Eliezer S. Yudkowsky ( ; born September 11, 1979) is an American artificial intelligence researcher and writer on

decision theory Decision theory or the theory of rational choice is a branch of probability theory, probability, economics, and analytic philosophy that uses expected utility and probabilities, probability to model how individuals would behave Rationality, ratio ...

and

ethics Ethics is the philosophy, philosophical study of Morality, moral phenomena. Also called moral philosophy, it investigates Normativity, normative questions about what people ought to do or which behavior is morally right. Its main branches inclu ...

, best known for popularizing ideas related to

friendly artificial intelligence Friendly artificial intelligence (friendly AI or FAI) is hypothetical artificial general intelligence (AGI) that would have a positive (benign) effect on humanity or at least align with human interests such as fostering the improvement of the hu ...

. He is the founder of and a research fellow at the

Machine Intelligence Research Institute The Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI), formerly the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence (SIAI), is a non-profit research institute focused since 2005 on identifying and managing potential existential risks from artifi ...

(MIRI), a private research nonprofit based in

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...

. His work on the prospect of a runaway

intelligence explosion The technological singularity—or simply the singularity—is a hypothetical point in time at which technological growth becomes uncontrollable and irreversible, resulting in unforeseeable consequences for human civilization. According to the ...

influenced philosopher

Nick Bostrom Nick Bostrom ( ; ; born 10 March 1973) is a Philosophy, philosopher known for his work on existential risk, the anthropic principle, human enhancement ethics, whole brain emulation, Existential risk from artificial general intelligence, superin ...

's 2014 book '' Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies''.

Work in artificial intelligence safety

Goal learning and incentives in software systems

Yudkowsky's views on the safety challenges future generations of AI systems pose are discussed in Stuart Russell's and

Peter Norvig Peter Norvig (born 14 December 1956) is an American computer scientist and Distinguished Education Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI. He previously served as a director of research and search quality at Google. Norvig is th ...

's undergraduate textbook '' Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach''. Noting the difficulty of formally specifying general-purpose goals by hand, Russell and Norvig cite Yudkowsky's proposal that autonomous and adaptive systems be designed to learn correct behavior over time: In response to the

instrumental convergence Instrumental convergence is the hypothetical tendency for most sufficiently intelligent, goal-directed beings (human and nonhuman) to pursue similar sub-goals, even if their ultimate goals are quite different. More precisely, agents (beings with ...

concern, that autonomous decision-making systems with poorly designed goals would have default incentives to mistreat humans, Yudkowsky and other MIRI researchers have recommended that work be done to specify software agents that converge on safe default behaviors even when their goals are misspecified.

Capabilities forecasting

In the

scenario hypothesized by I. J. Good, recursively self-improving AI systems quickly transition from subhuman general intelligence to

superintelligent A superintelligence is a hypothetical agent that possesses intelligence surpassing that of the brightest and most gifted human minds. "Superintelligence" may also refer to a property of advanced problem-solving systems that excel in specific area ...

's 2014 book '' Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies'' sketches out Good's argument in detail, while citing Yudkowsky on the risk that anthropomorphizing advanced AI systems will cause people to misunderstand the nature of an intelligence explosion. "AI might make an ''apparently'' sharp jump in intelligence purely as the result of anthropomorphism, the human tendency to think of 'village idiot' and 'Einstein' as the extreme ends of the intelligence scale, instead of nearly indistinguishable points on the scale of minds-in-general." In ''Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach'', Russell and Norvig raise the objection that there are known limits to intelligent problem-solving from

computational complexity theory In theoretical computer science and mathematics, computational complexity theory focuses on classifying computational problems according to their resource usage, and explores the relationships between these classifications. A computational problem ...

; if there are strong limits on how efficiently algorithms can solve various tasks, an intelligence explosion may not be possible.

''Time'' op-ed

In a 2023 op-ed for ''Time'' magazine, Yudkowsky discussed the risk of artificial intelligence and advocated for international agreements to limit it, including a total halt on the development of AI. He suggested that participating countries should be willing to take military action, such as "destroy nga rogue datacenter by airstrike", to enforce such a moratorium. The article helped introduce the debate about

AI alignment In the field of artificial intelligence (AI), alignment aims to steer AI systems toward a person's or group's intended goals, preferences, or ethical principles. An AI system is considered ''aligned'' if it advances the intended objectives. A '' ...

to the mainstream, leading a reporter to ask President

Joe Biden Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...

a question about AI safety at a press briefing.

