Google and U of T are each committing $10 million to support this position.
With funding from Google, University of Toronto (U of T) has created a new position named after artificial intelligence (AI) pioneer Geoffrey Hinton to honor his legacy and help attract another distinguished artificial intelligence expert to the university.
“I am encouraged that the Hinton Chair in Artificial Intelligence will support the next generation of AI research in the same spirit.”
Geoffrey Hinton
Hinton's Chair in Artificial Intelligence is funded by C$10 million from Google—Hinton's former employer—and a matching contribution from the University of Texas. The position was announced this evening at the NeurIPS conference in San Diego.
The university says this $20 million investment makes the position one of U of T's “most prestigious and generously supported advanced research positions.” It includes targeted support for a leading artificial intelligence researcher, as well as additional funds allocated to fundamental discoveries and ideas.
The University of Texas says the position and possible hiring will help attract new AI talent to Canada. The appointee will focus on artificial intelligence research in medicine, engineering, scientific discovery and the humanities. They will be tasked with recruiting, training and mentoring students, inspiring AI startups, and expanding the university's AI networks and international partnerships.
Efforts to cut research funding and put pressure on American universities under the leadership of US President Donald Trump have led higher education institutions in other countries to try to poach talented American scientists.
U of T was campaign to attract some of them to Canada, just recently hired three leading US scientistsincluding husband-and-wife economists Mark Duggan of Stanford University and Jacqueline Pless of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Canadian-born astrophysicist Sarah Seager, also of MIT.
Hinton, a British-Canadian dubbed the “godfather of artificial intelligence,” is a former Google executive, professor emeritus at Texas State University and Nobel laureate who played a key role in the development of artificial intelligence and devoted the last years of his life warning against the potentially catastrophic consequences of these systems if left unchecked.
“I am grateful for the opportunity to continue my research at the University of Toronto, which provided me with the time and resources to develop ideas that ultimately grew into the success of neural networks,” Hinton said in a statement. “I am encouraged that the Hinton Chair in Artificial Intelligence will support the next generation of AI research in the same spirit, allowing promising ideas to germinate for the benefit of all humanity.”
Image courtesy of University of Toronto. Photo by Nick Ivanishin.
