Stuart Russell

Stuart Russell is a Professor and formerly Chair of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at UC Berkeley, holder of the Smith-Zadeh Chair in Engineering, and Director of the Center for Human-Compatible AI. His research covers a wide range of topics in artificial intelligence, with a current emphasis on the long-term future of artificial intelligence and its relation to humanity. In the area of arms control, Russell has developed a new global seismic monitoring system for the nuclear-test-ban treaty. He has been active in efforts to ban lethal autonomous weapons, participating as an invited expert in UN negotiations in New York and Geneva and originating the short film Slaughterbots. Russell’s recent book, Human Compatible, has been described as “the most important book on AI so far.” It lays out a new direction for the development of artificial intelligence, based on the concept of systems that are provably beneficial to humans. He is a recipient of the IJCAI Computers and Thought Award and from 2012 to 2014 held the Chaire Blaise Pascal in Paris. He is an Honorary Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford, an Andrew Carnegie Fellow, a Fellow of AAAI, ACM, and AAAS, and an Associate Fellow of the Royal Institute for International Affairs. His book Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach (with Peter Norvig) is the standard text in AI, used in 1500 universities in 135 countries.