''If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies''

Together with Nate Soares, Yudkowsky wrote ''If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies'', which is being published by

Little, Brown and Company Little, Brown and Company is an American publishing company founded in 1837 by Charles Coffin Little and James Brown in Boston. For close to two centuries, it has published fiction and nonfiction by American authors. Early lists featured Emil ...

on September 16, 2025.

Rationality writing

Between 2006 and 2009, Yudkowsky and

Robin Hanson Robin Dale Hanson (born August 28, 1959) is an American economist and author. He is associate professor of economics at George Mason University and a former research associate at the Future of Humanity Institute of Oxford University. Hanson is k ...

were the principal contributors to ''Overcoming Bias'', a cognitive and social science blog sponsored by the

Future of Humanity Institute The Future of Humanity Institute (FHI) was an interdisciplinary research centre at the University of Oxford investigating big-picture questions about humanity and its prospects. It was founded in 2005 as part of the Faculty of Philosophy and t ...

of Oxford University. In February 2009, Yudkowsky founded ''

LessWrong ''LessWrong'' (also written ''Less Wrong'') is a community blog and Internet forum, forum focused on discussion of cognitive biases, philosophy, psychology, economics, rationality, and artificial intelligence, among other topics. It is associa ...

'', a "community blog devoted to refining the art of human rationality". ''Overcoming Bias'' has since functioned as Hanson's personal blog. Over 300 blog posts by Yudkowsky on philosophy and science (originally written on ''LessWrong'' and ''Overcoming Bias'') were released as an ebook, ''Rationality: From AI to Zombies'', by MIRI in 2015. MIRI has also published ''Inadequate Equilibria'', Yudkowsky's 2017 ebook on societal inefficiencies. Yudkowsky has also written several works of fiction. His

fanfiction Fan fiction or fanfiction, also known as fan fic, fanfic, fic or FF, is fiction typically written in an amateur capacity by fans as a form of fan labor, unauthorized by, but based on, an existing work of fiction. The author uses copyrighted ...

novel ''

Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality ''Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality'' (''HPMOR'') is a work of ''Harry Potter'' fan fiction by Eliezer Yudkowsky published on FanFiction.Net as a serial from February 28, 2010 to March 14, 2015, totaling 122 chapters and over 660,000 w ...

'' uses plot elements from

J. K. Rowling Joanne Rowling ( ; born 31 July 1965), known by her pen name , is a British author and philanthropist. She is the author of ''Harry Potter'', a seven-volume fantasy novel series published from 1997 to 2007. The series has List of best-sell ...

's ''

Harry Potter ''Harry Potter'' is a series of seven Fantasy literature, fantasy novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The novels chronicle the lives of a young Magician (fantasy), wizard, Harry Potter (character), Harry Potter, and his friends ...

'' series to illustrate topics in science and rationality. ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...

'' described ''Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality'' as a retelling of Rowling's original "in an attempt to explain Harry's wizardry through the scientific method".

Personal life

Yudkowsky is an

autodidact Autodidacticism (also autodidactism) or self-education (also self-learning, self-study and self-teaching) is the practice of education without the guidance of schoolmasters (i.e., teachers, professors, institutions). Overview Autodi ...

and did not attend high school or college. He is Jewish and was raised as a

Modern Orthodox Jew Modern Orthodox Judaism (also Modern Orthodox or Modern Orthodoxy) is a movement within Orthodox Judaism that attempts to synthesize Jewish values and the observance of Jewish law with the modern world. Modern Orthodoxy draws on several teach ...

, but is now secular.

Academic publications

* * * * * * * *

Notes

References

External links

*
''Rationality: From AI to Zombies''
(entire book online)
@ESYudkowsky
– Yudkowsky on X {{DEFAULTSORT:Yudkowsky, Eliezer 1979 births Living people American male bloggers American bloggers American founders American artificial intelligence researchers Life extensionists Fan fiction writers American transhumanists Writers from Berkeley, California American libertarians Singularitarians Cryonicists American epistemologists People associated with effective altruism Consequentialists American people of Jewish descent Rationalists Former Orthodox Jews AI safety scientists American secular Jews