4 ms·

Why would other employees be knowledgeable in the employment relationship between someone and a company? Unless the employees are in the direct management chain

Why would other employees be knowledgeable in the employment relationship between someone and a company? Unless the employees are in the direct management chain, or HR or something, aren't they just parroting what Timnit is claiming?

alisonkisk 6y ago
Sure, but management is also making a claim without direct evidence.
- oh_sigh 6y ago
  There is a difference between not having evidence and not providing evidence. My point wasn't even about the truthiness of the claims of either side, but rather that if party A claims X, and then parties B and C just repeat the claims without being able to add anything - that's not news. That's just a person having allies who believe their claims. If Microsoft chimed in and said Timnit actually resigned, no one would write an article on that (besides for how bizarre of a statement that would be by another company), because no one expects Microsoft to be apprised of what happens between Google and its employees.
zorpner 6y ago
In fact, Timnit Gebru's actual manager has issued a specific statement on this. It's on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3469738016467233&id=100002932057665 https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=34697380164672... Full text: Just wanted to say that I was stunned by what just happened to Timnit Gebru, who was in my team until a few days ago (I'm sure you've all read what happened already). I have always been and will remain a strong supporter of her scientific work to make sure that AI becomes a positive force for the minoritized, as well as her generosity and tireless actions to lift the voices of the silenced ones. She taught me a lot and still is. I stand by you, Timnit. I also stand by the rest of my team who, like me, was stunned and is trying to make sense of all this. In particular the Ethical AI team, but also the broader Brain Research team.
- sjg007 6y ago
  I mean that's a pretty big endorsement and something people here should think about. Also I read the highlights of the paper linked here and it seems fine and reasonable. These are reasonable questions to ask. Sure we can mitigate the cost of training these models with green energy or finding new optimization./compression techniques etc... but that doesn't mean that with ever evolving data volumes we will ever fully mitigate that. Bitcoin for all its merit consumes a lot of energy. Is that more than USD or something else? Another thing to consider is that AI right now has a rich get richer winner take all dynamic. We have titans battling it out for NLP supremacy. Deep mind just revolutionized protein folding which has direct implications into biomedical research and technology. Small academic labs are at an extreme disadvantage unless they collaborate with big tech. Interestingly physics research evolved in a similar way with large particle colliders and telescopes started up. So you can make a direct analogy to that, that the basic research can only be done with million dollar investments. That's an ethical question. GPT-3 trained on misinformation would make pizza gate look tame in comparison. So there are huge social implications. Even real datasets collected from society and social data will have implicit and explicit biases in them. There are huge ethical concerns with data, data collection and with the interpretations AI models will make. Your credit score, your social credit score, a company that refuses to hire you because a chat bot has labeled you subversive. The TSA/DHS blanket banned people from flying and gave no feedback or transparency into why. It took members of Congress to get some people redressed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapons_of_Math_Destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapons_of_Math_Destruction
- thu2111 6y ago
  There's another Googler who needs to be fired. Anyone who uses phrases like "minoritized" (that's not a word) or "the silenced ones" is quite clearly fighting the culture war and not even slightly interested in the norms of management. What kind of a manager "stands by" someone who is as completely poisonous as this woman is? What kind of "generosity" did she show to her colleagues when she demanded their identities and called them racist on Twitter? Google needs a massive clear-out. People aren't doing their jobs anymore there, they've become so obsessed with fictional narratives about non-existent racism and sexism.
apta 6y ago
Exactly the case. Plus, I'd trust someone like Jeff Dean who is accomplished and does not have a history of crying racism and "microagressions" at the slightest beurocratic issue. There are already a couple of posts on reddit from ex-colleagues who explained what it was like working with people like her. People are tired of "woke"ness.
- microtherion 6y ago
  It’s easier not to complain about behavior if you’re the perpetrator, rather than the recipient, of the behavior. I bet Jeffrey Dahmer didn’t have a history of complaining about cannibalism either, but that doesn’t necessarily make him the good guy.
  - apta 6y ago
    Looking at someone's history is a good indicator. Hasn't she already threatened to sue Google barely a few months into her job? If so, I don't blame them for letting her go at the soonest possible time. She gave them the opportunity, and it was only smart of them to take it.
  - Scea91 6y ago
    Based on what exactly do you imply that Jeff Dean is a perpetrator of racism? Because he is a white dude? Isn't that ironic?
    - microtherion 6y ago
      From what I have read about the affair, e.g. the latest "setting the record straight" blog post linked from the article, I have strong reasons to believe that the paper in question: 1. Did in fact go through and pass the internal approval process that he implied it didn't. 2. Was then subjected to a second, intransparent "review" that is not customary practice at Google. 3. The results of that "review" were presented to the author as a decree (which also is not customary practice). 4. And when the author subsequently protested that she would not work under such rules (as well she should) that was taken as a pretext to let her go — without even involving her direct manager. Under those circumstances, Dean's response is misleading and evasive, a practice often characterized as "gaslighting" or, in the term that the grandparent comment ridiculed, a "micro-aggression". It's not about whether you're a "white dude", it's what rules you set for "white dudes" vs. "non-white non-dudes".

