4 ms·

Sabotage is a pretty wild way to say “refusing to retract an academic paper that points out obvious flaws in ML models”.

andyxor 5y ago
there was much more to that, she demanded a list of reviewers who rejected her paper in a sort of ultimatum, and blasted group emails calling for sabotage I don't know if you saw Jeff Dean's response, but here it is https://docs.google.com/document/d/1f2kYWDXwhzYnq8ebVtuk9CqQqz7ScqxhSIxeYGrWjK0/preview?pru=AAABdlOOKBs*gTzLnuI53B2IS2BISVcgAQ https://docs.google.com/document/d/1f2kYWDXwhzYnq8ebVtuk9CqQ... There was also a thread on reddit with her colleagues reactions https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/k77sxz/d_timnit_gebru_and_google_megathread/?sort=top https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/k77sxz/d_t...
dekhn 5y ago
you left out "publicly calling out your SVP on twitter for not being racially sensitive enough" which she did before the paper blowup. Pretty sure that was the prime impetus for her being fired. BTW, I worked with TPUs on the hardware side, and the entire section about hardware power usage is just completely and totally wrong (I would have asked for the paper to be retracted if it was published, the errors are so large). As for the obvious flaws part, yeah, some of the flaws are obvious (and known to all practitioners of the art already), some are irrelevant but made to sound like they are existential crises, and some of the "flaws" are just per personal opionion about what she doesn't like. Hopefully she can find some academic position from which to propound her opinions. However, I do think in her behavior, she excluced herself from future employment.
- cdprojektdead 5y ago
  Multiple other, even white, employees called out this same SVP. Your usage of the phrase "Not being racially sensitive enough" strikes me as a bizarre euphemism for "racism", which it would appear you don't see as an issue. "are just per personal opinion about what she doesn't like." The field of AI Ethics is an amalgam of computer science and moral philosophy. What do you think value judgements are? What are those "personal opinions" and things she "doesn't like" and why? It seems you're using a lot of euphemisms to hide some very unpleasant truths about your world view.
  - dekhn 5y ago
    I don't know of any situation where anybody other than Timnit called out Jeff Dean publicly on twitter, at least not until Timnit had, or with nearly as much vehemence. I'm familiar with ethics in science; worked in biology for many years before concluding humanity isn't ready for gene modification. It's pretty clear that her opinion space in ethics is just one view, and not a particularly representative one. I know other ethicists who are far more careful (Sara Hooker for one) and say things that have much more impact, through careful writing to make it clear they are showing a societally relevant position on ethics.

andyxor 5y ago

there was much more to that, she demanded a list of reviewers who rejected her paper in a sort of ultimatum, and blasted group emails calling for sabotage I don't know if you saw Jeff Dean's response, but here it is https://docs.google.com/document/d/1f2kYWDXwhzYnq8ebVtuk9CqQqz7ScqxhSIxeYGrWjK0/preview?pru=AAABdlOOKBs*gTzLnuI53B2IS2BISVcgAQ https://docs.google.com/document/d/1f2kYWDXwhzYnq8ebVtuk9CqQ... There was also a thread on reddit with her colleagues reactions https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/k77sxz/d_timnit_gebru_and_google_megathread/?sort=top https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/k77sxz/d_t...

dekhn 5y ago

you left out "publicly calling out your SVP on twitter for not being racially sensitive enough" which she did before the paper blowup. Pretty sure that was the prime impetus for her being fired. BTW, I worked with TPUs on the hardware side, and the entire section about hardware power usage is just completely and totally wrong (I would have asked for the paper to be retracted if it was published, the errors are so large). As for the obvious flaws part, yeah, some of the flaws are obvious (and known to all practitioners of the art already), some are irrelevant but made to sound like they are existential crises, and some of the "flaws" are just per personal opionion about what she doesn't like. Hopefully she can find some academic position from which to propound her opinions. However, I do think in her behavior, she excluced herself from future employment.

cdprojektdead 5y ago
Multiple other, even white, employees called out this same SVP. Your usage of the phrase "Not being racially sensitive enough" strikes me as a bizarre euphemism for "racism", which it would appear you don't see as an issue. "are just per personal opinion about what she doesn't like." The field of AI Ethics is an amalgam of computer science and moral philosophy. What do you think value judgements are? What are those "personal opinions" and things she "doesn't like" and why? It seems you're using a lot of euphemisms to hide some very unpleasant truths about your world view.
- dekhn 5y ago
  I don't know of any situation where anybody other than Timnit called out Jeff Dean publicly on twitter, at least not until Timnit had, or with nearly as much vehemence. I'm familiar with ethics in science; worked in biology for many years before concluding humanity isn't ready for gene modification. It's pretty clear that her opinion space in ethics is just one view, and not a particularly representative one. I know other ethicists who are far more careful (Sara Hooker for one) and say things that have much more impact, through careful writing to make it clear they are showing a societally relevant position on ethics.