What In The Everloving Name Of Diversity, Equity, And Inclusion Is Going On At Google?
A major blowup at at Google led to the firing or resignation (depending on who you ask) of Timnit Gebru and accusations that the company's social-justice efforts are performative at best. But behind the scenes, some Googlers are telling a different, slightly more complicated story. Who's right? Katie and Jesse bring on Jon Stokes, an Ars Technica founder who is much better connected in the tech world than they are, to help explain this tangled controversy.
(Correction: In the original version of this episode we posted for our patrons, our guest, Jon Stokes, wrongly described Timnit Gebru's academic background as being in sociology, with her having also done some work in computer science. That should have been flipped: She has a PhD from the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, but has done plenty of work that intersects with sociology. Jon also said she was educated at M.I.T., but all her degrees are from Stanford. Whenever an error makes it into the final show, that is 100% the fault of hosts, and we apologize. We've snipped out the audio containing the errors and added a link to Gebru's Stanford page to the top of the show notes.)
Show notes/Links:
Timnit Gebru's background: https://ai.stanford.edu/~tgebru/ (https://ai.stanford.edu/~tgebru/)
Jon Stokes: https://twitter.com/jonst0kes (https://twitter.com/jonst0kes)
His site, The Prepared: http://www.theprepared.com (http://www.theprepared.com)
The New York Times: Google Chief Apologizes for A.I. Researcher’s Dismissal - https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/technology/timnit-gebru-google-pichai.html (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/technology/timnit-gebru-google-pichai.html)
The New York Times: Google Researcher Says She Was Fired Over Paper Highlighting Bias in A.I. - https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/03/technology/google-researcher-timnit-gebru.html (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/03/technology/google-researcher-timnit-gebru.html)
Wired: Behind the Paper That Led to a Google Researcher’s Firing - https://www.wired.com/story/behind-paper-led-google-researchers-firing/ (https://www.wired.com/story/behind-paper-led-google-researchers-firing/)
Platformer: The withering email that got an ethical AI researcher fired at Google - https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-an-ethical (https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-an-ethical)
MIT Technology Review: We read the paper that forced Timnit Gebru out of Google. Here’s what it says. - https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/12/04/1013294/google-ai-ethics-research-paper-forced-out-timnit-gebru/ (https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/12/04/1013294/google-ai-ethics-research-paper-forced-out-timnit-gebru/)
Twitter: Yann LeCun on the data problem - https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1274782757907030016 (https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1274782757907030016)
Twitter: Gebru disagrees - https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1274808654227619840 (https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1274808654227619840)
One of the Reddit posts in question critical of Gebru: https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/k77sxz/dtimnitgebruandgooglemegathread/gepq3u8/?utmsource=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 (https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/k77sxz/d_timnit_gebru_and_google_megathread/gepq3u8/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
(Correction: In the original version of this episode we posted for our patrons, our guest, Jon Stokes, wrongly described Timnit Gebru's academic background as being in sociology, with her having also done some work in computer science. That should have been flipped: She has a PhD from the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, but has done plenty of work that intersects with sociology. Jon also said she was educated at M.I.T., but all her degrees are from Stanford. Whenever an error makes it into the final show, that is 100% the fault of hosts, and we apologize. We've snipped out the audio containing the errors and added a link to Gebru's Stanford page to the top of the show notes.)
Show notes/Links:
Timnit Gebru's background: https://ai.stanford.edu/~tgebru/ (https://ai.stanford.edu/~tgebru/)
Jon Stokes: https://twitter.com/jonst0kes (https://twitter.com/jonst0kes)
His site, The Prepared: http://www.theprepared.com (http://www.theprepared.com)
The New York Times: Google Chief Apologizes for A.I. Researcher’s Dismissal - https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/technology/timnit-gebru-google-pichai.html (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/technology/timnit-gebru-google-pichai.html)
The New York Times: Google Researcher Says She Was Fired Over Paper Highlighting Bias in A.I. - https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/03/technology/google-researcher-timnit-gebru.html (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/03/technology/google-researcher-timnit-gebru.html)
Wired: Behind the Paper That Led to a Google Researcher’s Firing - https://www.wired.com/story/behind-paper-led-google-researchers-firing/ (https://www.wired.com/story/behind-paper-led-google-researchers-firing/)
Platformer: The withering email that got an ethical AI researcher fired at Google - https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-an-ethical (https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-an-ethical)
MIT Technology Review: We read the paper that forced Timnit Gebru out of Google. Here’s what it says. - https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/12/04/1013294/google-ai-ethics-research-paper-forced-out-timnit-gebru/ (https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/12/04/1013294/google-ai-ethics-research-paper-forced-out-timnit-gebru/)
Twitter: Yann LeCun on the data problem - https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1274782757907030016 (https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1274782757907030016)
Twitter: Gebru disagrees - https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1274808654227619840 (https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1274808654227619840)
One of the Reddit posts in question critical of Gebru: https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/k77sxz/dtimnitgebruandgooglemegathread/gepq3u8/?utmsource=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 (https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/k77sxz/d_timnit_gebru_and_google_megathread/gepq3u8/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
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