Google fires prominent AI ethicist Timnit Gebru

[HausOfLandau]

 

 

Summary

Google Fires a top AI ethicist due to her not submitting a paper within the timetable google outlines for the need to review the paper's that Google Team members author.

 

Quotes

Quote

 “A week before you go out on vacation, you see a meeting pop up at 4:30pm PST on your calendar,” it reads. “Then in that meeting your manager’s manager tells you ‘it has been decided’ that you need to retract this paper by next week... You are not worth having any conversations about this, since you are not someone whose humanity (let alone expertise recognized by journalists, governments, scientists, civic organizations such as the electronic frontiers foundation etc) is acknowledged or valued in this company.”

After the email went out, Gebru told managers that certain conditions had to be met in order for her to stay at the company. Otherwise, she would have to work on a transition plan.

 

My thoughts

Regardless of them not following the rules, its scary to see that a leading mind in this regard was let go due to a technicality like this. Sure she should've followed the rules but my concern is more so what does this mean for the ethics of Google's future AI endeavors. It seems like a step toward the future that all those dystopian movies predict for our future.  

Do they want SkyNet? Cause this is how you get SkyNet!

 

 

Sources

https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/3/22150355/google-fires-timnit-gebru-facial-recognition-ai-ethicist

[williamcll]

5 minutes ago, HausOfLandau said:

My thoughts

Ugh god this is scary, and seems like a step toward the future that all those dystopian movies predict for our future.  Do they want SkyNet? Cause this is how you get SkyNet!

What if the current CEO is actually just a puppet and Google is already sentient. 

[charlie_root]

She wasn't fired for the paper she wrote; sounds like she was fired for not following Google's procedure for publication. 

From the article above:

Quote

“Timnit co-authored a paper with four fellow Googlers as well as some external collaborators that needed to go through our review process (as is the case with all externally submitted papers),” the email reads. “Unfortunately, this particular paper was only shared with a day’s notice before its deadline — we require two weeks for this sort of review — and then instead of awaiting reviewer feedback, it was approved for submission and submitted. A cross functional team then reviewed the paper as part of our regular process and the authors were informed that it didn’t meet our bar for publication and were given feedback about why...We acknowledge that the authors were extremely disappointed with the decision that Megan and I ultimately made, especially as they’d already submitted the paper.”

 

[Guest]

Hopefully people read the entire article and not just your summation.

It seems there is a procedure for how you go about submitting papers, and she did not follow it.

Regardless of how right or wrong the firing was, you open yourself up for things like this when procedures are not followed.

[Teddy07]

I applaud Google 

I am against data privacy advocates or anyone else who hinders progress. 

[AlTech]

Just now, Teddy07 said:

I applaud Google 

I am against data privacy advocates or anyone else who hinders progress. 

Can't tell if trolling or serious.

 

Either way, that paves the road for technology and AI to be used for evil purposes such as AI taking over and killing humanity. Data privacy and advocates for ethics exists for many reasons, and if companies are truly hindered by it then they need to re-think their business model and structure. Not the other way around imo.

[HausOfLandau]

3 minutes ago, Den-Fi said:

Hopefully people read the entire article and not just your summation.

It seems there is a procedure for how you go about submitting papers, and she did not follow it.

Regardless of how right or wrong the firing was, you open yourself up for things like this when procedures are not followed.

Fair point... I updated the OP for more clarity into that regard. 

Regardless of them not following the rules, its scary to see that a leading mind in this regard was let go due to a technicality like this. Sure she should've followed the rules but my concern is more so what does this mean for the ethics of Google's future AI endeavors.

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, HausOfLandau said:

Fair point... I updated the OP for more clarity into that regard. 

Regardless of them not following the rules, its scary to see that a leading mind in this regard was let go due to a technicality like this. Sure she should've followed the rules but my concern is more so what does this mean for the ethics of Google's future AI endeavors.

Well hopefully the pressure from within gets them to fill that position quickly.

From an HR standpoint, sometimes your hands are tied.

They can't simply ignore policies. That would set a bad precedent and open up legal doors they clearly do not want open.

