Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

vox.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 373 posts

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#121

Post by kevingadd »

rjf72 wrote: post #67
swang wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eh you know that doesn't mean 96000 opposed this though? do you yourself actually care other than the fact that a specific group of people complained?

One issue with this view is that such petitions tend to be spread with near perfect coverage. So only 2,000 people out of 98,000 signing does generally mean that the other 96,000 are more likely to be opposed/neutral to the 2000. And the current culture of Google such that openly expressing support for a panel that includes genuinely diverse ideological views is something that could have consequences. As one interest…

This is a pretty weird take. The sort of petitions you're talking about are not widely spread with remotely perfect coverage at companies like Google or Microsoft, there's no allowed way to distribute these via company-wide email or something and people are distributed globally across campuses and timezones. Personally at both workplaces I have never seen any of these petitions or open letters that make the news cross my desk or even heard about them before reading about them in the press.

Maybe perfect coverage at smaller companies, but even then I kinda doubt it.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#122

Post by kevingadd »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #17

The Heritage Foundation is very much in the mainstream of conservatism in the United States. They are not a fringe right wing organization. This very public protest about the appointment of the Heritage Foundation president to the AI ethics panel, and Google's subsequent dissolution of it, deepens the mistrust that conservatives have about Google and Silicon Valley in general being hostile to them and the feeling tha…

There's an argument to be made on the political basis, but unfortunately the choice of conservative was poor given the complete lack of qualifications and unnecessarily toxic public speech background. It's really worthwhile to vet your selections in advance to ensure they're not militant anarchists or antisemites or homophobes or anything else in their historical tweets or public speeches - regardless of their expertise on the subject (in this case, also none) it prevents them from doing their job without interference.

There are numerous conservatives you could find to do the job who wouldn't have set off this controversy.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#123

Post by tastroder »

telltruth wrote: post #105
ecshafer wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would trust an ai ethicist with a PhD in philosophy or ethics of their ideas were coherent. Tech backgrounds are not necessarily required.

The big problem is that these people don't understand what current tech really is. The media and Musk have hyped this up as "AI" but it's not even remotely AI. These people go around and present slides as if sky is falling and induce massive FUD in general public. There is no real AI as far as anyone technical is concerned. So whole deal about "AI Ethics" is great way to get on AI train and get massive salaries for n…

Where is this "these people" narrative coming from in this thread? While I get the controversy about that particular board member, the others seemed to be accomplished researchers and include people with pretty technical backgrounds.

Archive link to the short bios, since Google seems to have taken the document down: https://web.archive.org/web/20190331195013/https://ai.google...

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#124

Post by soup10 »

telltruth wrote: post #105
ecshafer wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would trust an ai ethicist with a PhD in philosophy or ethics of their ideas were coherent. Tech backgrounds are not necessarily required.

The big problem is that these people don't understand what current tech really is. The media and Musk have hyped this up as "AI" but it's not even remotely AI. These people go around and present slides as if sky is falling and induce massive FUD in general public. There is no real AI as far as anyone technical is concerned. So whole deal about "AI Ethics" is great way to get on AI train and get massive salaries for n…

i mean we have super fast and accurate image processing now. doesn't take a genius to realize that its possible to use that technology to aim and manipulate weapons

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#125

Post by laughinghan »

dx87 wrote: post #51
ananth22by7 wrote: post #39

I fail to understand. Is “comments” and “views on issues” enough to cause such a stir? People’s sensitivity boggles my mind. Can we not say things without having to walk on eggshells? What kind of unforgiving and judgemental culture are we living in?

If it makes you feel any better, not everywhere is like that. I work at a mid sized technology consulting company on the east coast, and I've heard multiple managers say that they hate when they have to manage developers from the west coast. My manager told us about a time she got a nasty email from the lead developer of a team because she started an email with "Hey guys" instead of a gender neutral greeting.

It's funny, the mind-boggling sensitivity definitely goes both ways. I've known people who received direct but totally polite feedback suggesting they use one of many delightful gender neutral greetings instead of "guys", and became incredibly defensive. Probably described the feedback with a word similar to "nasty".

