7 ms·

I find it strange to take issue with the "I'm so tired" line. It would seem to be entirely appropriate for circumstances where you see an argument that you have

I find it strange to take issue with the "I'm so tired" line. It would seem to be entirely appropriate for circumstances where you see an argument that you have replied to many times but that completely ignores your reply. It also just doesn't strike me as particularly hostile or profane. Quitting twitter and making a show of it strikes me as a far more emotional reaction, but nobody here seems to take any issue with that? In this case, the issue is that "it's the dataset" is attacking a straw man: nobody is accusing ML practitioners to be explicit racists actively conspiring for their models to be racially biased. Everyone understands that it is (often) a result of the underlying dataset. But, the argument goes, understanding the genesis of such bias isn't enough to excuse it. At least not when those models are put to actual use in, say, law-enforcement contexts. Or credit agencies, or hiring decisions, or really anything. If your dog happened to bite any red-haired kid it came across, it doesn't matter that you think red-haired kids are just as good as others, or that the dog was once mistreated by a red-haired kid. You're not going to allow the dog to get near any red-haired kids. And if you do, you'll face charges of at least negligence when some red-haired kid gets mauled. To tie this back to AI, it would mean that as long as your models produce racially biased results, they simply aren't ready for deployment or publication. Go find better data until your work is no longer liable to inflict harm on anybody. That's the standard for all other industries: if your car is shown to reliably kill pedestrians below a certain height in crash tests, you go back to the drawing board. Adding a sticker "don't operate car in the vicinity of children" isn't enough. You can disagree with that reasoning (although you'd be wrong). What you can't do, as a leader in AI, is to pretend to have never heard of it, or that it is so obviously wrong that it warrants no reply whatsoever. > have to call out the "I'm so tired" bit every time I see it. so... I guess you're tired of it?

