person
Wei Dai
Cypherpunk; influential AI safety thinker
Invented b-money (the conceptual predecessor of Bitcoin) and has since been a central informal figure in AI safety discussions. Writes extensively on LessWrong about decision theory and AI risk.
Profile
expertise
Deep technical
Sustained peer-reviewed contribution to ML, alignment, interpretability, or safety techniques. Could review a frontier paper.
Cryptographer (b-money, predecessor to Bitcoin). Long body of LessWrong posts on decision theory and updateless decision theory.
recognition
Established
Reliable, recognised voice within their specific subfield. Cited and invited but not central to general AI discourse.
Recognised in cryptography and rationalist communities.
vintage
Pre-deep-learning
Active before AlexNet. The existential-risk frame matures (FHI, OpenPhil, EA). Public AI commentary still rare; deep learning not yet dominant.
b-money 1998. LessWrong decision-theory posts from late 2000s. Frame predates deep learning.
Hand-classified. See the board for the criteria and the full grid.
Strategy positions
Alignment firstendorses
Solve technical alignment before capability thresholds closeArgues philosophical progress is a bottleneck for alignment, and that current approaches under-invest in decision theory.
Alignment requires philosophical progress we do not yet have.
Closest strategy neighbours
by jaccard overlapOther people whose strategy tags overlap with Wei Dai's. Overlap is on tag identity, not stance; opposites can show up if they reference the same tags.
Record last updated 2026-04-24.