About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean • Hacker News Board

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#531

Post by marcinzm » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 3:49 AM UTC

headsupftw wrote: post #459

eachro wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But in this scenario, shielding Google from liability is actually a primary concern given that Timnit is discussing ethics/bias. A paper on say novel transformer architecture, the lottery ticket hypothesis in a new setting, a new RL benchmark suite, etc is not going to expose Google to legal risk the way ethical AI research often can.

Then what's the point of hiring her and people like her to work for Google in the first place? So that Google could claim that they have Ethical AI researchers and Google's AI research is indeed ethical?

Of course, it's like going from the government to a lobbying firm. Everyone knows why you're there and why you're getting paid to be there.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

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Post by JamesBarney » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 3:49 AM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #222

aylmao wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...if we didn’t meet these demands, she would leave Google and work on an end date. To be fair it doesn't sound like her ultimatum was "I'll leave immediately"— that was forced on her by Google, and is an important detail.

Definitely. "If we don't fix this I don't think I can continue working here" is not a resignation, it's a negotiating position.

Judging from most of her writing online (which is all pretty assertive) I think it's far more likely she said "if you don't fix this, I can't continue working here".

And that's both a negotiating position and a resignation.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#533

Post by pseudalopex » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 3:50 AM UTC

fatbird wrote: post #494

sidlls wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure that’s a fair point but asking for the reviewers to be identified is way out of bounds. What possible legitimate reason could she have for that request?

I think it was less "who said this?" and more "who was the reviewer, how were they chosen, what guidelines did they follow?" Peer review in Academia is anonymous but has relative guarantees that the reviewer will have sufficient knowledge to judge your paper, won't be an academic rival out to skewer your work, and is generally capable of being a disinterested judge. As many others have pointed out here, Google doesn'…

Good point. Asking who gave the feedback could mean their qualifications but be interpreted as their names. Or their qualifications might be enough to identify them.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

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Post by [deleted] » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 3:50 AM UTC

sitkack wrote: post #498

acituan wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's not "runaway activism" if you hire ethics researchers who find ethics problems. The fundamental difference between activism and research is that activism sets the agenda ahead of time while research explores the knowledge space and reports findings. One helps us incrementally make better sense of the world, the other wants us to narrow on particular facts while omitting other relevant facts in the name of adva…

You don't have enough context or evidence to assert the things you asserting.

[deleted]

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#535

Post by sieabahlpark » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 3:59 AM UTC

acoard wrote: post #64

theobeers wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Yeah, put more simply, they pushed out someone in their Ethical AI department because they did not soften critiques against AI enough. They couch these in terms of rigour, but the substance of the problem has to do with her criticisms against AI. Ultimately it makes the whole Ethical AI department look more like a rubber stamp for Google.

> Ultimately it makes the whole Ethical AI department look more like a rubber stamp for Google.

It didn't concern you before?

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

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Post by geofft » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 4:02 AM UTC

geofft wrote: post #311

tooltalk wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please go read the link first. Jeff clearly states that Google has a review protocol for journal submission which requires a two weeks internal review period. Timnit shared the paper a day before the publication deadline, ie, no time for internal review, and someone with a fat finger apparently approved it for submission without the required review.

That's not under dispute. What's under dispute is: 1) Is the review protocol that requires a two-week review period a peer review process intended to maintain scientific rigor, or an internal controls process intended to prevent unwanted disclosure of trade secrets, PII, etc.? Repeating the comment at the very top of the thread: > Maybe different teams are different, but on my previous team within Google AI, we thoug…

BTW, a couple more examples of Googlers saying this isn't a firm deadline by any means and one-day reviews are quite permissible:

https://twitter.com/william_fitz/status/1335004771573354496

https://twitter.com/mena_gonzalo/status/1335066989191106561 (an intern!)

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

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Post by fuzzylightbulb » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 4:12 AM UTC

zaksoup wrote: post #61

that_guy_iain wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> While I’m a spectator to this unfolding story and am reacting to a pretty cursory overview of what happened, this has the distinct feeling that Google thought they were moving in for a checkmate by, in their words, “accepting a resignation”, only to have it — very predictably? - blow up in their faces completely. I wouldn't say this has blown up in their face. But to be honest, I've not seen that much drama about i…

If somebody used HR as the mechanism to communicate feedback on the scientific rigor of research I was leading I would also find that concerning and objectionable. Human Resources is not peer review.

