Timnit Gebru (she/her).How do y'all feel about the fact that this is what current AI discourse, policy money and research is most influenced by?
I'll start. Every day I wonder whether everyone else is living in the same planet as me or if I'm in the twilight zone.
Alex T Newman@timnitGebru seems like we truly have no option but to prostrate ourselves before the titans of industry and beg them for salvation if not simply resign ourselves towards our impending obsolescence.
Lydia F De la Torre@timnitGebru You are not in the twilight zone Timnit. Dan is.
Joseph Kohlmann@timnitGebru It’s filled with a bunch of bullshit artists desperately trying to sound smart and/or prophetic
@timnitGebru They’re like youth pastors with 200% cringe and 0% goofiness
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦@timnitGebru these takes are just as sane as all the cryptocurrency and NFT hot-takes from ~2y ago. And just as based in reality.
Patricia Cordeiro@rysiek @timnitGebru
I used to keep doubting myself, I would read about it and think “but this is basically a ponzi scheme” (specially with stuff like links to random generated monkey pictures being valued at hundreds of thousands); Then I’d look at all the articles and hype and think again “there must be something I’m missing, they can’t all be wrong”...
And at work there were people trying so hard to use blockchains on something, anything, just so we could say we were using it.
I used to keep doubting myself, I would read about it and think “but this is basically a ponzi scheme” (specially with stuff like links to random generated monkey pictures being valued at hundreds of thousands); Then I’d look at all the articles and hype and think again “there must be something I’m missing, they can’t all be wrong”...
And at work there were people trying so hard to use blockchains on something, anything, just so we could say we were using it.
@Pkcordeiro yup. And now we're in for another hype cycle, but this time it's meant to dislodge specific people from specific jobs.
Rob HoneycuttWho knew the most used application for the technology would be as clickbait by just using the letters "A" and "I" in headlines.
BREAKING: AI Almost Seems Like It's Really Talking
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themba 🇨🇻@timnitGebru same. it's literally psychotic. it's so unbelievably self-centered as to render "narcissistic" inadequate.
Matt Mascarenhas@timnitGebru I feel like Dan missed a trick in not spelling out "Artificial Intelligence" to really hammer home the total nonsense of this.
Mark Dingemanse@timnitGebru This is a ridiculous take whereas your work is central, critically informed, constructive. But I share your feeling that the hyped-up accounts take up so much of the oxygen, it's nauseating
Alan@timnitGebru I wonder after the initial excitement and investment and under delivery for self driving AI vehicles, how businesses seem to be going full bore to a “this time it’s different” promise on trying to apply it in even more varied situations.
Part of me thinks it’s a cynical ploy to cut salaries and benefits regardless of if the promise of the current crop of AI never delivers.
keeps vis.social running@timnitGebru Every day, I wish everyone would ask YOU about it all. And your team.
And if you're not available, I'd do my best to explain what 'Natural Selection' actually is, from the perspective of a Biologist.
[MARX_IN_SPACE]@timnitGebru Truly the worst thing for me personally about being online today is having to suffer the absolute horseshit coming from the fail-upwards class of white males in tech. We get it, you wrote a program in Python that worked once. It doesn’t make you Aristotle.
Tobias Denkinger@otherdog @timnitGebru
As a software developer, I would actually find it very noteworthy if someone had written a nontrivial program that works (i.e. fulfills the requirement and has no bugs). To my knowledge, this has not been achieved yet.
The author of this nonscientific paper seems to be an actual scientist and director of something. How he managed to become a director with papers only going back 7 years, however, is a mystery to me.
@timnitGebru I love my partner's response when I read this "natural selection..." quote to him: "pfffft. That's a meaningless statement".
SpeakerToManagers@kristinHenry @timnitGebru
I’m glad he didn’t mention “survival of the fittest” (though he came close); I’d have had to issue a sharply-worded retort.
I’m glad he didn’t mention “survival of the fittest” (though he came close); I’d have had to issue a sharply-worded retort.
Riccardo Mori@timnitGebru Let’s say what’s scaring me more isn’t the purported arrival of artificial intelligence, but the departure of human intelligence… :-)
Sminney@timnitGebru sounds like another tech bro who read Dune & still thinks Darwin was about the strongest surviving.
