441–450 of 607 posts
> Highlighting risks without pointing out methods for researchers and developers to understand and mitigate those risks misses the mark on helping with these problems
You have to have sympathy for her position but in the end if all you do is offer criticism then it's hard to see you inside Google, let alone as a manager.
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Critical race/gender theory is all about power dynamics permeating every interaction. You might think that's exhausting, I certainly do, but that's what we're dealing with here.
You might think that's exhausting, I certainly do Why? Is there something about CRT that threatens your means and way of living, or is it forcing a type of introspection about what minorities have and continue to go through in various forms and machinations you'd rather not entertain?
Anyways I was just explaining to OP that the situation was already about that stuff before any response was considered.
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You might think that's exhausting, I certainly do Why? Is there something about CRT that threatens your means and way of living, or is it forcing a type of introspection about what minorities have and continue to go through in various forms and machinations you'd rather not entertain?
This right here. The veiled accusation and attempt to put me on the back foot in a power dynamics debate. That's what I find exhausting. Anyways I was just explaining to OP that the situation was already about that stuff before any response was considered.
That tactic is not a problem inherent to CRT, that tactic is a problem with how people deploy and weaponize CRT.
In the absence of anything else, yes, people are going to make assumptions.
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This right here. The veiled accusation and attempt to put me on the back foot in a power dynamics debate. That's what I find exhausting. Anyways I was just explaining to OP that the situation was already about that stuff before any response was considered.
It wasn't veiled at all, it was a bald-faced ask, why dodge it? If the veiled accusations that some people utilize in the name of CRT is bothersome, why wouldn't you call THAT out from the very start? That tactic is not a problem inherent to CRT, that tactic is a problem with how people deploy and weaponize CRT. In the absence of anything else, yes, people are going to make assumptions.
Edit: I agree that one could incorporate some CRT into their worldview without becoming insufferable, in fact I think lots of normal people have without calling it that. That said, there are a lot of true believers out there, that's who I was talking about.
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It wasn't veiled at all, it was a bald-faced ask, why dodge it? If the veiled accusations that some people utilize in the name of CRT is bothersome, why wouldn't you call THAT out from the very start? That tactic is not a problem inherent to CRT, that tactic is a problem with how people deploy and weaponize CRT. In the absence of anything else, yes, people are going to make assumptions.
But you're doing the thing. The tactic that you agree is bothersome. Edit: I agree that one could incorporate some CRT into their worldview without becoming insufferable, in fact I think lots of normal people have without calling it that. That said, there are a lot of true believers out there, that's who I was talking about.
No, I'm not doing that right now, I am trying to understand your framing of CRT and where your issues lie with it. It would seem those issues lie with how certain people argue CRT, not CRT itself.
Thank you for clarifying that.
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Of course he was vague. This just happened, tensions are high, and no doubt Timnit is talking to an employment lawyer to find out what both parties' right and obligations are, and I'm sure Google's lawyers are also getting all their ducks in a row. This is spin at best, gaslighting at worst. We'll never get the full story (and should we? it is an internal company matter made public, after all)..
>We'll never get the full story (and should we? it is an internal company matter made public, after all)) Not really sure what the point of an 'ethical AI' department is when there's no transparency or accountability facing the public because if it can be cancelled internally at any point if it threatens the company you've basically recreated some kind of Soviet ministry for truth
The official outputs and products of that department should (hopefully) be public and shared, I 100% agree with you. But that's not what this is about.
This matter in particular is an internal employee/employer dispute and dismissal, and is only public because of the high profile of the persons involved.
And what I meant that we'll never get the full story is that these kinds of situations are always more complicated than they appear. We are only seeing the tip of the iceberg, and are not privy to the history that led to this moment.
These kinds of things don't just happen out of nowhere.
If I had to guess who's "more right" here, I'd side with Timnit, personally.. but again I don't have all the facts, so it's just a gut feeling based on what I know about how large enterprises work.
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And the examples of issues flagged in review that Jeff keeps highlighting—like Timnit’s alleged failure to mention recent work to reduce the environmental impact of large models—are themselves a bit worrisome. Jeff gives the impression that they demanded retraction (!) because they wanted Timnit and her coauthors to soften their critique. The more I read about this, the worse it looks.
> Jeff gives the impression that they demanded retraction (!) because they wanted Timnit and her coauthors to soften their critique. The more I read about this, the worse it looks. I get the impression that she wrote a hit piece on Google and published with Google's name. For me, it's correct they demand a retraction. It's simply unprofessional to critque your company for something while not mentioning the work they'…
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Uh, or you could compromise with them and act like two adults? This isn't a zero sum game.
If someone wants to negotiate, they don't use an ultimatum.
"X is the lowest price I can sell for, take it or leave it" "How about X-10?" "Done"
"I want to read 5 books!" "You can either read one book before bedtime or go to bed now" "How about 2 books?" "Okay, but then straight to bed!"
There are a lot of people commenting that she didn't actually resign. I agree, but it sounds like the conversation went like this: employee: I'm not happy about x, y and z. If you don't do those, I'm going to quit. manager: well we are not going to do those, so thank you for your time. We accept your resignation and would like it to start immediately (i.e. you're fired). If you are gonna tell your manager that you pl…
As a manager I would only do this if I really wanted to fire the person already. For employees I care about I would give them an out. Part of being a good manager is understanding your employees and helping them succeed. If someone makes a statement like this in the heat of frustration it doesn't necessarily mean they will actually quit. If they're a valuable member of the team you should present them with an opportu…
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In most cases, yes. In this case, because the paper was about bias in Google's AI models, it might not be just a business decision because the racial bias described in that paper might result in a disparate impact on users, which could be in violation of state or federal law.
This is pretty dystopian ... 1. There exist laws to prevent discrimination against people based on protected attributes 2. ML models make predictions based on attributes without interpretability (it's not possible to prove that protected attributes are not factoring into model predictions) 3. Empirical observation that a model proxies a protected property exposes corporation to liability for regulatory non compliance…