Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry • Hacker News Board

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#311

Post by kevingadd » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 5:39 PM UTC

rjf72 wrote: post #234

kevingadd wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 cros…

This is inaccurate in a very ironic way. Not only are individuals specifically guaranteed the right to organize and discuss conditions/etc of work via company email [1], but this is a right that Google has been actively lobbying to rescind following the recent walkout that was organized largely by company email. [2] This right was specifically clarified/ensured by the NLRB in 2014. [1] - https://www.littler.com/nlrb-…

I'm not talking about rights, i'm talking about functionally not being able to do it. There's no way for them to send everyone a petition or poll or open letter. It's why I've never seen them. I would've had to be on those mailing lists.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#312

Post by mike00632 » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 5:40 PM UTC

Rebelgecko wrote: post #110

mike00632 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if you want a council on the exploration of space should you include a few flat-Earthers?

Most people can tell the difference between someone you don't agree with for ideological reasons and someone you don't agree with because they ignore facts for attention. I'm assuming the poster was referring to the former. There's a big difference between say, having a Republican on the committee vs a Holocaust denier. While it requires a certain amount of empathy to realize that rational people can have the same in…

>... because they ignore facts for attention...

The Heritage Foundation literally falsified studies to go after LGBT people and claim they are unfit to have children. This isn't just about being ignorant of the facts or having behavior that proves you to be unqualified. This is about being completely counterproductive to the goals of the committee. That is exactly like having a flat-Earther on a space exploration committee. Furthermore, this inane argument about intellectual diversity to have ignorant people on an expert panel applies just as well to flat-Earth believers as it does to the Heritage Foundation.

>...rational people can have the same inputs...

Not everyone is equally well informed and well intentioned.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

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Post by jbarciauskas » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 5:43 PM UTC

Chris2048 wrote: post #182

jbarciauskas wrote: post #161

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…

what is non-partisan? Do you believe there are more than two genders, or not? you either answer a question like that, or don't. If you don't answer, people don't know your opinion, thus you are "non-partisan" via ambiguity.

There's a difference between believing things and actively campaigning for other people to adopt your view via the enactment/enforcement of various laws by the government.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

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Post by mike00632 » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 5:44 PM UTC

tree_of_item wrote: post #187

krishicks wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They may be referring to tweets such as this, linked elsewhere in the comments: https://mobile.twitter.com/KayColesJames/status/110836523877...

The text of the tweet: > Today @heritage will critique gender identity @UN_CSW because powerful nations are pressing for the radical redefining of sex. If they can change the definition of women to include men, they can erase efforts to empower women economically, socially, and politically. #CSW63 That tweet does not say anything like "trans people don't exist", or that they should be harmed in any way, or that they…

>That tweet does not say anything like "trans people don't exist"...

The claim that all trans people are actually just cisgendered people trying to fool everyone does imply that trans people don't exist. It also implies that trans people are inherently deceptive. You are demonizing trans people when you claim this. Trans people are not mean-spirited demons who are trying to pull the wool over everyone's eyes and to say that is unethical. Trans people are not "activists" for just being themselves and expecting to be treated with basic human dignity.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#315

Post by bzbarsky » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 5:48 PM UTC

yesofcourse wrote: post #298

bzbarsky wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm Jewish. I would not in fact be up in arms if your hypothetical person were on an AI ethics council, if I felt they might have useful things to contribute outside the context of "the Jewish Question". I suspect I would personally be happier if people could be found who could offer similar contributions without that particular viewpoint, but "mildly unhappy" is about as far as I would go in this particular scenario…

> "mildly unhappy" is about as far as I would go in this particular scenario. I suspect that you're only willing to say that because, at the moment, nazis are not anywhere close to being in a position to carry out any of their promises. Let's imagine that 30% of the general population agreed with this person's views, but that they were highly unpopular among educated people and had little influence in certain institu…

One other thing, because I do think this is also important. In the presented hypothetical, "highly unpopular among educated people" is an important condition which I'd love to see data for in the case in question. That will require carefully pinning down by what views we really think Kay Coles James holds, though; I suspect that support for her views varies quite significantly based on that, and also based on geography and age, after controlling for education.

I, personally, would not be surprised if 30%, or more, of "educated people" across the US agreed that some (though perhaps not all) of the issues she raises are valid issues that need to be addressed.

Now maybe this just makes the situation scarier for trans people, of course....

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

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Post by physicsyogi » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 6:01 PM UTC

goatlover wrote: post #103

deviomi wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you need to be a nuclear physicist to have opinions on ethics of nuclear weapons?

Nope, and it seems like nuclear physicists back in the day could have used some stronger opinions on the ethics of making nuclear weapons.

During WWII, Germany was also trying to build the bomb. All things considered, it's probably better that the Manhattan Project beat them to it.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

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Post by SamReidHughes » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 6:10 PM UTC

skj wrote: post #197

SamReidHughes wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Looks like it's already in this thread.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

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Post by anon12345690 » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 6:19 PM UTC

xnyan wrote: post #302

raxxorrax wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that's unacceptable for this role Do we really need to play facts opinion? In a discussion about ethics you include as many viewpoints possible or it become dishonest immediately. You are not a priest or something like that. It has taken too long to accept premised authority.

