mekka okereke Apr 3, 2023

Communique for #BlackMastodon and Black folk only:

(White folk can listen too if they want, but this conversation is not for them).

The people telling you to be very afraid of Artificial General Intelligence don't know what they're talking about. Remember, their last big predictions were:
* Monkey jpegs are now money. Buy crypto.
* Elon will be great for Twitter
* Listening to VCs talk on Clubhouse is the next big social network
* Adam Neuman is a genius, and we should give him more money

Show threadmekka okereke Apr 3, 2023

These people are very very rich, not very very smart. The track record of their judgment speaks for itself.

There are very real, very serious, risks from Machine Learning in general, but they are not the risks that these delusional dudes are talking about.

The real risks are not "coming in the near future." They are here with us today, and they affect systems that impact marginalized communities the most.

Most of the experts on the real risks are from marginalized communities.

Show threadmekka okereke Apr 3, 2023

All this talk of artificial general intelligence is a head fake to draw attention from the massive and real harms that can be caused by ML systems today.

Today's systems can:
* Issue a warrant for your arrest for a crime that you didn't even do based on facial recognition
* Decide that you are a pre-trial flight risk and deny you pre-trial release
* Give a false diagnosis at a hospital, deciding that you are not worth putting on life support
* Tell a car to run you over as you cross the street

Show threadAmadi LovelaceApr 3, 2023
@mekkaokereke my county (Allegheny County, Pennsylvania) is using an AI prediction model to determine which parents should be able to get their children back from our child protection services, and which ones are just never going to be competent to raise their own offspring.
Show threadwolfkinApr 3, 2023
@amaditalks @mekkaokereke I just saw a trailer for a movie about a kid raised by parents with Downs. A flashback movie about how these people with downs formed a relationship and had a kid. I can't imagine these algos are gonna be very fair and considered to those communities either.
Show threadAmadi Lovelace
@wolfkin I only learned about this because of a recent news story about a couple who had their child seized when they brought her here from out of state for medical care. One of them is autistic, and IIRC the other has a different kind of developmental issue, and the predictive modeling said that they were not capable of adequately caring for the baby even though they brought her here because she had been under constant medical care.
Apr 3, 2023 at 6:25pmWeb