uoaei 6y ago
> so... I guess you're tired of it? Yeah GP is modeling exactly the behavior they're railing against. Claiming that something is wrong without any practical insights for how that thing might be better.
- visarga 6y ago
  It's not exactly the same behavior - it's along the lines of "can't tolerate intolerance" (meta).
prionassembly 6y ago
> so... I guess you're tired of it? I'm not. Many other rhetorical moves have a lot of politics to muddle through / implicit assumptions that can be disavowed in bad faith, etc. I don't like to engage in that kind of discussion at all. But the "I'm so tired" bit is both condescending (and it takes... something... to condescend to Yan LeCunn) and evasive. The end result is authoritarian -- look man, this is decided and settled, you haven't kept up. Calling this out is interesting because it evidences on the contrary that the discussion isn't settled at all, and that she's unable or unwilling to frame it in a convivial manner that's conducive to progress. I sit out of conversations I'm tired about.
- adamsea 6y ago
  > Many other rhetorical moves have a lot of politics to muddle through / implicit assumptions that can be disavowed in bad faith, etc. I don't like to engage in that kind of discussion at all. But isn’t what you described so vague and subjective, that you can apply it to pretty much anything? IMHO it’s more honest to say “I sit out of conversations I don’t like”, which is an entirely fair and understandable decision to make :).
  - prionassembly 6y ago
    It’s hard to like something that makes you tired when it’s not one of your kids.
- gaze 6y ago
  Yann was (actively or unintentionally) refusing to participate in the same conversation. His response was the "facts don't care about feelings" one. It's not wrong but it is a thought terminating cliche.
  - prionassembly 6y ago
    It is. Yann also seems blissfully unaware of how sampling bias issues have always been dealt with (eg the Heckman correction model) in traditional statistics, where “getting more data” is not an option.
matthewdgreen 6y ago
This post is a really good explanation, and I wish it had been in that Twitter thread.
- jeffxtreme 6y ago
  The comment by the first John in the comment of the article here [https://syncedreview.com/2020/06/30/yann-lecun-quits-twitter-amid-acrimonious-exchanges-on-ai-bias/ https://syncedreview.com/2020/06/30/yann-lecun-quits-twitter...] adds a lot of insight too (starting with "As I understand, the social and structural problems are that AI learns the social and structural biases that are already present.").
yamrzou 6y ago
> To tie this back to AI, it would mean that as long as your models produce racially biased results, they simply aren't ready for deployment or publication. Go find better data until your work is no longer liable to inflict harm on anybody. Well, the disagreement is about publication. Yann LeCun himself said that "The consequences of bias are considerably more dire in a deployed product than in an academic paper."[1] Why would it be wrong to publish research based on biased data? [1] https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1274790777516961792 https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1274790777516961792
rubatuga 6y ago
What Yann said about data bias is a fact. He wasn’t dismissing your concerns nor distracting from it. A lot of people tried to extrapolate what Yann meant, but from the way I see it, if more people learn about the cause of this racial bias, the more people will be inclined to use fairer and diverse datasets in their future ML research.
- je42 6y ago
  The point is that she has an expectation of Yann to go further than just stating a fact. I assume she thinks that Yann has enough intellectual capacity to improve situation of biased ML but doesnt execute. Further, my guess is that the reason why he doesnt execute is not transparent to her, hence frustrating.
  - rubatuga 6y ago
    Although that is a bit overreaching of an expectation in my opinion, I agree it would be good if Yann was a bit more explicit.
  - TheMagicHorsey 6y ago
    I don't think that's what she meant. You are filling in the blanks that she should have filled herself.
  - prionassembly 6y ago
    One of Jenny Holzer’s truisms is: you owe the world, not the other way around. Isn’t Gebru an “AI researcher”, after all?
  - PeterisP 6y ago
    This is probably the core of the conflict there - there are researchers that aim to remove technical bias from technical systems and expect to stop there, not going into social issues of how the systems will be applied, as they consider that (e.g. solving the biases in the society) as a separate issue. Dr. Gebru, among others, expects and insists that they do go beyond that and try to get involved in the social consequences of tech. They refuse, ergo conflict.
nwallin 6y ago
It's not the message, it's the tone. There's a big difference between offering constructive criticism and being a condescending prick. > You can disagree with that reasoning (although you'd be wrong). What you can't do, as a leader in AI, is to pretend to have never heard of it, or that it is so obviously wrong that it warrants no reply whatsoever. There's a third option. You can just decide to not engage with the condescending prick at all. We have one of those at work. His area of responsibility is a very cross functional one, and while it is important, he have a great deal of difficulty getting people to participate. Because participation usually means getting told you're an idiot. Loudly, forcefully, and with more words. That seems to be the case here, only substituting "idiot" out for "racist".
- IfOnlyYouKnew 6y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_policing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_policing
  - kspacewalk2 6y ago
    Yes, tone matters, regardless of your gender. A prerequisite for a mature adult conversation is for you to quit being hostile to me from the get-go. Am I saying something controversial or micro-aggressive here? So be it.
    - prionassembly 6y ago
      Then, this is a confrontational tone too. I have the distinct impression that what they want is for discussions to become personal. Don't let them get to you.
njanirudh 6y ago
You shouldn't be tired of telling someone about a cutting edge subject that you are an " expert" of.
visarga 6y ago
> "I'm so tired" Tiredness is probably coming from trying to educate people on Twitter, you can't do that because tomorrow a fresh batch will come and you have to start over.

uoaei 6y ago

> so... I guess you're tired of it? Yeah GP is modeling exactly the behavior they're railing against. Claiming that something is wrong without any practical insights for how that thing might be better.

visarga 6y ago
It's not exactly the same behavior - it's along the lines of "can't tolerate intolerance" (meta).

prionassembly 6y ago

> so... I guess you're tired of it? I'm not. Many other rhetorical moves have a lot of politics to muddle through / implicit assumptions that can be disavowed in bad faith, etc. I don't like to engage in that kind of discussion at all. But the "I'm so tired" bit is both condescending (and it takes... something... to condescend to Yan LeCunn) and evasive. The end result is authoritarian -- look man, this is decided and settled, you haven't kept up. Calling this out is interesting because it evidences on the contrary that the discussion isn't settled at all, and that she's unable or unwilling to frame it in a convivial manner that's conducive to progress. I sit out of conversations I'm tired about.