 

[BuckGup]

How is this news at all? Companies have rules and guidelines. If you don't follow them you are probably going to get fired, it doesn't matter who you are either

[DildorTheDecent]

2 minutes ago, BuckGup said:

How is this news at all? Companies have rules and guidelines. If you don't follow them you are probably going to get fired, it doesn't matter who you are either

GOOGLE BAD

[igormp]

If you people want to dig a bit deeper, twitter is on fire about this, and many googlers are voicing themselves against what happened. Seems to not be something as simple as "fired for not following procedures", while also being related to the anti-union attacks made by google recently.

13 minutes ago, Teddy07 said:

I applaud Google 

I am against data privacy advocates or anyone else who hinders progress. 

Hmmm, you do know that recent research has shown that models that go through anonymization have better performance than their regular counterparts (less bias), and are also more robust against adversarial attacks and attacks on the training datasets?

 

[Teddy07]

9 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Can't tell if trolling or serious.

Yes I was serious. 

10 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Either way, that paves the road for technology and AI to be used for evil purposes such as AI taking over and killing humanity. 

Now I canˋt tell if you are trolling. Companies are not evil. They just want to make as much money as possible. They donˋt want to kill us

[AlTech]

1 minute ago, Teddy07 said:

Companies are not evil. They just want to make as much money as possible. They donˋt want to kill us

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

 

If you don't have people dealing with Ethics in AI then you will inevitably end up with AI taking over humanity and killing people. AI if given the opportunity eventually will lead to it. That's why we need to limit AI so it doesn't do bad things. But you said this was limiting progress.

 

9 minutes ago, BuckGup said:

How is this news at all? Companies have rules and guidelines. If you don't follow them you are probably going to get fired, it doesn't matter who you are either

Google, according to the Source, seemed to have treated it as her resignation despite the fact that she's been fired. I would say this is news.

 

Also this:

Quote

You are not worth having any conversations about this, since you are not someone whose humanity.... is acknowledged or valued in this company.”

 

[wanderingfool2]

12 minutes ago, HausOfLandau said:

Fair point... I updated the OP for more clarity into that regard. 

Regardless of them not following the rules, its scary to see that a leading mind in this regard was let go due to a technicality like this. Sure she should've followed the rules but my concern is more so what does this mean for the ethics of Google's future AI endeavors.

I don't like the article by Verge personally, it's headline literally lies about the cause (or they've done very little actual thinking).

 

To your point @HausOfLandau she wasn't let go.  She made a demand of changes that needed to be made and they refused (and accepted her resignation).  To me, this is her leaving, not Google firing/letting go.  (While there might be a good reason for her leaving, she made demands knowing full well it could lead to her dismissal).  She literally sent an internal email blasting Google as well

 

Quote

After the email went out, Gebru told managers that certain conditions had to be met in order for her to stay at the company. Otherwise, she would have to work on a transition plan.

 

 

4 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Google, according to the Source, seemed to have treated it as her resignation despite the fact that she's been fired. I would say this is news.

By chance did you read the email that forced google's hand?  She literally badmouths the company in an internal email

 

I find it ironic that an AI ethicist would actually send out an email like this (given her words seem like she's just saying things because she is salty that they have a different viewpoint and she feels like she doesn't want to follow the guidelines)

[SPARTAN VI]

I wish my company were this strict with procedural compliance. I can name at least a dozen people in my organization who needlessly tie up extra resources on a daily basis because of their refusal (we've coached them dozens of times) to adhere to their own team's written procedure. 

[staticpage]

EVery time I read about Google AI working on crime statistics they talk about how the results are racist and then gut the AI to get the results that fit their narrative, because everything and one has one now, so maybe with her gone we can get real unbiased data.

[Blade of Grass]

5 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

She made a demand of changes that needed to be made and they refused (and accepted her resignation).

Quote

Gebru asked Google Research vice president Megan Kacholia for an explanation and told her that without more discussion on the paper and the way it was handled she would plan to resign after a transition period. She also wanted to make sure she was clear on what would happen with future, similar research projects her team might undertake.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-03/google-s-co-head-of-ethical-ai-says-she-was-fired-over-email?sref=sZVE7m7d

IDK man, doesn't sound at all unreasonable or like she demanded any changes, just explanation and clarity for moving forward.

