Andrew Maynard is Director of the Arizona State University Risk Innovation Lab.
Prof Maynard argued that in areas such as autonomous vehicles, gene editing, and artificial intelligence, the nature of emergent risks and benefits often lies beyond the scope of many conventional risk frameworks. This is especially apparent where emerging knowledge, capabilities and trends are increasing the likelihood of existential risks, or are raising awareness around such risks. To navigate an increasingly complex and shifting emerging risk landscape, businesses, governments, not-for-profits, consumers, and others, will need equally radical innovation in how they think about and act on risk. “Risk innovation” is more a mindset than a methodology. It encourages novel approaches to risk that combine creativity and imagination with academic rigor and practical applicability. This presentation explored ideas emerging from risk innovation thinking and creative approaches to complex risk-related challenges.
This talk was given at 2018’s Cambridge Conference on Catastrophic Risk (CCCR2018), the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk’s major international conference, supported by the Templeton World Charity Foundation. It focused on four challenges faced by research communities focused on existential and global catastrophic risk research: Challenges of Evaluation and Impact; Challenges of Evidence; Challenges of Scope and Focus; and Challenges in Communication.