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Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

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Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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

I'd actually push this thought one step further: most tech degrees require between zero and one course of ethics over a full college program. The people we trust to make the technical decisions are under-trained in making those decisions with an eye towards ethical questions, and we're in a time where ethics should be ahead of the technology.

Many successful teams in history included members who were not technically skilled, but had an implementable vision. The gap in knowledge bridgeable, and the alternative is more "Facebook is involuntarily committing users to an experiment in what makes people sad" ethical errors.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for being a great example of what GP was talking about. Shutting down discussions about issues based on the pretext that the people you disagree with are "fascist" or "bigots" is a huge part of the problem. (And yes, the other side does the same while calling you "communists" — doesn't change anything)

> And yes, the other side does the same while calling you "communists" — doesn't change anything Well, both the right and left thinks the other is the fascist. The right also thinks the left is communist. Both think the other is bigoted in different ways.

Calling someone both fascist and communist is, if nothing else, logically incoherent.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#193

This is a shameful situation. We need to all wake up and take a step back and realize what's happening here: increasingly you can't have a conversation about one issue unless you are a hundred percent pure in the eyes of a frankly self-proclaimed judge jury and executioner for 100% of your other views. I am of the left myself but on a meta-level what we're doing is essentially making it impossible to ever find middle…

Where would you draw the line?

For example, would you put the president of company that sells a purported homeopathic measles cure (yes, that exists) on a medical ethics board in the name of finding common ground?

I wouldn't, because they either (1) know that they are selling a product that is nothing more than a placebo, which they lie about to ignorant people, and which will likely lead to serious harm for many of those people (often children), but value their income more than that, or (2) they actually believe that it works. The former is disqualifying because it calls into question their own ethics, and the later because it calls into question their ability to understand objective evidence and draw sound inferences from it.

The Heritage Foundation publishes things like this [1]:

> The current average world temperature is about 58 degrees. The true believers in climate change are predicting global catastrophe if that temperature rises by a worst-case estimate of 7 degrees Fahrenheit. That would bring the world average temperature to about 65 degrees.

> Dubai, today, is doing quite well at an average temperature 35 degrees higher.

The gist of the article is that people can handle heat in Dubai through the use of air conditioning in their cars and buildings, which shows that maybe if we just go all in for cheap fossil fuel based energy we'll be able to handle the paltry little worst case 7 degrees that we might get if climate change turns out to be real.

I find it extremely hard to believe that they don't know that this and most of their other material on climate change is scientifically wrong, and so I'd rule out putting their president on an ethics board because they are not an ethical organization.

You want some conservative viewpoints to find common ground on your board? There are conservatives who have not embraced scientific quackery. E.g., [2]. Pick from them.

[1] https://www.heritage.org/environment/commentary/how-fossil-f...

[2] https://www.clcouncil.org/plan-co-authors/

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#194

This is a shameful situation. We need to all wake up and take a step back and realize what's happening here: increasingly you can't have a conversation about one issue unless you are a hundred percent pure in the eyes of a frankly self-proclaimed judge jury and executioner for 100% of your other views. I am of the left myself but on a meta-level what we're doing is essentially making it impossible to ever find middle…

You articulated so well what I've been observing. With the widening political divide, we find ourselves in this weird situation where any decision makers are swarmed with moral outrage attacks unless they're the bastions of politically correct ideology. An increasing number of topics are taboo because merely opening up a discussion around them summons the moral outrage army. Moral outrage has become most effective so…

I'm underwhelmed. In this specific example, the individual in question could've gotten out ahead of the press cycle and explained herself. That she didn't means the beliefs she holds as reported probably are her beliefs, and yeah---that's unacceptable for this role. This isn't thoughtless litmus-testing; this is "Google has a track record of errors regarding its trans userbase and is a company that specifically wants to do better there." If she doesn't see trans people as valid, she's the wrong fit for the role.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#195
In the information age, people perceive authority and trustworthiness differently. This can be both a good thing and a bad thing.

What we really need is a solution to the problem of `building diverse expert opinion` that doesn't rely on a panel of flawed humans, because in the 21st century it's obvious the public will refuse to trust said expert panel when it conflicts with their worldview in an entirely unrelated way (eg a members view on climate change).

I don't think there's a point fighting against the public outcry on this, as many commenters here seek to do. People don't trust authority the same in the information age, and the world needs to adapt to that.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#196
post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This board could have been non-partisan, filled with leading thinkers in the space from academia and industry, and given meaningful access and authority. Google management decided to make it clear the whole thing was a sham by specifying they'll work a whole 8 hours a year and inviting someone who was wholly unqualified. There are many reasons to fear for the future of our political discourse but I don't think this i…

Maybe I'm wrong here, but I think a real challenge is that a group of only leading thinkers from academia and industry has a very good chance of being labeled partisan -- possibly with good reason. The American population's opinions are not well represented among that group. (edit) Maybe what you're getting at is that the mission of the group should be more explicitly non-partisan, and then hopefully politics stays a…

> The American population's opinions are not well represented among that group.

