MATS Research

MATS is by all accounts very good at what they do and they have good positive spillover effects on the surrounding ecosystem. The recruiting classes they’re getting are outstanding.

If (and only if) you think that what they do, which is support would-be alignment researchers starting out and especially transitioning from other professions, is what you want to fund, then you should absolutely fund them. That’s a question of prioritization.

Donate here, or contact them via webform.

Update: we don't appear to be funding constrained for Winter, but will continue accepting donations for our Summer 2024 Program!

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MATS Program, Apr 2024

Update: thanks to your donations, we were able to support an additional 8.5 scholars in the Winter 2023-24 Program, at an ex post cost of $22.4k/scholar! Thank you so much for your contributions to the field of AI safety :)

We are currently fundraising for our Summer 2024 Program and again expect to receive less funding than our ideal program. We can support marginal scholars at a cost of $24.4k/scholar. We currently have 1220 applicants for Summer 2024 and expect to accept ~3-5% (i.e., MIT's admissions rate). Given the high calibre of applicants and mentors, we would love further funding to support additional scholars!

We have announced the following mentors and hope to announce more as we confirm additional funding: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sDnD9Igr3gkWX-N_l9W8itVBpqx-pChh-61atxGYkPc/edit

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MATS Program, May 2024

Update: MATS is no longer in need of additional funding for our Summer 2024 Program. We are still accepting donations towards our Winter 2024-25 Program, however!

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MATS Program, May 2024

Update: we recently published our Winter 2024-25 Retrospective: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Z87fSrxQb4yLXKcTk/mats-winter-2023-24-retrospective

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MATS Program, May 2024

Update: we recently published a blog post summarizing our takes on talent needs of technical AI safety teams based on 31 interviews with key figures in AI safety, including senior researchers, organization leaders, social scientists, strategists, funders, and policy experts.

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MATS Program, Aug 2024

Update: we have assembled a team of expert advisors to select mentors for the Winter 2024-25 Program, as we received 78 mentor applicants! Our mentor pool has never been more exciting!

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MATS Program, Sep 2024

Update: mentors for the Winter 2024-25 Program released! Currently fundraising for the Summer 2025 Program; 48 mentors have already expressed interest!

Thank you to Manifund for collectively supporting ~11 additional research scholars with your collective donations so far! It's very important for us at MATS to continue seeking funding from diverse sources, which lets us run larger programs with further research diversity. We will continue to do our best to turn your donations into impact!

I've found being a MATS mentor a very valuable experience! I think my scholars have done kick-ass work, several of them have had very high impact roles going forwards, and I've mentored many more people than I would have done on my own in a way that I believe has significantly magnified my and their impact, and I appreciate MATS for facilitating this.

I'm not donating more, as MATS is a large funding opportunity that I don't think EACC is well placed for, but a token donation seems in the spirit.

I've been very impressed with the MATS program. Lots of impressive people have gotten into and connected through their program and when I've visited I've been impressed with the caliber of people I met.

An example is Marius Hobbhahn doing interpretability research during MATS that helped inform the Anthropic interpretability team's strategy, and then Marius going on to co-found Apollo.

• SERI MATS is a program that helps established AI safety researchers find mentees. The program has grown substantially since we first provided funding, and now supports 15 mentors, but at the time, the mentors were Alex Gray, Beth Barnes, Evan Hubinger, John Wentworth, Leo Gao, Mark Xu, and Stuart Armstrong. Mentors took part in the program in Berkeley in a shared office space.
• When SERI MATS was founded, there were very few opportunities for junior researchers to try out doing alignment research. Many opportunities were informal mentorship positions, sometimes set up through cold emails or after connecting at conferences. The program has generally received many more qualified applicants than they have places for, and the vast majority of fellows report a positive experience of the program. I also believe the program has substantially increased the number of alignment research mentorship positions available.
• I think that SERI MATS is performing a vital role in building the talent pipeline for alignment research. I am a bit confused about why more organisations don’t offer larger internship programs so that the mentors can run their programs ‘in-house’. My best guess is that MATS is much better than most organisations running small internship programs for the first time, particularly in supporting their fellows holistically (often providing accommodation and putting significant effort into the MATS fellows community). One downside of the program relative to an internship at an organisation is that there are fewer natural routes to enter a managed position, though many fellows have gone on to receive LTFF grants for independent projects or continued their mentorship under the same mentor.