Open Phil AI Fellowship donations received

This is an online portal with information on donations that were announced publicly (or have been shared with permission) that were of interest to Vipul Naik. The git repository with the code for this portal, as well as all the underlying data, is available on GitHub. All payment amounts are in current United States dollars (USD). The repository of donations is being seeded with an initial collation by Issa Rice as well as continued contributions from him (see his commits and the contract work page listing all financially compensated contributions to the site) but all responsibility for errors and inaccuracies belongs to Vipul Naik. Current data is preliminary and has not been completely vetted and normalized; if sharing a link to this site or any page on this site, please include the caveat that the data is preliminary (if you want to share without including caveats, please check with Vipul Naik). We expect to have completed the first round of development by the end of July 2024. See the about page for more details. Also of interest: pageview data on analytics.vipulnaik.com, tutorial in README, request for feedback to EA Forum.

Table of contents

Basic donee information

We do not have any donee information for the donee Open Phil AI Fellowship in our system.

Donee donation statistics

Cause areaCountMedianMeanMinimum10th percentile 20th percentile 30th percentile 40th percentile 50th percentile 60th percentile 70th percentile 80th percentile 90th percentile Maximum
Overall 5 1,840,000 1,780,000 1,135,000 1,135,000 1,135,000 1,300,000 1,300,000 1,840,000 1,840,000 2,300,000 2,300,000 2,325,000 2,325,000
AI safety 5 1,840,000 1,780,000 1,135,000 1,135,000 1,135,000 1,300,000 1,300,000 1,840,000 1,840,000 2,300,000 2,300,000 2,325,000 2,325,000

Donation amounts by donor and year for donee Open Phil AI Fellowship

Donor Total 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018
Open Philanthropy (filter this donee) 8,900,000.00 1,840,000.00 1,300,000.00 2,300,000.00 2,325,000.00 1,135,000.00
Total 8,900,000.00 1,840,000.00 1,300,000.00 2,300,000.00 2,325,000.00 1,135,000.00

Full list of documents in reverse chronological order (0 documents)

There are no documents associated with this donee.

Full list of donations in reverse chronological order (5 donations)

Graph of top 10 donors (for donations with known year of donation) by amount, showing the timeframe of donations

Graph of donations and their timeframes
DonorAmount (current USD)Amount rank (out of 5)Donation dateCause areaURLInfluencerNotes
Open Philanthropy1,840,000.0032022-04AI safety/technical researchhttps://www.openphilanthropy.org/grants/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2022-class/-- Donation process: The Open Phil AI Fellowship is awarded annually based on an application process. https://www.openphilanthropy.org/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence-the-open-phil-ai-fellowship/ has more details on the application process.

Intended use of funds (category): Living expenses during project

Intended use of funds: Grant to provide scholarship to eleven machine learning researchers over five years.

Donor reason for selecting the donee: According to the grant page: "These [eleven] fellows were selected for their academic excellence, technical knowledge, careful reasoning, and interest in making the long-term, large-scale impacts of AI a central focus of their research. [...] We believe that progress in artificial intelligence may eventually lead to changes in human civilization that are as large as the agricultural or industrial revolutions; while we think it’s most likely that this would lead to significant improvements in human well-being, we also see significant risks. Open Phil AI Fellows have a broad mandate to think through which kinds of research are likely to be most valuable, to share ideas and form a community with like-minded students and professors, and ultimately to act in the way that they think is most likely to improve outcomes from progress in AI. The intent of the Open Phil AI Fellowship is both to support a small group of promising researchers and to foster a community with a culture of trust, debate, excitement, and intellectual excellence."

Donor reason for donating that amount (rather than a bigger or smaller amount): Although the amount per researcher is lower than in previous years (at $1,840,000 over 11 years, it averages to around $170,000 per researcher, less than the $260,000 in the previous year), this reduced amount is partly explained by some of the grantees also receiving funding as Vitalik Buterin Postdoctoral Fellows (see https://futureoflife.org/team/fellowship-winners-2022/ for details); for these grantees, Open Phil and Future of Life Institute split the money equally. Also, regarding the amount, the grant page says: "This is an estimate because of uncertainty around future year tuition costs and currency exchange rates. This number may be updated as costs are finalized."

Donor reason for donating at this time (rather than earlier or later): This is the fourth of annual sets of grants, decided through an annual application process, with the announcement made between April and June each year. The timing may have been chosen to sync with the academic year.
Intended funding timeframe in months: 60

Other notes: Five of the eleven grantees (Cynthia Chen, Erik Jenner, Johannes Treutlein, Usman Anwar, and Zhijing Jin) also receiving funding as Vitalik Buterin Postdoctoral Fellows (see https://futureoflife.org/team/fellowship-winners-2022/ for details); for these grantees, Open Phil and Future of Life Institute split the money equally.
Open Philanthropy1,300,000.0042021-04AI safety/technical researchhttps://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2021-classDaniel Dewey Donation process: According to the grant page: "These [five] fellows were selected from 397 applicants for their academic excellence, technical knowledge, careful reasoning, and interest in making the long-term, large-scale impacts of AI a central focus of their research."

Intended use of funds (category): Living expenses during project

Intended use of funds: Grant to provide scholarship to five machine learning researchers over five years.

Donor reason for selecting the donee: According to the grant page: "The intent of the Open Phil AI Fellowship is both to support a small group of promising researchers and to foster a community with a culture of trust, debate, excitement, and intellectual excellence. We plan to host gatherings once or twice per year where fellows can get to know one another, learn about each other’s work, and connect with other researchers who share their interests."