What if you were the sort of person with a very public history of suing your employer? Could you understand then why they might be very formal when dealing with you, especially when needing to deliver news you'd likely not be a fan of?

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

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Post by refulgentis » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 4:15 AM UTC

joshuamorton wrote: post #308

angry_octet wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That isn't the impression I had from reading the principal's statements, to wit: > Unfortunately, this particular paper was only shared with a day’s notice before its deadline — we require two weeks for this sort of review — and then instead of awaiting reviewer feedback, it was approved for submission and submitted. It seems like someone short-circuited the review process and submitted without review to meet a deadl…

Jeff's statement is a lie. I work at Google, and the publication approval process doesn't normally take to weeks. Any Google employee can verify this, and others have, both in this thread and on twitter. There's some documentation that asks for 2 weeks, but it's not followed, and inconsistent application of policy is absolutely a concern in a case like this. A summary of the events, as best as I can tell, is the norm…

I work at Google too, and it's embarrassing to see you attack your colleagues like this in public - how is Jeff's statement "a lie"? Whether or not you believe the 2 week deadline is a hard and fast rule followed 100% of the time, Jeff never made that claim. 1 day is certainly unreasonable.

What makes you think they weren't given the opportunity? We were told specifically they _were_ given an opportunity to revise, and instead, demanded HR(!?) provide attributed versions of any and all statements made by any colleagues regarding the paper (!??!!?), or they'd 'work on setting an end date'

I'm not exactly proud, excited, or anything but pensive about this series of developments, and it's _highly_ likely Jeff feels the same way. Everything got too hostile and out of control here for people to be able to work together healthily moving forward, and I'm skeptical of anything beyond that being anything more than people attaching a narrative to an unfortunate breakdown in a relationship.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#539

Post by pseudalopex » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 4:16 AM UTC

ThomPete wrote: post #527

pseudalopex wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"My submissions were always checked for disclosure of sensitive material, never for the quality of the literature review."[1] "In all of my time at Google AI, I never heard of pubapproval being used for peer review or to critique the scientific rigor of the work. It was never used as a journal, it was an afterthought that folks on my team would usually clear only hours before important deadlines. We like to leave pee…

other people who work at google says it was not unusual at all.

Do you have examples? The closest I've seen is the person I replied to saying a key person in their less academic department spiked papers he thought weren't interesting enough.[1]

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25308225

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#540

Post by bsanr2 » Sat, Dec 05, 2020, 4:16 AM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #401

nickff wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the company is in slightly different position from the manager. They can abrogate the manager's authority, but that would permanently undermine that individual. On the other hand, they can also choose to accept the subordinate's resignation. They could try to transfer the subordinate somewhere else, but that's also risky, and wouldn't really address the ultimatum in this case. Accepting a resignation achieves t…

I think you're coming at the ultimatum from some sort of strange power dynamic perspective, where an employee who successfully gets their ultimatum approved somehow disenfranchises their manager of their authority, enabling future employees to…what? Vie for the managerial position? This has a "crush dissent" kind of vibe. In every employment contract there is a balance of things and employee is willing to do and an e…

What gets me is all this talk of an employee making their terms of employment known (this so-called "ultimatum") being somehow unusual. An employee/employer relationship is ultimately a running series of ultimatums. What's really discouraged is making each one explicit, but of course, that doesn't mean they aren't there, nor that occasional forthright discussions aren't customary. What do these people think a performance review is?

Usually the goal of management is to employ explicit, stop-gap communication to avoid having to get to the explicit question of continued employment, because the company has already made a committment to that employment by hiring the employee in the first place. Obviously, most employees want to continue on, also. So it seems nonsensical to view anything save an explicit declaration of resignation as the same. "I would like to discuss what would cause me to resign," is not a declaration of resignation, and the people reading this situation in good faith understand that.