The taskforce represents a startup government mindset that makes me optimistic
I would say it’s not just potentially a startup government mindset in the abstract but rather an attempt to repeat a specific, preexisting highly successful example of startup government, namely the UK’s covid vaccine task force which was name checked in the original Foundation model task force announcement.
That was also fast-moving attempt to solve a novel problem that regular scientific institutions were doing badly at and it substantially beat expectations, and was run under an administration that has a lot of overlap with the current administration, with the major exception being a more stable and reasonable PM at the top (Sunak not Boris) and no Dominic Cummings involved.
I would say it’s not just potentially a startup government mindset in the abstract but rather an attempt to repeat a specific, preexisting highly successful example of startup government, namely the UK’s covid vaccine task force which was name checked in the original Foundation model task force announcement.
That was also fast-moving attempt to solve a novel problem that regular scientific institutions were doing badly at and it substantially beat expectations, and was run under an administration that has a lot of overlap with the current administration, with the major exception being a more stable and reasonable PM at the top (Sunak not Boris) and no Dominic Cummings involved.