Donor reason for donating that amount (rather than a bigger or smaller amount): An explicit reason for the amount is not specified, and the total amount is lower than previous years, but the amount per researcher ($260,000) is a little higher than previous years. It's likely that the amount per researcher is determined first and the total amount is the sum of these.

Donor reason for donating at this time (rather than earlier or later): This is the fourth of annual sets of grants, decided through an annual application process, with the announcement made between April and June each year. The timing may have been chosen to sync with the academic year.
Intended funding timeframe in months: 60

Donor retrospective of the donation: The followup grant https://www.openphilanthropy.org/grants/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2022-class/ confirms that the program would continue.

Other notes: The initial grant page only listed four of the five fellows and an amount of $1,000,000. The fifth fellow, Tan Zhi-Xuan, was added later and the amount was increased to $1,300,000.
Open Philanthropy2,300,000.0022020-05AI safety/technical researchhttps://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2020-classCatherine Olsson Daniel Dewey Donation process: According to the grant page: "These fellows were selected from more than 380 applicants for their academic excellence, technical knowledge, careful reasoning, and interest in making the long-term, large-scale impacts of AI a central focus of their research."

Intended use of funds (category): Living expenses during project

Intended use of funds: Grant to provide scholarship to ten machine learning researchers over five years

Donor reason for selecting the donee: According to the grant page: "The intent of the Open Phil AI Fellowship is both to support a small group of promising researchers and to foster a community with a culture of trust, debate, excitement, and intellectual excellence. We plan to host gatherings once or twice per year where fellows can get to know one another, learn about each other’s work, and connect with other researchers who share their interests." In a comment reply https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/DXqxeg3zj6NefR9ZQ/open-philanthropy-our-progress-in-2019-and-plans-for-2020#BCvuhRCg9egAscpyu (GW, IR) on the Effectiive Altruism Forum, grant investigator Catherine Olsson writes: "But the short answer is I think the key pieces to keep in mind are to view the fellowship as 1) a community, not just individual scholarships handed out, and as such also 2) a multi-year project, built slowly."

Donor reason for donating that amount (rather than a bigger or smaller amount): The amount is comparable to the total amount of the 2019 fellowship grants, though it is distributed among a slightly larger pool of people.

Donor reason for donating at this time (rather than earlier or later): This is the third of annual sets of grants, decided through an annual application process, with the announcement made between April and June each year. The timing may have been chosen to sync with the academic year.
Intended funding timeframe in months: 60

Donor retrospective of the donation: The followup grant https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2021-class (2021) confirms that the program would continue.

Other notes: Announced: 2020-05-12.
Open Philanthropy2,325,000.0012019-05AI safety/technical researchhttps://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2019-classDaniel Dewey Donation process: According to the grant page: "These fellows were selected from more than 175 applicants for their academic excellence, technical knowledge, careful reasoning, and interest in making the long-term, large-scale impacts of AI a central focus of their research."

Intended use of funds (category): Living expenses during project

Intended use of funds: Grant to provide scholarship support to eight machine learning researchers over five years

Donor reason for selecting the donee: According to the grant page: "The intent of the Open Phil AI Fellowship is both to support a small group of promising researchers and to foster a community with a culture of trust, debate, excitement, and intellectual excellence. We plan to host gatherings once or twice per year where fellows can get to know one another, learn about each other’s work, and connect with other researchers who share their interests."

Donor reason for donating that amount (rather than a bigger or smaller amount): The amount is about double the amount of the 2018 grant, although the number of people supported is just one more (8 instead of 7). No explicit comparison of grant amounts is done in the grant page.

Donor reason for donating at this time (rather than earlier or later): This is the second of annual sets of grants, decided through an annual application process, with the announcement made in May/June each year. The timing may have been chosen to sync with the academic year.
Intended funding timeframe in months: 60

Donor retrospective of the donation: The followup grants https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2020-class (2020) and https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2021-class (2021) confirm that the program would continue. Among the grantees, Smitha Milli would receive further support https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/smitha-milli-participatory-approaches-machine-learning-workshop from Open Philanthropy, indicating continued confidence in the support.

Other notes: Announced: 2019-05-17.
Open Philanthropy1,135,000.0052018-05AI safety/technical researchhttps://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/ai-fellows-program-2018Daniel Dewey Donation process: According to the grant page: "These fellows were selected from more than 180 applicants for their academic excellence, technical knowledge, careful reasoning, and interest in making the long-term, large-scale impacts of AI a central focus of their research"

Intended use of funds (category): Living expenses during project

Intended use of funds: Grant to provide scholarship support to seven machine learning researchers over five years

Donor reason for selecting the donee: According to the grant page: "The intent of the Open Phil AI Fellowship is both to support a small group of promising researchers and to foster a community with a culture of trust, debate, excitement, and intellectual excellence. We plan to host gatherings once or twice per year where fellows can get to know one another, learn about each other’s work, and connect with other researchers who share their interests."

Donor reason for donating at this time (rather than earlier or later): This is the first of annual sets of grants, decided through an annual application process.
Intended funding timeframe in months: 60

Donor retrospective of the donation: The corresponding grants https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2019-class (2019), https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2020-class (2020), and https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/open-phil-ai-fellowship-2021-class (2021) confirm that these grants will be made annually. Among the grantees, Chris Maddison would continue receiving support from Open Philanthropy in the future in the form of support https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/potential-risks-advanced-artificial-intelligence/university-of-toronto-machine-learning-research for his students, indicating continued endorsement of his work.

Other notes: Announced: 2018-05-31.