Stanford University has announced a new institute designed for studying, guiding, and developing human-centered artificial intelligence technologies called the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI). HAI’s mission is to advance artificial intelligence (AI) research, education, policy, and practice for improving the human condition.
The institute is committed to partnering with industry, government, and non-government organizations that share a goal of driving a better future for humanity through artificial intelligence. And the institute is working closely with companies across a wide variety of industries including technology, healthcare, financial services, and manufacturing.
John Etchemendy and Fei-Fei Li are the co-directors of the HAI. Etchemendy is a professor of philosophy and former Stanford University provost and Li is a professor of computer science and former director of the Stanford AI Lab. Li coined the “human-centered AI” in a New York Times op-ed article.
“Its biggest role will be to reach out to the global AI community, including universities, companies, governments and civil society to help forecast and address issues that arise as this technology is rolled out,” said Etchemendy. “We do not believe we have answers to the many difficult questions raised by AI, but we are committed to convening the key stakeholders in an informed, fact-based quest to find those answers.”
Stanford is known for its world-class humanities, social sciences, engineering, entrepreneurship, and medical programs. By combining these resources with experts in business, law, and policy, Stanford HAI is expecting to become a global hub for artificial intelligence.
Photo: Stanford
“AI is no longer just a technical field,” she said. “If we’re going to make the best decisions for our collective future, we need technologists, business leaders, educators, policy makers, journalists and other parts of society to be versed in AI, and to contribute their perspectives,” added Li. “Stanford’s depth of expertise across academic disciplines combined with a rich history of collaboration with experts and stakeholders from around the world make it an ideal platform for this institute.”
The Stanford HAI launched with 200 participating faculty from all seven schools at the university. And it is planning to hire at least 20 new faculty including 10 junior fellows from across fields spanning humanities, engineering, medicine, arts, etc. Plus it will house research fellows, convene groups of professionals for solving critical issues to humanity, and distribute funding to spur research directions. And the Stanford HAI will partner with organizations like AI4All, AI100, AI Index, Center for AI Safetyand the Center for the Study of Language and Information.
The HAI is the first initiative to launch out of Stanford’s long-range planning process that started in 2017 with an open invitation to faculty, students, and staff for submitting ideas for how Stanford could empower creativity and agile research along with accelerating solutions for society. The process resulted in multiple focus areas with teams strategizing how to best leverage Stanford’s unique strengths to approach challenges in diverse fields including education, health, the environment, and basic research.
The Stanford HAI officially launched yesterday as part of the 2019 Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence Symposium. Speakers at the event included Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Bill Gates, California Governor Gavin Newsom, Kate Crawford (co-director of the AI Now Institute at NYU), Jeff Dean (Google Senior Fellow), Demis Hassabis (founder and CEO of DeepMind), Alison Gopnik (psychology professor at UC Berkeley), Reid Hoffman (LinkedIn co-founder and partner at Greylock), and Eric Horvitz (Technical Fellow at Microsoft).
At the event, Gates said that he is hoping the institute will bring in legislators, judges, and executive branch representatives to get up to speed on artificial intelligence due to its global nature and the lack of government involvement makes things challenging, according to SiliconValley.com. And Governor Newsom pointed out that major employment areas in the state like trucking and logistics are on the edge of automation. So the state added about $10 million out of a $204 billion budget to help “increase skills training to community colleges.”
The Washington Post reported that the Stanford HAI is aiming to raise more than $1 billion. This money would go towards research grants, academic events, hiring talent and data processing power costs.
The Stanford HAI and a new Data Science Institute are going to anchor a planned 200,000-square-foot building that is intended to serve as a rallying point and catalyst for interdisciplinary collaboration. And the advisory council includes Hoffman, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, former Yahoo CEO and Google exec Marissa Mayer, Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang, and prominent venture capitalist Jim Breyer.
“Now is our opportunity to shape that future by putting humanists and social scientists alongside people who are developing artificial intelligence,” explained Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne. “This approach aligns with Stanford’s founding purpose to produce knowledge for the betterment of humanity. I am deeply thankful to our supporters who are providing foundational funding for the institute, which is a critical element for our vision for the future of Stanford University.”
