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Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

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Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#501

Post by mpfundstein »

thinkingemote wrote: post #457
vimy wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I’m pessimistic about the West winning the second cold war. While Chinese engineers are working hard on world dominating AI models and other hard tech, Western engineers are wasting man hours on crap like this.

Interesting comment. Putin is continually making "west is degenerate"-ish remarks as a kind of justification for his invasion of Ukraine, and yet his words fall flat. It's obvious he's being disengenius. It's like, yes, we know some over paid highly educated technologists are biased against but that doesn't equal the end of liberalism and democracy itself. His words are not at all going to sway any of the HN readers…

read Aleksandr Dugin and you will understand

Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#502

Post by nullc »

user3939382 wrote: post #108
mgraczyk wrote: post #9

In the article they use the example of "Motherboard" and "Landlord" and seem to suggest that these are areas where the Google AI is making mistakes or being overly strict. As a Google employee expressing my own opinion and observations of company culture, I can say that these are 100% not mistakes. Many Google employees are just so out of touch with the real world that they believe it is the duty of Google Docs to ch…

If we're going to play this game, I think dissuading people from using "mother" in the example of "motherboard" is offensive. Mothers are the source of human life on earth, and in that capacity are revered and honored. When we say motherboard, we're making an analogy that suggests the board's significance and universal connection to everything. To discourage the term as an analogy for things that are a universal sour…

> is to demote women and their role as mothers.

Their role as breeders and birthing people, you mean. Time for a trip to HR for you.

> they have the right to shape speech for millions of people and therefore,

Google', "Do the right thing" could be understood as "if you have the power to do something, you have the obligation to do so". I'd say someone forgot that most evil in the world is done by people convinced that they're doing the right thing, but if that were forgotten the old motto wouldn't have been an impediment.

You could ask what idiot gave google this power, but the answer-- to the extent that they have it-- is each and every one of us. Fortunately, it lasts only as long as we keep giving it to them.

Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#503

Post by rougka »

scythe wrote: post #301
timmg wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who also works at Google, I agree that there is a vocal minority who want Google to be a promoter of progressive values, but: I think you nay be exaggerating things here. I've never even heard of any controversy over the word "motherboard". I just did some internal searches. It seems to be a well-used word, both in code and in documentation. (I did a code search for both "motherboard" and "mainboard" and t…

"Allowlist" and "denylist" are sonically awkward. Why not "inlist" and "outlist"?

I want to offer greenlist and redlist

And to those who say this is not inclusive to the colorblind, I say traffic lights

Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#504

Post by bloak »

lxgr wrote: post #475
bloak wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about "redlist" and "greenlist"? The association between "red" and "stop", and between "green" and "go", seem more arbitrary than the associations with "black" and "white" but almost everyone in the world is familiar with traffic lights. (And the inhabitants of the North Sentinel Island probably don't need to configure mail servers or whatever.)

Red and green traffic lights (and indeed even the distinction between green and blue) are not universally understood either: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2013/02/25/language/the-ja... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue%E2%80%93green_distinction... What's your objection to "allowlist" (or "golist") and "denylist"/"blocklist"/"stoplist"? It's not often that we have an almost universally better alternative, but at…

I'm aware that many languages don't distinguish blue and green, but English does distinguish them and we're talking about English terminology here. (Apparently in Japan the green traffic lights are officially allowed to be slightly bluer than in other countries because the word they use for them includes blue: an interesting case of language changing the world.)

I don't like "allowlist" and "denylist" because they sound wrong to me: perhaps because the first element of a compound should be a noun, not a verb, but that's just an attempt to explain what I feel. I don't like "blocklist" because that sounds like a list of blocks, something in a file system. Of the ones you mention, I think I'd probably prefer "golist" and "stoplist", which I hadn't really considered before. They're also shorter than "allowlist" and "denylist".

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term "stop list" has been in use since 1920, but "go list" is not recorded.

Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#505

Post by Pxtl »

user3939382 wrote: post #108
mgraczyk wrote: post #9

In the article they use the example of "Motherboard" and "Landlord" and seem to suggest that these are areas where the Google AI is making mistakes or being overly strict. As a Google employee expressing my own opinion and observations of company culture, I can say that these are 100% not mistakes. Many Google employees are just so out of touch with the real world that they believe it is the duty of Google Docs to ch…

If we're going to play this game, I think dissuading people from using "mother" in the example of "motherboard" is offensive. Mothers are the source of human life on earth, and in that capacity are revered and honored. When we say motherboard, we're making an analogy that suggests the board's significance and universal connection to everything. To discourage the term as an analogy for things that are a universal sour…

I know we all see this as a slippery slope, but let's remember what's at the other end of the slope.

Anyhow, you might find it awkward, but the general assumption that "parent" is synonymous with "mother" to the exclusion of all other kinds of parents does real damage to inclusiveness, and the term "motherboard" flows from that.

I know your tongue is in cheek, but the mainboard may be considered a parent of the components, but it is not giving birth to them. "Parent" fits better than "mother". So your absurdist counter-argument doesn't really fit here.

We're programmers. We refactor mercilessly. Why shouldn't language be refactored mercilessly too? The term "mainboard" is available, widely understood, and well-adopted, so why not use that?

Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#506

Post by MikeDelta »

bjt2n3904 wrote: post #364
______-_-______ wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Motherboard" is particularly unbelievable. The motherboard runs the machine. It's a woman in a position of power. Isn't that what everyone says they want? Or is the idea to just erase the very concept of gender from the world? Welcome to OkCupid, I am a [PERSON] seeking [PERSON] I want out of this timeline

The most tragic part of the endgame of transgender ideology is the erasure of gender. We'll promise them they can be a boy. They do all the things boys can: can play on the boys sports teams, use the boys lockers and bathrooms... And all the meanwhile we're banishing gendered extracurricular programs and making the bathrooms unisex. We promise them we'll help them find their identity in gender, and destroy gender in…

Nature is full of males and females (with some species being exceptions); the concept of gender is baked in nature and will remain so for a very long time.

About the cultural aspect of gender: this video opened my eyes about what most people think it means to do things 'like a girl', and what it actually is supposed to mean.

https://youtu.be/XjJQBjWYDTs

Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#508

Post by politician »

throw10920 wrote: post #467
xg15 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of couriosity: Why then didn't flag it the actual n-word of all things? > A transcribed interview of neo-Nazi and former Klan leader David Duke—in which he uses the N-word and talks about hunting Black people—gets no notes. Edit: Also interesting that this comment is dropping like a stone in HN's comment ranking, even though currently the comment score is at 1. If I accidentally triggered some anti-flame or anti-…

> Edit: Also interesting that this comment is dropping like a stone in HN's comment ranking, even though currently the comment score is at 1. If I accidentally triggered some anti-flame or anti-profanity filter, I'm sorry. Comment order is a function of both score and age. As far as anybody (except those who actually have access to the source), there's no other "hidden" mechanic.

Initial ranking depends on the author's karma. From there, the other factors take over.

Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#509

Post by dylan604 »

gdulli wrote: post #314
dylan604 wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if your 3) was in 2) pushing 1) only it backfired and people in 2) took it seriously?

As possible a reason for #2 going wrong as any other. But #2 thinking they know what's best for humanity is an established enough pattern that I imagine it happens organically as well.

I'm so tired of SV thinking they are making the world a better place. It's such a tired trope.

Re: Google’s AI-powered ‘inclusive warnings’ feature is very broken

#510

Post by darkwater »

olalonde wrote: post #42
mgraczyk wrote: post #9

In the article they use the example of "Motherboard" and "Landlord" and seem to suggest that these are areas where the Google AI is making mistakes or being overly strict. As a Google employee expressing my own opinion and observations of company culture, I can say that these are 100% not mistakes. Many Google employees are just so out of touch with the real world that they believe it is the duty of Google Docs to ch…

Reminds me of when GitHub stopped using "master" for the default branch because it was somehow offensive.

And the world moved on, nothing exploded and new generations will be used to 'main'.
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