I don't accept people who advocate suppressing the rights of trans people as members of society. I'm fine if you judge me for that or think I'm moralizing, because I am. I can live with that.

trans people are people. they already have rights as people. nothing is being suppressed.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#319

Post by yesofcourse » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 6:19 PM UTC

tree_of_item wrote: post #292

yesofcourse wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That tweet does not say anything like "trans people don't exist" It advocates "critiquing gender identity," which I take to mean asserting that gender identity is either not real or not important. Gender identity is the defining characteristic of trans people, so when someone critiques it as a concept, that implies that they think trans identities are made up, possibly for some insidious purpose, ie. that trans peo…

I'll reply to the most salient point: > This tweet says nothing of the sort, nor would I expect it to, as no one in the history of the world has ever suggested the contrary. This is actually a primary claim of transactivists: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2S0e-i117vY This video contains at least one lawyer from the ACLU, Chase Strangio, claiming that there is no such thing as a "male body" or "female body". They ab…

> transactivists

Trans activists. "Trans" is an adjective. Calling someone a "trans activist" would be like them calling you a "stupidbigot."

> Video

So, the first words of the video are:

"Sex typically refers to your biological traits such as your gonads, your genitalia, your internal sex characterstics, your hormone production, hormone response, and secondary sex characteristics"

To me claiming that humans are not sexually dimorphic would mean claiming that men and women don't generally differ in these characteristics. That's also what it would mean to "deny the existence of biological sex." That's obviously not what this video is doing, since they acknowledge all of these things from the beginning. This video is just about how intersex and trans people exist, and sometimes exhibit a mixed set of characteristics that we usually think of us mutually exclusive. This is obviously true and goes without saying for anyone older than the intended audience for the video, teenagers.

> This video contains at least one lawyer from the ACLU, Chase Strangio, claiming that there is no such thing as a "male body" or "female body".

So, I assume you're talking about the beginning:

"What are we talking about when we say sex and gender, is there something called biological sex and what does that mean."

Notice that this is a question. He's introducing a discussion about this topic.

"This idea that the body is either male or female is totally wrong"

They're saying that the body is not exclusively male or female. They're not saying that humans don't differ sexually / aren't sexually dimorphic.

> This video is accompanied by many other articles all arguing that transwomen are "female" because they say so, and therefore should be allowed in women's sex segregated spaces, sports etc.

Trans women are female and should be allowed in women's spaces. That doesn't imply that humans are not sexually dimorphic. In fact, in implies the opposite: if humans were like amoebas and were not sexually dimorphic, then no one could be called female. Clownfish sometimes change sex naturally, but no one would say they're not sexually dimorphic.

Re: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

#320

Post by yalue » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 6:20 PM UTC

durability wrote: post #306

yalue wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but if they're not debating that topic, why should it be an issue? Not that I think such a person belongs on the panel, but the reason they're not invited should be, as you said, that they have few or no qualifications to discuss either ethics or AI. The fact that they don't agree with the others on LGBT rights should only be an issue if they insist on trying to espouse their unrelated viewpoints using the pane…

Because you can’t look at these beliefs in a vacuum. Someone who’s against LGBTQ rights isn’t against it for the hell of it, they have some underlying reason such as religious ideology. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with religion, but when you believe that a man and a man together is unnatural and a sin against nature, then I have to wonder what other backwards regressive medieval beliefs they hold as well.

(Note that I'm not trying to straw-man you here, because I know you're only talking about the specific instance of this panel, which I've already agree was a farce to begin with. However,...) I still think it's harmful to society as a whole to try to use someone's views on any given topic as an excuse to refuse to work with them on something unrelated.

Say, for instance, that you're asked by a supervisor to collaborate with a Muslim living in a middle eastern country on writing a piece of software. For the sake of argument, say that this particular person believed that the laws recently enacted in Brunei were in line with the commands of Islam, and therefore just. (For the sake of argument only--obviously not everybody in those categories is like this at all--but clearly at least some must be or we wouldn't have situations like this recent one.) Would it be right to refuse to work with this person on writing say, some python code, when the topic of "sharia law" is never going to be a factor? Furthermore, by your argument, would you be willing to trust this person's judgement on software architecture when they have exhibited a, in your view, extreme lack of good judgement in another field?

Second, you can even take this argument to a higher level. You admit that the opposing party has a reason to believe what they believe, and I'd imagine that you'd even grant that they probably believe that their reasons for their particular position are good reasons. Leaving aside whether the positions themselves are good or not, how do you evaluate whether someone's reasons for holding a particular position are good? After all, a religious person may believe that one day an omniscient being will call them to answer for why they failed to keep holy commands in their life. To the holder of such a view, that's a pretty good reason to do some twisted stuff. If anything, (if their religion is right) such a reason for them holding their particular position (fear of eternal condemnation) may even be better to them than your reasons for your position are to you!