Please read the article. I address some of the issues raised. My point is that Gebru's firing is symptomatic of some deep problems Google are experiencing. Thank you.
>. I don’t want to downplay the deep instutionalised sexism and racism that is at play in Gebru’s firing — that is there for all to see.
This is a very badly written and uniformed article, and sentences like these essentially illustrate the thinking here (It's imploding because I don't like it).
Here is an alternative reading: Google is cleaning house of toxic activists who are not interested in serious ethics research but use it as a vehicle for their ultra-progressive political agendas.
but isn't ethics inextricably linked to the worldview generally? We have some common ground nowadays (no killing in so called "civilized" countries), but to me it seems like you are just proposing the usual neo-xyz-argument: things can't be changed (which - originally developed in the thinktanks of cold-war-USA under heavy fascist influence - now has been the main global narrative without any institutionalized counter for 30 years)
I read the article and i'm not following the argument delivered at all.
There is no real proof to this.
I'm following and reading research @ google (stuff like this https://ai.googleblog.com/ and other sources) for ages now and NOTHING indicates an 'implosion'.
It is strong research with real and constant results.
I have no idea why the autor would even consider using the word 'implode'.
Its not rocket science that data is biased and it just will continue be researched and a solution will be found. For the single reason that biased systems in certain areas will not deliver the results you need to use it properly.
> For the single reason that biased systems in certain areas will not deliver the results you need to use it properly.
well, they produce happy numbers for papers and depending on the brainwash-level of a population, they might also sufficiently often do the "right thing" towards minorities that noone cares too much about, independent of whether it would stand a chance against objective evaluation.
Nothing symptomatic about firing toxic employees. The only thing imploding is AI etichs research. There are good people doing quality research that will now have much harder time finding a job in industry because of the bad rep these Google employees "contributed" to the field.