[Blade of Grass]

7 minutes ago, staticpage said:

EVery time I read about Google AI working on crime statistics they talk about how the results are racist and then gut the AI to get the results that fit their narrative, because everything and one has one now, so maybe with her gone we can get real unbiased data.

Honestly, I don't really know where to start with this one, but I can assure you that there are significant issues with how crime data is used to train ML models. A good initial reading on the topic: https://www.propublica.org/article/machine-bias-risk-assessments-in-criminal-sentencing

 

Quote

ON A SPRING AFTERNOON IN 2014, Brisha Borden was running late to pick up her god-sister from school when she spotted an unlocked kid’s blue Huffy bicycle and a silver Razor scooter. Borden and a friend grabbed the bike and scooter and tried to ride them down the street in the Fort Lauderdale suburb of Coral Springs.

 

Just as the 18-year-old girls were realizing they were too big for the tiny conveyances — which belonged to a 6-year-old boy — a woman came running after them saying, “That’s my kid’s stuff.” Borden and her friend immediately dropped the bike and scooter and walked away.

 

But it was too late — a neighbor who witnessed the heist had already called the police. Borden and her friend were arrested and charged with burglary and petty theft for the items, which were valued at a total of $80.

 

Compare their crime with a similar one: The previous summer, 41-year-old Vernon Prater was picked up for shoplifting $86.35 worth of tools from a nearby Home Depot store.

 

Prater was the more seasoned criminal. He had already been convicted of armed robbery and attempted armed robbery, for which he served five years in prison, in addition to another armed robbery charge. Borden had a record, too, but it was for misdemeanors committed when she was a juvenile.

 

Yet something odd happened when Borden and Prater were booked into jail: A computer program spat out a score predicting the likelihood of each committing a future crime. Borden — who is black — was rated a high risk. Prater — who is white — was rated a low risk.

 

Two years later, we know the computer algorithm got it exactly backward. Borden has not been charged with any new crimes. Prater is serving an eight-year prison term for subsequently breaking into a warehouse and stealing thousands of dollars’ worth of electronics.

Even the initial opening should be good to give you an idea about the issues that exist currently. There are real ethical concerns with the data being used to train ML models, the biases that are already imprinted in the data, and if the models are able to account for that or if they just product similarly biased output data sets. 

[igormp]

12 minutes ago, staticpage said:

we can get real unbiased data

Unbiased data relies on unbiased datasets. As long as we are humans, there WILL be biases on datasets, which will result in skewed models, that's why ethical AI and the whole anonymization thing is helpful, since it brings more robusts models that reflect reality rather than our own assumptions.

[wanderingfool2]

1 hour ago, Blade of Grass said:

IDK man, doesn't sound at all unreasonable or like she demanded any changes, just explanation and clarity for moving forward.

Jeff Dean's email included the following

Quote

Timnit responded with an email requiring that a number of conditions be met in order for her to continue working at Google, including revealing the identities of every person who Megan and I had spoken to and consulted as part of the review of the paper and the exact feedback. Timnit wrote that if we didn’t meet these demands, she would leave Google and work on an end date. We accept and respect her decision to resign from Google.

My issue is that she works in ethics...and to me asking for the identities of people reviewed her paper and came to a conclusion that it didn't meet the requirements to be published is an egregious overstep.  Keeping identities of peer reviews is the fundamental to allowing for less bias to be present.  So for myself her demands were a bit unreasonable, and given her email that she sent out internally just screams to someone who didn't get her way and she's throwing a tantrum.

[Zodiark1593]

2 hours ago, HausOfLandau said:

 

 

Summary

Google Fires a top AI ethicist due to her not submitting a paper within the timetable google outlines for the need to review the paper's that Google Team members author.

 

Quotes

 

My thoughts

Regardless of them not following the rules, its scary to see that a leading mind in this regard was let go due to a technicality like this. Sure she should've followed the rules but my concern is more so what does this mean for the ethics of Google's future AI endeavors. It seems like a step toward the future that all those dystopian movies predict for our future.  

