SB 1047: California's AI bill & its potential to shape US AI policy | Nathan Calvin

Nathan Calvin shares his insider perspective on SB 1047, the new AI safety bill that Nathan has helped shape as it’s moved through the California state legislature. Nathan is senior policy counsel at the Center for AI Safety Action Fund, and this episode was recorded on August 19, 2024.

Nathan and host Luisa Rodriguez talk about:
• What’s actually in SB 1047, and which AI models it would apply to.
• The most common objections to the bill — including how it could affect competition, startups, open source models, and US national security — and which of these objections Nathan thinks hold water.
• What Nathan sees as the biggest misunderstandings about the bill that get in the way of good public discourse about it.
• Why some AI companies are opposed to SB 1047, despite claiming that they want the industry to be regulated.
• How the bill is different from Biden’s executive order on AI and voluntary commitments made by AI companies.
• Why California is taking state-level action rather than waiting for federal regulation.
• How state-level regulations can be hugely impactful at national and global scales, and how listeners could get involved in state-level work to make a real difference on lots of pressing problems.

Learn more and see the full transcript on the 80,000 Hours website: https://80000hours.org/podcast/episod...

Chapters:
• Cold open (00:00:00)
• Luisa's intro (00:00:57)
• The interview begins (00:02:30)
• What risks from AI does SB 1047 try to address? (00:03:10)
• Supporters and critics of the bill (00:11:03)
• Misunderstandings about the bill (00:24:07)
• Competition, open source, and liability concerns (00:30:56)
• Model size thresholds (00:46:24)
• How is SB 1047 different from the executive order? (00:55:36)
• Objections Nathan is sympathetic to (00:58:31)
• Current status of the bill (01:02:57)
• How can listeners get involved in work like this? (01:05:00)
• Luisa's outro (01:11:52)

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The 80,000 Hours Podcast features unusually in-depth conversations about the world’s most pressing problems and what you can do to solve them.