Exploration · as of October 2026
AI safety compendium
The fate of humanity may hinge on whether we're able to safely align superintelligent AI. Over a hundred unique ideas have been proposed for how to achieve this. The prospect of contributing to such a consequential project is alluring to many, but I myself spent too much time rederiving ideas that had already been offered by others before me. Therefore, I set out to map every idea in AI safety, so that I could start from the frontier and build upon it. This is that map.
Thus far, my attempted mapping has covered 218 sources, producing 129 unique ideas across 11 category groups.
Has this been tried?
Describe an idea in plain words. Below are the closest approaches on this page. Each one shows how many of the 19 sources name it and how much work it gets.
Or try one of these:
19 sources on the field, side by side
Researchers, labs, funders and course designers have each published their own overview of AI-safety work. This chart lines up 19 of them, from 2016 to 2026.
Each column is one source. Each row is one approach to making AI safe. A filled dot means the source names the approach. A hollow dot means the source only implies it or names something close.
Tap a row to read what each source says about it. Tap a source name for details. Scroll the chart sideways to see all 19 sources.
The 19 sources, with links
How many sources cover each group
129 approaches, by group
This list merges the 19 sources with 199 further published sources and with scans of research agendas, lab programmes and funder calls. It names who works on each approach and how much attention it gets.
People and organisations
A who's who of people and organisations that shaped the field's ideas, money and institutions. Open a card for key ideas, works and where to start reading.