Shunryu Colin Garvey

Trained in the interdisciplinary field of Science & Technology Studies (STS), Dr. Shunryu Colin Garvey probes decision making under the conditions of complexity, uncertainty, and disagreement. Using AI as a case study, he explores how societies can more safely, fairly, and wisely govern controversial sociotechnical systems. Garvey uses political decision theory and contemporary history as guides to future flourishing. His history of American AI was awarded Best Early Career Paper by the Society for the History of Technology, and his study of the first global “AI Arms Race” in the 1980s was published in a special issue of Pacific Historical Review. He recently guest edited “AI and its Discontents,” a special issue of Interdisciplinary Science Reviews (2020) featuring critical analyses of AI from diverse perspectives, and his book manuscript, Terminated? How Society Can Avert the Coming AI Catastrophe, is under review. His work has been supported by the National Science Foundation, as well as Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences. After completing a postdoctoral fellowship with join appointments at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI and Center for International Security and Cooperation, Garvey relocated to Japan in October 2020, where he is currently completing training in the Zen Buddhist priesthood. After reemerging in April 2021, he will join a start-up as Head of AI Strategy, assist in building bridges between the Japanese and Western AI communities, and further probe avenues for incorporating the wisdom of the ancient “Human-Centered” institutions of Buddhism and democracy with modern technoscience.