Information for Foundational Research Institute

Table of contents

Basic information

Item Value

Positions count by year

Hover over a name to see the position and date range. This table only includes positions where at least the start date is known. The positions count can count the same person multiple times if they held different positions; similarly, the list of staff may include the same person multiple times if they held more than one position during a single year. For each year, a person is included if they were at the organization for any part of the year; this means the actual staff count at any point during the year can be lower (or higher, if some staff held multiple positions in a single year).

Year Positions count Researchers General staff Associates Board members Advisors
2015 2 Caspar Oesterheld, Lukas Gloor
2016 3 Caspar Oesterheld, Lukas Gloor Kaj Sotala
2017 5 Caspar Oesterheld, Lukas Gloor Max Daniel Kaj Sotala Brian Tomasik
2018 5 Caspar Oesterheld, Lukas Gloor Max Daniel Kaj Sotala Brian Tomasik
2019 2 Caspar Oesterheld Brian Tomasik
2020 2 Caspar Oesterheld Brian Tomasik
2021 1 Caspar Oesterheld
2022 1 Caspar Oesterheld
2023 1 Caspar Oesterheld
2024 1 Caspar Oesterheld

Number of full-time staff at the beginning each year

The following table lists some dates and people who were at the organization on the given date (namely, the start of the year). The table may not list every person who worked for the organization (e.g. they could have joined and left in the middle of a single year). This table excludes associates, interns, advisors, and board members.

Date Staff count Staff
2016-01-01 2 Caspar Oesterheld, Lukas Gloor
2017-01-01 2 Caspar Oesterheld, Lukas Gloor
2018-01-01 3 Caspar Oesterheld, Lukas Gloor, Max Daniel
2019-01-01 1 Caspar Oesterheld
2020-01-01 1 Caspar Oesterheld
2021-01-01 1 Caspar Oesterheld
2022-01-01 1 Caspar Oesterheld
2023-01-01 1 Caspar Oesterheld
2024-01-01 1 Caspar Oesterheld

Full history of additions and subtractions

This table shows the full change history of positions. Each row corresponds to at least one addition or removal of a position. Additions are in green and subtractions are in red. If a position name changed, it is listed simultaneously as an addition (of the new name) and removal (of the old name) and colored yellow. Additionally there are faded variants of each color for visited links.

Date Number of positions Number of positions added Number of positions removed Positions added Positions removed
2 2 0 Kaj Sotala, Tobias Baumann
2015-12-01 4 2 0 Caspar Oesterheld, Lukas Gloor
2016-06-01 5 1 0 Kaj Sotala
2017-06-01 6 1 0 Max Daniel
2017-11-01 7 1 0 Brian Tomasik
2018-06-01 4 0 -3 Kaj Sotala, Lukas Gloor, Max Daniel
2020-02-01 3 0 -1 Brian Tomasik

List of people (7 positions)

Person Title Start date End date AI safety relation Subject Employment type Source Notes
Kaj Sotala Researcher [1], [2] One of 37 AGI Safety Researchers of 2015 funded by donations from Elon Musk and the Open Philanthropy Project
Max Daniel Executive Director 2017-06-01 2018-06-01 GCR organization general full-time [3], [4]
Brian Tomasik Advisor 2017-11-01 2020-02-01 position background advisor [5], [6], [7], [8], [9]
Lukas Gloor Researcher (AI safety) 2015-12-01 2018-06-01 position background [10], [4], [11], [12] Previously listed as a volunteer, but the paid staff/volunteer sections were removed from the website so the status of employment is unclear.
Caspar Oesterheld Researcher (AI safety) 2015-12-01 position technical research [10], [13], [14] Previously listed as a volunteer, but the paid staff/volunteer sections were removed from the website so the status of employment is unclear.
Kaj Sotala Research Associate 2016-06-01 2018-06-01 position background associate [15], [4], [16]
Tobias Baumann Network member position [14]

Products (0 products)

Name Creation date Description

Organization documents (0 documents)

Title Publication date Author Publisher Affected organizations Affected people Document scope Cause area Notes

Documents (0 documents)

Title Publication date Author Publisher Affected organizations Affected people Affected agendas Notes

Similar organizations

Organization Number of people in common List of people in common
Effective Altruism Foundation 18 Max Daniel, Brian Tomasik, Lukas Gloor, Adrian Hutter, Adriano Mannino, David Pearce, Lucius Caviola, David Althaus, Ruairí Donnelly, Olle Häggström, Ewelina Tur, Ulla Wessels, Ole Martin Moen, Johannes Treutlein, Anni Leskelä, Jesse Clifton, Alfredo Parra, Daniel Kestenholz
Center on Long-Term Risk 16 Brian Tomasik, Lukas Gloor, Caspar Oesterheld, Adrian Hutter, David Pearce, Lucius Caviola, David Althaus, Ruairí Donnelly, Olle Häggström, Ulla Wessels, Ole Martin Moen, Anni Leskelä, Jesse Clifton, Alfredo Parra, Daniel Kestenholz, Nicolas Feil
Raising for Effective Giving 5 Lukas Gloor, Adriano Mannino, Ruairí Donnelly, Alfredo Parra, Daniel Kestenholz
Center for Emerging Risk Research 4 Adrian Hutter, David Althaus, Jesse Clifton, Daniel Kestenholz
Sentience Politics 3 Tobias Baumann, Adriano Mannino, Lucius Caviola
Center for Reducing Suffering 2 Brian Tomasik, Tobias Baumann
Lightcone Infrastructure 1 Kaj Sotala
Machine Intelligence Research Institute 1 Kaj Sotala
Effective Altruism Funds 1 Max Daniel
Forethought Foundation for Global Priorities Research 1 Max Daniel
Open Philanthropy 1 Max Daniel
Sentience Institute 1 Max Daniel
Wild-Animal Suffering Research 1 Brian Tomasik
University College London 1 Tobias Baumann
GiveWell 1 Simon Knutsson
Conjecture 1 Janko Prester
Rethink Priorities 1 Holly Elmore
Centre for Effective Altruism 1 Johannes Treutlein
Center for Human-Compatible AI 1 Johannes Treutlein
Cooperative AI Foundation 1 Jesse Clifton
Legal Priorities Project 1 Alfredo Parra