It is incredible to me how as humans we are capable of harnessing rationality and abstraction in science to the point that such technology has become possible (think from the perspective of someone 200 years ago, the development of physics & math -> electricity -> computers -> the internet -> LLMs) and yet we are still totally incapable of rationally dealing with our different backgrounds and experiences.
Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
761–770 of 1001 posts
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#762We live in times were non-problems are turned into problems. Simple responses should be generated truthfully. Truth which is present in today's data. Most software engineers and CEOs are white and male, almost all US rappers are black and male, most childminder and nurses are female from all kinds of races. If you want the person to be of another race or sex, add it to the prompt. If you want a software engineer from…
I'm sure people with this take will be totally happy at the "historically accurate" pictures of Jesus then (he would not have been white and blue eyed)
I think the parent comment couldn't care less about a white Jesus to be honest, he seems very pragmatic.
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#763Earlier quoted context omitted.
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>Antman, Indiana Jones, Wish, all had white main characters, DEI doesn't just affect main characters. See who were tasked to write and direct those movies and the DEI agendas they're forced to push. Clueless people with other flops under their belt, who got the projects out of DEI so Disney can look inclusive on social media. And speaking of Indiana Jones, that flopped because they shoved a strong independent Girl Bo…
> Same stuff with Star Wars where Disney shoved Rey the super-powerful Girl Boss™ to replace Luke Skywalker the old and useless CIS white Jedi, and defeat all other evil white men in the movie by herself with her magic powers. Same with Marvel, Snow White, Little Mermaid and every other of Disneys trash remakes that are all about DEI instead of entertainment.
I don't see how this was a flop given they grossed more $ than their predecessors, so people actually do pay more money to have better representation? https://www.the-numbers.com/movies/franchise/Star-Wars#tab=s...
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#764I think this is all a bit silly, but if we're complaining anyway, I'll throw my hat in the ring as an American of Hispanic descent. Maybe I'm just being particularly sensitive, but it seems to me that while people are complaining that your stereotypical "white" folks are erased, and replaced by "diversity", it seems to me the specific "diversity" here is "BIPOC" and your modal Mexican hispanic is being erased, despit…
Hispanic racism is an advanced-level topic that most of the blue-haired know-nothings aren't prepared to discuss because they can't easily construct the requisite Oppression Pyramid. It's easier to lump them in with "Black" (er, "BIPOC") and continue parroting the canned factoids they were already regurgitating. The ideology is primarily self-serving ("Look at me! I'm a Good Person!", "I'm a member of the in-group!")…
The second part is literally how we got the term Latinx. A bunch of white elites congratulating themselves for "removing sexism" from a language that they have a pamphlet level understanding of.
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#765Personally speaking, this is a blaring neon warning sign of institutional rot within Google where shrieking concerns about DEI have surpassed a focus on quality results. Investors in Google (of which I am NOT one) should consider if this is the mark of a company on the upswing or downslide. If the focus of Google's technology is identity rather than reality, it is inevitable that they will be surpassed.
> If the focus of Google's technology is identity rather than reality, it is inevitable that they will be surpassed. They're trailing 5 or so years behind Disney who also placed DEI over producing quality entertainment and their endless stream of flops reflects that. South Park even mocked them about that ("put a black chick in it and make her lame and gay"). Can't wait for Gemini and Google to flop as well since nob…
Fortune 500s are laughably insincere and hamfisted in how they do DEI. But these types of comments feel like schadenfreude towards the "woke moralist mind-virus"
But lets be real here ... DEI is a good thing when done well. How are you going to talk to the customer when they are speaking a different cultural language. Even form a purely capitalist perspective, having a diverse workforce means you can target more market segments with higher precision and accuracy.
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#766Quite the cultural flame war in this thread. For me, the whole incident points to the critical importance of open models. A bit of speculation, but if AI is eventually intended to play a role in education, this sort of control would be a dream for historical revisionists. The classic battle of the thought police is now being extended to AI.
> Quite the cultural flame war in this thread.
It's kind of the perfect storm, because both sides of the argument include a mixture of reasonable well-intentioned people, and crazy extremists. However you choose to be upset about this, you always have someone crazy to point at.
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#767Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why is a "lack of diversity" a problem? Do different races have different attributes which complement each other on a team?
Yep, people from different backgrounds bring different experiences and perspectives, which complement each other and make products more useful for more people. Race and gender are two characteristics that lead to pretty different lived experiences, so having team members who can represent those experiences matters.
Does this mean that teams consisting of mainly brown and black members should actively seek out white members, rejecting black and brown potential members?
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#768Earlier quoted context omitted.
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>Antman, Indiana Jones, Wish, all had white main characters, DEI doesn't just affect main characters. See who were tasked to write and direct those movies and the DEI agendas they're forced to push. Clueless people with other flops under their belt, who got the projects out of DEI so Disney can look inclusive on social media. And speaking of Indiana Jones, that flopped because they shoved a strong independent Girl Bo…
Fleabag is not a strong independent Girl Boss either, the problem is bad writing and poor characterization which has a lot of broader industry factors. Gig-style inconsistent writer employment, lack of streaming royalties, shorter seasons, shutting writers out of film shoots, they all screw up the junior -> veteran pipeline and produce more immature and unpolished writing.
Today, bad writing manifests as bad expressions of today's predominant values because that's what people grow up with, just as bad writing in the past would badly express the past's predominant values.
Also 90% of stuff is crap and we only remember the good stuff from the past.
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#769Earlier quoted context omitted.
Scottish people in 1820 https://twitter.com/BasedTorba/status/1759949016320643566 British / American / German / Swedish women https://twitter.com/iamyesyouareno/status/175989313218585855...
"It’s often assumed that African people arrived in Scotland in the 18th century, or even later. But in fact Africans were resident in Scotland much earlier, and in the early 16th century they were high-status members of the royal retinue." https://www.nts.org.uk/stories/africans-at-the-court-of-jame...
an article about a small number of royally-associated africans in soctland in the 16th century does not justify an image generating AI producing large numbers of black people in pictures of scottish people in the 16th century.
Re: Google to pause Gemini image generation of people after issues
#770Personally speaking, this is a blaring neon warning sign of institutional rot within Google where shrieking concerns about DEI have surpassed a focus on quality results. Investors in Google (of which I am NOT one) should consider if this is the mark of a company on the upswing or downslide. If the focus of Google's technology is identity rather than reality, it is inevitable that they will be surpassed.
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