More about us
Oxford AI Safety Initiative was spun out of OxAI’s Safety and Governance team in 2024. We believed the AI safety community at Oxford would benefit from an independent organisation focused on supporting its work.
Oxford is home to many people capable of contributing to AI safety in Oxford who haven’t yet been introduced to the field or aren’t working on it. We’re here to help them make a contribution.
Meet OAISI’s Executive Committee
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James Lester
President
Hi, I'm James, and I'm at Balliol studying for an MPhil in Economics. Before this, I graduated from Cambridge (also economics), where I became concerned about extreme AI risks through the effective altruism community in 2022. I was an ERA:AI fellow in 2024, and have also worked in a think tank, economic consultancy and quant trading firm. My research has focused on incentive problems and "market failures" across AI governance and strategy. Super happy to chat about OAISI, AI risk and economics in general, especially if you're from an EA, policy or less technical background!
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Juliana Eberschlag
Programme Manager
Hi, I’m Juliana! I’m a Programme Manager at OAISI, where I work across operations, community building, and programme design to support Oxford’s growing AI safety ecosystem. Previously, I studied Philosophy at Queen’s University in Canada with a focus on philosophy of science, mind, AI, and logic - topics which remain reflective of my interests. I’m always keen to connect with others thinking about AI safety (especially from a high-level perspective), but I’d also be excited to chat all things music, personal psychology insights, or whatever else you’ve been pondering lately.
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Matthew Farrugia-Roberts
Committee Member
Hi, I'm Matthew! I'm a DPhil in Computer Science at Magdalen. I came to Oxford to deepen my understanding of technology and its future and to broaden my understanding of society and its history, in order to help these things work better together. My current technical research is on understanding emergent agency in reinforcement learning. In the past, I have worked on developmental interpretability and singular learning theory, goal misgeneralisation, neural network geometry, and inverse reinforcement learning. I'm excited to meet students and researchers across Oxford who are studying and working on all topics relevant to the future of AI and society.
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Louis Thomson
Committee Member
Hi, I'm Louis! I've recently graduated from the Master's in Computer Science and Philosophy at Oxford. My main interests include AI [control / safety / ethics], game theory, and cooperative AI. I've previously worked on the following projects (in order of recency): agentic monitoring for AI control; cooperation and alignment in multi-agent games; AI-Control games; and behavioural evaluations of deception in LLMs.
I'm always up for talking about all things CS, philosophy (particularly AI-relevant topics but also continental philosophy), and other entirely-not-work-related stuff like music and games!
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Rohan Selva-Radov
Advisor
Hey – I’m Rohan, a third-year undergraduate studying PPE at Merton!
Last year I helped run OAISI, and I’m now still involved as an advisor. I previously worked on investing & strategy at Macroscopic Ventures, a non-profit grantmaker focused on AI safety & preventing dystopian futures. Outside of AI, I'm a big fan of bouldering and gardening, and I'd be excited to chat about any & all of the above!
