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Wikipedia - Center for Applied Rationality
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3/5
Good(3)Good quality. Reputable source with community review or editorial standards, but less rigorous than peer-reviewed venues.
Rating inherited from publication venue: Wikipedia
Useful background reference for understanding the organizational landscape of the AI safety community, particularly the role of rationalist-adjacent organizations in cultivating researchers and advocates in the field.
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Importance: 30/100wiki pagereference
Summary
Wikipedia overview of the Center for Applied Rationality (CFAR), a nonprofit organization focused on developing and teaching rationality techniques to help people think more clearly and make better decisions. CFAR has been particularly influential in the AI safety community by training researchers and advocates in cognitive tools and epistemic practices. The organization has historically served as a pipeline connecting rationalist community members to AI safety work.
Key Points
- •CFAR is a nonprofit that conducts workshops teaching applied rationality and cognitive debiasing techniques drawn from psychology and behavioral economics.
- •The organization has strong ties to the LessWrong rationalist community and the Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI).
- •CFAR workshops have been used to recruit and prepare individuals for careers in AI safety research and related fields.
- •The center focuses on practical skill-building around decision-making, introspection, and overcoming cognitive biases.
- •CFAR represents a community-building and human-capital development approach to improving AI safety outcomes.
Cited by 1 page
| Page | Type | Quality |
|---|---|---|
| Center for Applied Rationality | Organization | 62.0 |
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# Center for Applied Rationality
Center for Applied Rationality
US-based nonprofit organization
| [](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CFAR.png) |
| Formation | 2012;14years ago(2012) |
| Type | [Nonprofit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonprofit "Nonprofit") [research institute](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Research_institute "Research institute") |
| Legal status | [501(c)(3)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/501(c)(3) "501(c)(3)") [tax exempt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_exempt "Tax exempt") [charity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charitable_organization "Charitable organization")[\[1\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Applied_Rationality#cite_note-guidestar-1) |
| Purpose | [Research](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Research "Research") and training in [cognitive science](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_science "Cognitive science"), and de- [biasing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias "Bias"), to alleviate [existential risk from artificial general intelligence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existential_risk_from_artificial_general_intelligence "Existential risk from artificial general intelligence")[\[2\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Applied_Rationality#cite_note-mission2016-2) |
| Location | - [Berkeley, California](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley,_California "Berkeley, California"), U.S. |
| [President](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_(corporate_title) "President (corporate title)") | Anna Salamon[\[1\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Applied_Rationality#cite_note-guidestar-1) |
| Website | [rationality.org](http://rationality.org/) |
Center for Applied Rationality
The **Center for Applied Rationality** ( **CFAR**) is a nonprofit organization based in [Berkeley, California](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley,_California "Berkeley, California"), that hosts workshops on [rationality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rationality "Rationality") and [cognitive bias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_bias "Cognitive bias"). It was founded in 2012 by [Julia Galef](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_Galef "Julia Galef"), Anna Salamon, Michael Smith and Andrew Critch,[\[3\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Applied_Rationality#cite_note-3) to improve participants' [rationality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rationality "Rationality") using "a set of techniques from math and decision theory for forming your beliefs about the world as accurately as possible".[\[4\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Applied_Rationality#cite_note-4) Its president since 2021 is Anna Salamon.[\[1\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Applied_Rationality#cite_note-guidestar-1)
CFAR's training draws upon fields such as [psychology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychology "Psychology") and [behavioral economics](https://en.wikipe
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