AI safety-evaluations ecosystem + the EA money map
(AI-chronology Tab. This is the "targets of work / who evaluates whom" layer under the spec-ai-lab-chronology-ea-pathways safety-reg story.)
The eval institutions (fact)
- US AISI (at NIST; renamed the Center for AI Standards and Innovation / CAISI under the current administration) + UK AISI run pre-deployment model testing - the government-eval layer. The rename + de-emphasis is itself a policy signal.
- METR (Model Evaluation & Threat Research) - dangerous-capability + autonomy/task-horizon evals labs cite in safety cases.
- Apollo Research - deception / scheming evals (does the model strategically mislead?).
Self-governance instruments (fact; sincerity graded)
- Anthropic's Responsible Scaling Policy (AI Safety Levels) and OpenAI's Preparedness Framework are voluntary capability thresholds + commitments - pitched as the template for formal regulation. Critics call that mechanism regulatory capture / safety-washing (lab self-rules become the policy baseline). Interpretation, labeled.
The EA money map (fact of funding; conflict framing labeled)
The same Effective Altruism capital - Open Philanthropy (+ SFF/FLI) - substantially funds the labs' safety teams, the eval nonprofits (METR, Apollo), AND the policy advocates. That triple role is why a "follow the money" trace keeps landing on EA (SB 1047 -> the 2026 pacing letters -> spec-buist-v-anthropic-pacing). Coordinated-intent claims remain unsupported; the linkages are documented.
DataRepublican's "EA Explorer" (independent open-source map)
Prompted by Jacob Coxon's viral Sep-2026 Anthropic-resignation/pause post - and the ensuing tracing to METR and EA nonprofits - DataRepublican (pseudonymous data analyst; tagline "Exposing where the money flows") published EA Explorer: a people-and-funding network map plus a "Their words" verbatim-quote browser over 25+GB of EA forum material (every quote links to its source). It applies her charity-graph tooling (multi-root BFS over IRS 990 filings, taxpayer-fund tracing) to the EA/Open-Philanthropy network.
- Link: datarepublican.com (charity graph: /expose; write-up on her Substack).
- Honest handling: it is an independent analysis with an explicitly critical POV - a genuine open-data contribution (sourced quotes, 990-based graphs), not a neutral arbiter. Treat specific funding-flow figures as leads to verify against primary 990s; treat the framing as her viewpoint.
Honest limits
Institutions, evals, RSPs, and grants = fact; "safety-washing / regulatory capture" = interpretation; DataRepublican's map = independent, critical, source-linked (verify dollar claims vs 990s); no coordinated-conspiracy claim is asserted. Structural overlay - no financial-core edges.
Sources: NIST/CAISI, UK AISI, METR, Apollo Research; Anthropic/OpenAI RSP+Preparedness; Open Philanthropy grants; datarepublican.com + Substack. Cross-refs: US_AISI, METR, Apollo_Research, Responsible_Scaling_Policy, Anthropic, OpenAI, Open_Philanthropy, Effective_Altruism, AI_Safety_Regulation, DataRepublican, spec-buist-v-anthropic-pacing.
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