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#126

Post by 93s6oz »

smelendez wrote: post #61
dx87 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it makes you feel any better, not everywhere is like that. I work at a mid sized technology consulting company on the east coast, and I've heard multiple managers say that they hate when they have to manage developers from the west coast. My manager told us about a time she got a nasty email from the lead developer of a team because she started an email with "Hey guys" instead of a gender neutral greeting.

That is regional, though. I'm from New York and I've addressed groups of older female relatives as "you guys" without anyone batting an eye. In other parts of the country that's not common and people see "guys" as gendered, and people feel like you're forgetting they're there. The word "dude" as a form of address is gender neutral and business appropriate some places and not others. It's a hard problem: Y'all works s…

I am European. "Y'all" and "folks" are big warning signs for me. When I see someone use those, I know where things are going.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#127

Post by 93s6oz »

matt4077 wrote: post #119
educationdata wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is "Which bathroom should this person use" an easy question? If it is really easy, why it is so controversial? You may think it is an easy question, in reality it is an actual hard question.

„Some say you shouldn’t exist. Others say you have a right to live. Hard question“

That is polarising. An extreme take. I haven't seen anybody make the argument that trans people should be killed. Just that men should not be able to use women bathrooms. In this case, that's the argument. Turning it into something like that is not going to help anybody.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#128

Post by keithpeter »

telltruth wrote: post #77
vilhelm_s wrote: post #44

I thought this twitter thread by Kelsey Piper was pretty good: > as I look through her history I am mostly confused why she was chosen in the first place. She doesn't have any background in tech. She doesn't have any prior writing or research related to AI. No background in the other topics that come up - surveillance, data privacy, international security. She's mostly a culture warrior, so no wonder now we're having…

Interestingly everyone who hasn't done anything technical but wants to ride AI train chooses to become "AI Ethics" person these days. You can look up vast number of these AI ethics "experts" giving talks on this subject without ever having trained a model for anything. So apparently the bar for this "field" is zero experience in anything technical but great ability to hold a microphone and induce FUD in public.

https://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/people/luciano-floridi/

Publication records help to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#129

Post by roenxi »

matt4077 wrote: post #118
ehsankia wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This wasn't really a "position of power" though, it was just a council that would meet once in a while to talk about AI ethics. It was also 1 person out of 8. Don't get me wrong, I think her views are despicable, but if you can't even allow a single person of opposing view in your council, that only shows insecurity in your views. I highly doubt having one person with some past bigoted opinions is going to completely…

The are opinions that I would vehemently disagree with, yet not consider illegitimate. The Catholic Church, for example, does and says all sorts of horrible shit. Yet they have a rich intellectual history, are somewhat consistent (i. e. against abortion and also against the death penalty), and for better or worse represent a sizable portion of the population. This person was peddling in ludicrous Obama-killed-his-fri…

> This person was peddling in ludicrous Obama-killed-his-friend conspiracy theories. If you want them on your ethics board, you need to also invite flat earthers and people believing there’s a ham sandwich that rules the world. Because who are you to judge some opinions more legit than others.

James wasn't invited because she believes Obama-killed-his-friend conspiracies; so that argument doesn't make sense. Those conspiracies are clearly unrelated to AI ethics and so she was clearly representing something else. She was likely included because she is obviously great leadership material given what she has achieved as an African-American women. Someone of that caliber, and representing a conservative viewpoint to boot, was obviously a reasonable addition to any ethics group.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#130

Post by matt4077 »

roenxi wrote: post #129
matt4077 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The are opinions that I would vehemently disagree with, yet not consider illegitimate. The Catholic Church, for example, does and says all sorts of horrible shit. Yet they have a rich intellectual history, are somewhat consistent (i. e. against abortion and also against the death penalty), and for better or worse represent a sizable portion of the population. This person was peddling in ludicrous Obama-killed-his-fri…

> This person was peddling in ludicrous Obama-killed-his-friend conspiracy theories. If you want them on your ethics board, you need to also invite flat earthers and people believing there’s a ham sandwich that rules the world. Because who are you to judge some opinions more legit than others. James wasn't invited because she believes Obama-killed-his-friend conspiracies; so that argument doesn't make sense. Those co…

She never wrote anything on AI ethics, so she most definitely was invited for some other, unrelated action of hers.

it‘s also not unrelated, because it speaks to her ability to evaluate facts, and to her soundness of mind.

Post reply on HN