EA Forum Podcast (All audio) “Transformative AI and wild animals: An exploration.” by mal_graham, Wild_Animal_Initiative
A note on status: The following post is Wild Animal Initiative's first foray into thinking about the intersection of transformative AI and wild animal welfare. I’m not an AI safety expert, but I’ve been largely familiar with the main ideas since 2012. I’ve done my best to read around the issues and asked several more AI-informed folks to give feedback on this draft; however, our ideas at Wild Animal Initiative remain very early days so please take this all with a grain of salt.
We welcome additional feedback on how we should be preparing for potential societal changes due to AI. Please feel free to contact strategy@wildanimalinitiative.org to share suggestions or thoughts; I’ll also be engaging with comments on this post.
Executive Summary
Many in the AI safety community believe transformative AI (TAI; defined here as AI tools with cognitive capabilities surpassing highly trained humans) could arrive within [...]
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Outline:
(00:16) Executive Summary
(02:15) Transformative AI and wild animals: An exploration.
(03:22) When will TAI get here, and what will it bring?
(03:46) When will TAI get here?
(05:36) What will TAI bring?
(07:18) How will a technological & manufacturing explosion affect wild animal welfare science?
(07:25) TAI and the strategic importance of academic fields.
(12:41) Shortened impact timelines for wild animal welfare science
(18:41) Asymmetric acceleration and research priorities
(27:27) How does TAI affect WAW directly?
(29:21) Space exploration
(31:55) Misalignment
(34:49) Abundance
(38:07) Unknown unknowns
(39:00) Summary
(39:37) Summary of takeaways for wild animal welfare science
(40:43) Summary of takeaways for the wild animal welfare community in general
(42:00) Closing thoughts
(44:25) Acknowledgments
(45:03) Appendix
(45:06) TAI and wild animal welfare science: potential effects.
(45:38) Grand challenges
(45:44) Issues of lower relevance
(48:03) Issues of uncertain sign
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First published:
April 24th, 2025
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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.