Do they want SkyNet? Cause this is how you get SkyNet!

 

 

Sources

https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/3/22150355/google-fires-timnit-gebru-facial-recognition-ai-ethicist

GladOS >>> SkyNet. 

[Blade of Grass]

1 hour ago, wanderingfool2 said:

My issue is that she works in ethics...and to me asking for the identities of people reviewed her paper and came to a conclusion that it didn't meet the requirements to be published is an egregious overstep.  Keeping identities of peer reviews is the fundamental to allowing for less bias to be present.  So for myself her demands were a bit unreasonable, and given her email that she sent out internally just screams to someone who didn't get her way and she's throwing a tantrum.

I don't particularly see a ethical dilemma in having an open and transparent review process, and that would be up to the company to decide if that is their regular procedure. From her email, it seems that this is generally not the case at Google, and from my own experience working at a different large technology company, internal pre-publication reviews are not anonymous. Anonymous peer review is the norm for a lot of journal publications, to try and mitigate retaliation against a reviewer (especially new researchers in a field speaking out against old ones), but it also creates its own problem (see "reviewer #2 problem"). 

So generally, I'm not convinced there's a moral hazard in named peer-review, especially within a company where employees are already supposed to be professional with one another. 

 

Quote from her email:

Quote

...

Have you ever heard of someone getting “feedback” on a paper through a privileged and confidential document to HR? ...

 

Imagine this: You’ve sent a paper for feedback to 30+ researchers, you’re awaiting feedback from PR & Policy who you gave a heads up before you even wrote the work saying “we’re thinking of doing this”, working on a revision plan figuring out how to address different feedback from people, haven’t heard from PR & Policy besides them asking you for updates (in 2 months). A week before you go out on vacation, you see a meeting pop up at 4:30pm PST on your calendar (this popped up at around 2pm). No one would tell you what the meeting was about in advance. Then in that meeting your manager’s manager tells you “it has been decided” that you need to retract this paper by next week, Nov. 27, the week when almost everyone would be out (and a date which has nothing to do with the conference process). ...

 

Then, you ask for more information. What specific feedback exists? Who is it coming from? Why now? Why not before? Can you go back and forth with anyone? Can you understand what exactly is problematic and what can be changed?

 

And you are told after a while, that your manager can read you a privileged and confidential document and you’re not supposed to even know who contributed to this document, who wrote this feedback, what process was followed or anything. You write a detailed document discussing whatever pieces of feedback you can find, asking for questions and clarifications, and it is completely ignored. And you’re met with, once again, an order to retract the paper with no engagement whatsoever.

...

And I have to be honest here, I agree with her that none of this sound like standard procedure for an internal paper review. The involvement of HR, confidentiality requirements, not being given the feedback, not being able to work on address the concerns, etc, all sound like extremely out of the ordinary. 

 

Jeff Dean's email commented that her paper didn't address some new forms of mitigation and didn't talk about specific benefits that some of the models have, but I can't help but feel like those comments are inadequate a reason to retract a paper (or, would be caught by journal peer-review if they were seminal to the paper). Considering the paper was critical about how some things are currently being done (including at Google), it's seems that there is an air of them covering for themselves in this. 

[Brooksie359]

2 hours ago, BuckGup said:

How is this news at all? Companies have rules and guidelines. If you don't follow them you are probably going to get fired, it doesn't matter who you are either

I don't agree here. Most companies will give an employee a written warning on the first violation of guidelines unless it is malicious behavior or fairly serious. This doesn't sound like this case would fall under the serious or malicious behavior to me but I guess Google can still do what they want and have the right to fire them if they want. 

[Shreyas1]

3 hours ago, Teddy07 said:

I applaud Google 

I am against data privacy advocates or anyone else who hinders progress. 

Trying to appease the AI overlords, I see.

[RejZoR]

3 hours ago, Teddy07 said:

I applaud Google 

I am against data privacy advocates or anyone else who hinders progress. 

I guess you'd also applaud Nazis for all the technological progress they've made? And you're one of those people who repeatedly say "I have nothing to hide" and just willingly hand over their entire lives to these mega corporations.