It’s clear that Eliezer has been the driving force behind SIAI existing as an organization. He founded it, his writings have been its most visible and influential face, he wants to organize an FAI team of which he would be a member, and so forth. The Singularity Summit is basically independent of him, and he was not particularly involved in the Visiting Fellows and rationality camp events that have occurred so far, proceeded mostly without him), but “driving force” remains very fair.
However, a number of SIAI folk like Michael Vassar and myself were independently interested in AI risk (and benefit) before coming in contact with Eliezer or his work, and would have likely continued to pursue other paths to affect this area sans EY. I think that this is important for the underlying question about independence of beliefs, and the two were bundled together.
Also, Nick Bostrom’s work has been influential for a number of people, especially his papers on the ethics of astronomical waste and superintelligence.
It’s clear that Eliezer has been the driving force behind SIAI existing as an organization. He founded it, his writings have been its most visible and influential face, he wants to organize an FAI team of which he would be a member, and so forth. The Singularity Summit is basically independent of him, and he was not particularly involved in the Visiting Fellows and rationality camp events that have occurred so far, proceeded mostly without him), but “driving force” remains very fair.
However, a number of SIAI folk like Michael Vassar and myself were independently interested in AI risk (and benefit) before coming in contact with Eliezer or his work, and would have likely continued to pursue other paths to affect this area sans EY. I think that this is important for the underlying question about independence of beliefs, and the two were bundled together.
Also, Nick Bostrom’s work has been influential for a number of people, especially his papers on the ethics of astronomical waste and superintelligence.
EY founded it. Everyone else is self selected for joining (as you yourself explained), and represents extreme outliers as far as I can tell.