Shaping AI for the Public Good via the Berkeley Lab Model
David Patterson & Andy Konwinski ((UC Berkeley and Google) and (Laude Institute))
Colloquium
Tuesday, June 3, 2025, 3:30 pm
Gates Center (CSE2), G20 | Amazon Auditorium
Abstract
This three-part talk summarizes the underlying philosophy and best practices of the Berkeley lab model, offers a perspective on improving AI’s impact, and describes a new research funding opportunity starting this Fall.
Senior computer scientists and rising stars in AI developed a balanced perspective on AI's societal impact informed by interviews with 24 experts including John Jumper, Barack Obama, Susan Rice, and Eric Schmidt (see www.ShapingAI.com). We believe we are in the early days of practical AI, and focused efforts by practitioners, policymakers, and stakeholders can still increase AI's upsides and reduce its downsides.
We suggest guidelines for enhancing AI development: i) Human-AI collaboration exceeds capabilities of either AI or people; ii) Focus on productivity improvements that generate more jobs; iii) Initially prioritize eliminating tedious tasks; and iv) Consider that AI impact varies by geography.
Rather than simply predict long-term AI impact, we've identified research milestones across seven fields that could improve it. To inspire work on these milestones, we propose
- Creating $1M+ inducement prizes
- Establishing $10M+ 5-year multidisciplinary research labs
The forthcoming nonprofit Laude Institute will sponsor some of these prizes and research centers using funds raised from those who prospered in the tech industry.
Bios:
David Patterson is a UC Berkeley Pardee professor emeritus and a Google distinguished engineer. His most influential Berkeley projects likely were RISC and RAID. His best-known book is Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach. He and his co-author John Hennessy shared the 2017 ACM A.M Turing Award and the 2022 NAE Charles Stark Draper Prize for Engineering. (The Turing Award is often referred to as the "Nobel Prize of Computing" and the Draper Prize is considered a "Nobel Prize of Engineering.")
Andy Konwinski is a co-founder of Databricks, Perplexity, and Laude Ventures. His work spans research and real-world impact in AI, data, and software infrastructure. At Databricks he most recently ran AI Product, and he continues to serve as President of Perplexity. He got his PhD in Computer Science from UC Berkeley, where he contributed to Apache Hadoop and co-created Apache Mesos and Apache Spark. He co-teaches a PhD seminar entitled “Research to Startups” at UC Berkeley.
This talk will be streamed live on our YouTube channel. Link will be available on that page one hour prior to the event.