alisonkisk 6y ago

Sure, but management is also making a claim without direct evidence.

oh_sigh 6y ago
There is a difference between not having evidence and not providing evidence. My point wasn't even about the truthiness of the claims of either side, but rather that if party A claims X, and then parties B and C just repeat the claims without being able to add anything - that's not news. That's just a person having allies who believe their claims. If Microsoft chimed in and said Timnit actually resigned, no one would write an article on that (besides for how bizarre of a statement that would be by another company), because no one expects Microsoft to be apprised of what happens between Google and its employees.

zorpner 6y ago

In fact, Timnit Gebru's actual manager has issued a specific statement on this. It's on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3469738016467233&id=100002932057665 https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=34697380164672... Full text: Just wanted to say that I was stunned by what just happened to Timnit Gebru, who was in my team until a few days ago (I'm sure you've all read what happened already). I have always been and will remain a strong supporter of her scientific work to make sure that AI becomes a positive force for the minoritized, as well as her generosity and tireless actions to lift the voices of the silenced ones. She taught me a lot and still is. I stand by you, Timnit. I also stand by the rest of my team who, like me, was stunned and is trying to make sense of all this. In particular the Ethical AI team, but also the broader Brain Research team.

sjg007 6y ago
I mean that's a pretty big endorsement and something people here should think about. Also I read the highlights of the paper linked here and it seems fine and reasonable. These are reasonable questions to ask. Sure we can mitigate the cost of training these models with green energy or finding new optimization./compression techniques etc... but that doesn't mean that with ever evolving data volumes we will ever fully mitigate that. Bitcoin for all its merit consumes a lot of energy. Is that more than USD or something else? Another thing to consider is that AI right now has a rich get richer winner take all dynamic. We have titans battling it out for NLP supremacy. Deep mind just revolutionized protein folding which has direct implications into biomedical research and technology. Small academic labs are at an extreme disadvantage unless they collaborate with big tech. Interestingly physics research evolved in a similar way with large particle colliders and telescopes started up. So you can make a direct analogy to that, that the basic research can only be done with million dollar investments. That's an ethical question. GPT-3 trained on misinformation would make pizza gate look tame in comparison. So there are huge social implications. Even real datasets collected from society and social data will have implicit and explicit biases in them. There are huge ethical concerns with data, data collection and with the interpretations AI models will make. Your credit score, your social credit score, a company that refuses to hire you because a chat bot has labeled you subversive. The TSA/DHS blanket banned people from flying and gave no feedback or transparency into why. It took members of Congress to get some people redressed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapons_of_Math_Destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapons_of_Math_Destruction
thu2111 6y ago
There's another Googler who needs to be fired. Anyone who uses phrases like "minoritized" (that's not a word) or "the silenced ones" is quite clearly fighting the culture war and not even slightly interested in the norms of management. What kind of a manager "stands by" someone who is as completely poisonous as this woman is? What kind of "generosity" did she show to her colleagues when she demanded their identities and called them racist on Twitter? Google needs a massive clear-out. People aren't doing their jobs anymore there, they've become so obsessed with fictional narratives about non-existent racism and sexism.

apta 6y ago

Exactly the case. Plus, I'd trust someone like Jeff Dean who is accomplished and does not have a history of crying racism and "microagressions" at the slightest beurocratic issue. There are already a couple of posts on reddit from ex-colleagues who explained what it was like working with people like her. People are tired of "woke"ness.

microtherion 6y ago
It’s easier not to complain about behavior if you’re the perpetrator, rather than the recipient, of the behavior. I bet Jeffrey Dahmer didn’t have a history of complaining about cannibalism either, but that doesn’t necessarily make him the good guy.
- apta 6y ago
  Looking at someone's history is a good indicator. Hasn't she already threatened to sue Google barely a few months into her job? If so, I don't blame them for letting her go at the soonest possible time. She gave them the opportunity, and it was only smart of them to take it.
- Scea91 6y ago
  Based on what exactly do you imply that Jeff Dean is a perpetrator of racism? Because he is a white dude? Isn't that ironic?
  - microtherion 6y ago
    From what I have read about the affair, e.g. the latest "setting the record straight" blog post linked from the article, I have strong reasons to believe that the paper in question: 1. Did in fact go through and pass the internal approval process that he implied it didn't. 2. Was then subjected to a second, intransparent "review" that is not customary practice at Google. 3. The results of that "review" were presented to the author as a decree (which also is not customary practice). 4. And when the author subsequently protested that she would not work under such rules (as well she should) that was taken as a pretext to let her go — without even involving her direct manager. Under those circumstances, Dean's response is misleading and evasive, a practice often characterized as "gaslighting" or, in the term that the grandparent comment ridiculed, a "micro-aggression". It's not about whether you're a "white dude", it's what rules you set for "white dudes" vs. "non-white non-dudes".