adamsea 6y ago
> Many other rhetorical moves have a lot of politics to muddle through / implicit assumptions that can be disavowed in bad faith, etc. I don't like to engage in that kind of discussion at all. But isn’t what you described so vague and subjective, that you can apply it to pretty much anything? IMHO it’s more honest to say “I sit out of conversations I don’t like”, which is an entirely fair and understandable decision to make :).
- prionassembly 6y ago
  It’s hard to like something that makes you tired when it’s not one of your kids.
gaze 6y ago
Yann was (actively or unintentionally) refusing to participate in the same conversation. His response was the "facts don't care about feelings" one. It's not wrong but it is a thought terminating cliche.
- prionassembly 6y ago
  It is. Yann also seems blissfully unaware of how sampling bias issues have always been dealt with (eg the Heckman correction model) in traditional statistics, where “getting more data” is not an option.

matthewdgreen 6y ago

This post is a really good explanation, and I wish it had been in that Twitter thread.

jeffxtreme 6y ago
The comment by the first John in the comment of the article here [https://syncedreview.com/2020/06/30/yann-lecun-quits-twitter-amid-acrimonious-exchanges-on-ai-bias/ https://syncedreview.com/2020/06/30/yann-lecun-quits-twitter...] adds a lot of insight too (starting with "As I understand, the social and structural problems are that AI learns the social and structural biases that are already present.").

yamrzou 6y ago

> To tie this back to AI, it would mean that as long as your models produce racially biased results, they simply aren't ready for deployment or publication. Go find better data until your work is no longer liable to inflict harm on anybody. Well, the disagreement is about publication. Yann LeCun himself said that "The consequences of bias are considerably more dire in a deployed product than in an academic paper."[1] Why would it be wrong to publish research based on biased data? [1] https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1274790777516961792 https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1274790777516961792

rubatuga 6y ago

What Yann said about data bias is a fact. He wasn’t dismissing your concerns nor distracting from it. A lot of people tried to extrapolate what Yann meant, but from the way I see it, if more people learn about the cause of this racial bias, the more people will be inclined to use fairer and diverse datasets in their future ML research.

je42 6y ago
The point is that she has an expectation of Yann to go further than just stating a fact. I assume she thinks that Yann has enough intellectual capacity to improve situation of biased ML but doesnt execute. Further, my guess is that the reason why he doesnt execute is not transparent to her, hence frustrating.
- rubatuga 6y ago
  Although that is a bit overreaching of an expectation in my opinion, I agree it would be good if Yann was a bit more explicit.
- TheMagicHorsey 6y ago
  I don't think that's what she meant. You are filling in the blanks that she should have filled herself.
- prionassembly 6y ago
  One of Jenny Holzer’s truisms is: you owe the world, not the other way around. Isn’t Gebru an “AI researcher”, after all?
- PeterisP 6y ago
  This is probably the core of the conflict there - there are researchers that aim to remove technical bias from technical systems and expect to stop there, not going into social issues of how the systems will be applied, as they consider that (e.g. solving the biases in the society) as a separate issue. Dr. Gebru, among others, expects and insists that they do go beyond that and try to get involved in the social consequences of tech. They refuse, ergo conflict.

nwallin 6y ago

It's not the message, it's the tone. There's a big difference between offering constructive criticism and being a condescending prick. > You can disagree with that reasoning (although you'd be wrong). What you can't do, as a leader in AI, is to pretend to have never heard of it, or that it is so obviously wrong that it warrants no reply whatsoever. There's a third option. You can just decide to not engage with the condescending prick at all. We have one of those at work. His area of responsibility is a very cross functional one, and while it is important, he have a great deal of difficulty getting people to participate. Because participation usually means getting told you're an idiot. Loudly, forcefully, and with more words. That seems to be the case here, only substituting "idiot" out for "racist".

IfOnlyYouKnew 6y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_policing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_policing
- kspacewalk2 6y ago
  Yes, tone matters, regardless of your gender. A prerequisite for a mature adult conversation is for you to quit being hostile to me from the get-go. Am I saying something controversial or micro-aggressive here? So be it.
  - prionassembly 6y ago
    Then, this is a confrontational tone too. I have the distinct impression that what they want is for discussions to become personal. Don't let them get to you.

njanirudh 6y ago

You shouldn't be tired of telling someone about a cutting edge subject that you are an " expert" of.

visarga 6y ago

> "I'm so tired" Tiredness is probably coming from trying to educate people on Twitter, you can't do that because tomorrow a fresh batch will come and you have to start over.