I grew up in small town rural Pennsylvania in a lower middle class family. I'm certainly now someone who is "in the industry". What differentiates me from myself twenty years ago is twenty years of learning and experience. I went to school, I had jobs.

What you're implying is that even someone like me wouldn't have a representative opinion of the American population. If any American, after being educated on the subject they're expected to develop ethics guidelines on, is no longer an acceptable candidate, we've started down a very dangerous path. It means that expert opinions are inherently untrusted. How can ethics be developed in a reasonable way if the people we trust with the task are people whose credentials are their likeability?

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#197
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tried to read it, to see what she did that was considered objectionable, but I couldn't get past the trite putdowns the article slipped in all over the place about lefties and millennials. I was three pages deep before I gave up.

I found a tweet where she opposed a law that would force women’s sports leagues to let men play, require people to let men use women’s bathrooms, and force doctors to sterilize teenagers.

Any possibility you're going to link to any of that sauce so we can decode it?

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#198
post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if we want sex-segregated bathrooms then there's little point if people can just randomly change their mind about which category they belong to. What's the point of categories then? Categories do not need to be immutable. There are meetups for bikers and redditors and many other categories which anyone may self-identify as belonging to. These people prefer to think of themselves as belonging within those catego…

> Categories do not need to be immutable. I agree, but you have to ask yourself, what purpose do the categories serve. It seems to me that th epurpose of sex-segregated bathrooms is two-fold: (1) to make people feel more comfortable, because many have weird hangups regarding intimacy and sex, and (2) to keep women safe. Even disregarding (2), it seems to be a choice between inconveniencing a tiny proportion of the po…

The error you're making in trading off a bit more discomfort for an already-marginalized group against any discomfort for the mainstream is exactly the reason having someone in an AI ethics board who doesn't see being a trans person as valid was a problem.

It's also the reason we need more ethics boards, because it's a common error technical training leads a person to, where we're taught how to optimize for common cases and defend against unusual cases---when the things we use aren't people and don't care if they're considered "common" or "unusual."

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#199

This is a shameful situation. We need to all wake up and take a step back and realize what's happening here: increasingly you can't have a conversation about one issue unless you are a hundred percent pure in the eyes of a frankly self-proclaimed judge jury and executioner for 100% of your other views. I am of the left myself but on a meta-level what we're doing is essentially making it impossible to ever find middle…

I respect that someone who studies climate science can have grave concerns with the consensus, and may some day revolutionize or even reverse our current understanding. I welcome their criticism. I believe in Red Teams, who do everything they can to tear down the work of the main stream view. If their best efforts to deny a claim fail, you have that much more strength in the claim.

Kay Coles James has not studied climate science.

As a lay person, she has rejected the scientific consensus.

I have a difficult time imagining the value of the input she would provide to any ethics board.

I've worked with IRB for healthcare. I wouldn't want a phrenologist on my IRB. Or a homeopathic medicine advocate. Someone who pushes MLM essential oils. A young-earth creationist. A Christian Scientist who rejects medicine. A Scientologist who rejects psychology.

Those people aren't on the Red Team. They're on the Denial Team. They don't want to make my process better. They don't believe in my process.

There's a huge difference between respecting a person, engaging them on a personal level, listening to their concerns, granting them dignity, allowing them to self-determine, having a vote in politics, etc... And allowing that same person to steer ethics for a corporation, or industry.

Society needs to have the broader conversations you're talking about. No question. I hear what you're saying. But an ethics board can and should be more selective about who they invite.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#200
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What duty does the majority have to respect the feelings of the minority? Google recently posted that less than one percent of their population was non binary. If there was a concern that impacted every non binary Googler and they all spoke out passionately, it might not register as a major voice, but it still seems important to listen. Should we only concern ourselves with what the majority thinks? Isn't that the gr…

sure and what if 20 percent feel strongly the opposite way but cant say anything or else they will be bullied by the 1 pct and called bigots and fired like damore? I'm sure 1 pct of people are white supremacists but we don't listen to them just because they whinge

If the 20% can't speak out without creating a hostile work environment, then no, they probably should not speak out. The devil doesn't need nearly as many advocates as it gets.

... And your implied comparison of Google's trans employees to white supremacists suggests you may not understand this difference yet. Some aspects of morality are considered (legally and morally) no longer up for debate.

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