked in changing the world so we should be humble and not assume we are doing The Most Important Thing 2. The case studies we focus on are likely confirmation bias, where
 ·  · 2m read
 · 
I speak to many entrepreneurial people trying to do a large amount of good by starting a nonprofit organisation. I think this is often an error for four main reasons. 1. Scalability 2. Capital counterfactuals 3. Standards 4. Learning potential 5. Earning to give potential These arguments are most applicable to starting high-growth organisations, such as startups.[1] Scalability There is a lot of capital available for startups, and established mechanisms exist to continue raising funds if the ROI appears high. It seems extremely difficult to operate a nonprofit with a budget of more than $30M per year (e.g., with approximately 150 people), but this is not particularly unusual for for-profit organisations. Capital Counterfactuals I generally believe that value-aligned funders are spending their money reasonably well, while for-profit investors are spending theirs extremely poorly (on altruistic grounds). If you can redirect that funding towards high-altruism value work, you could potentially create a much larger delta between your use of funding and the counterfactual of someone else receiving those funds. You also won’t be reliant on constantly convincing donors to give you money, once you’re generating revenue. Standards Nonprofits have significantly weaker feedback mechanisms compared to for-profits. They are often difficult to evaluate and lack a natural kill function. Few people are going to complain that you provided bad service when it didn’t cost them anything. Most nonprofits are not very ambitious, despite having large moral ambitions. It’s challenging to find talented people willing to accept a substantial pay cut to work with you. For-profits are considerably more likely to create something that people actually want. Learning Potential Most people should be trying to put themselves in a better position to do useful work later on. People often report learning a great deal from working at high-growth companies, building interesting connection
 ·  · 31m read
 · 
James Özden and Sam Glover at Social Change Lab wrote a literature review on protest outcomes[1] as part of a broader investigation[2] on protest effectiveness. The report covers multiple lines of evidence and addresses many relevant questions, but does not say much about the methodological quality of the research. So that's what I'm going to do today. I reviewed the evidence on protest outcomes, focusing only on the highest-quality research, to answer two questions: 1. Do protests work? 2. Are Social Change Lab's conclusions consistent with the highest-quality evidence? Here's what I found: Do protests work? Highly likely (credence: 90%) in certain contexts, although it's unclear how well the results generalize. [More] Are Social Change Lab's conclusions consistent with the highest-quality evidence? Yes—the report's core claims are well-supported, although it overstates the strength of some of the evidence. [More] Cross-posted from my website. Introduction This article serves two purposes: First, it analyzes the evidence on protest outcomes. Second, it critically reviews the Social Change Lab literature review. Social Change Lab is not the only group that has reviewed protest effectiveness. I was able to find four literature reviews: 1. Animal Charity Evaluators (2018), Protest Intervention Report. 2. Orazani et al. (2021), Social movement strategy (nonviolent vs. violent) and the garnering of third-party support: A meta-analysis. 3. Social Change Lab – Ozden & Glover (2022), Literature Review: Protest Outcomes. 4. Shuman et al. (2024), When Are Social Protests Effective? The Animal Charity Evaluators review did not include many studies, and did not cite any natural experiments (only one had been published as of 2018). Orazani et al. (2021)[3] is a nice meta-analysis—it finds that when you show people news articles about nonviolent protests, they are more likely to express support for the protesters' cause. But what people say in a lab setting mig
Recent opportunities in AI safety
9
An International Collaborative Hub for Advancing AI Safety Research
Cody Albert
· · 6m read
0
0
28
Apply to the Cambridge ERA:AI Fellowship 2025
Harrison 🔸
· · 3m read
0
0
20
Applications Open: Pivotal 2025 Q3 Research Fellowship
2 authors
· · 2m read
0
0
View more