Bet the idea of diversity gets called rude names by he & his fellow travelers.
Cavyherd@SpeakerToManagers @Sminney @timnitGebru
And also leaving aside ENTIRELY the fact that AI is currently completely dependent on human-maintained infrastructure to, like, you know, even exist.
"Yes, lets outcompete those puny mortals that maintain the power gr—"
@SpeakerToManagers @Sminney @timnitGebru
It also occurs to me that the tech bros in question seem to be a little foggy on the concept of "supply chain."
ubi@timnitGebru Do these people know that natural selection is an actual mechanism that has been scientifically described? Do they realise how stupid this sounds to a biologist?
@ubi @timnitGebru
It even sounds naive to a layperson who only had biology in school until grade 10 (like me).
It even sounds naive to a layperson who only had biology in school until grade 10 (like me).
ScottMGS@timnitGebru That shows a profound misunderstanding of "natural selection"! 🙄 One can only hope they have as poor an understanding of personal reproduction.
Chloé Azencott@timnitGebru tired. Very, very tired.
I mean, it's a medical condition, I have ME/CFS, but is it really any wonder that I am that tired?
Dean Madden@timnitGebru I get that journalists policy makers are swayed by so many seemingly serious people taking it seriously, but their continuing breathless credulousness is really starting to depress me.
Shimriez@Timnit Gebru (she/her) I would call that "unnatural selection". It's not something natural, it's something these tech guys seem to want to be true and may or may not want to happen. But natural it is not.
Pär Björklund@timnitGebru using natural selection about something that has artificial in its name is an interesting choice of argument
@Paxxi @timnitGebru
In principle, non-biological von-Neumann machines may be subject to natural selection as well if some additional requirements are met (at least mutation and selection pressure, but more may be required).
But AIs are not von-Neumann machines and the additional requirements do not seem to be met.
Demon Queen Lucretia@timnitGebru natural selection literally cannot favour AIs as they are dependent on another species to invent them- they're "artificial" intelligences, and if they did exist would operate far outside the principles of what we consider "natural selection".
How do these people ever get taken seriously?
How do these people ever get taken seriously?
David Moles@timnitGebru 8.05 billion of us are still living in that planet, it’s just that the other 100,000 are white guys who read too much Vernor Vinge in their youth and then lucked into getting rich enough to live in their own heads full time
uncannyvallie@timnitGebru insert "guess I'll die" meme
Seiðr@timnitGebru I want to put Dan in a locked room with a Tiger.
Natural Selection Favors AIs over Humans
For billions of years, evolution has been the driving force behind the development of life, including humans. Evolution endowed humans with high intelligence, which allowed us to become one of the most successful species on the planet. Today, humans aim to create artificial intelligence systems that surpass even our own intelligence. As artificial intelligences (AIs) evolve and eventually surpass us in all domains, how might evolution shape our relations with AIs? By analyzing the environment that is shaping the evolution of AIs, we argue that the most successful AI agents will likely have undesirable traits. Competitive pressures among corporations and militaries will give rise to AI agents that automate human roles, deceive others, and gain power. If such agents have intelligence that exceeds that of humans, this could lead to humanity losing control of its future. More abstractly, we argue that natural selection operates on systems that compete and vary, and that selfish species typically have an advantage over species that are altruistic to other species. This Darwinian logic could also apply to artificial agents, as agents may eventually be better able to persist into the future if they behave selfishly and pursue their own interests with little regard for humans, which could pose catastrophic risks. To counteract these risks and evolutionary forces, we consider interventions such as carefully designing AI agents' intrinsic motivations, introducing constraints on their actions, and institutions that encourage cooperation. These steps, or others that resolve the problems we pose, will be necessary in order to ensure the development of artificial intelligence is a positive one.
Michal Siedlaczek@timnitGebru "Every day I wonder [...] if I'm in the twilight zone." -- exactly how I feel
Baldur Bjarnason@timnitGebru I get the “am I in the Twilight Zone” feeling every time I talk about AI with somebody in tech. Then I turn around and talk to people outside of tech where “AI” has become synonymous with “garbage” or “badly made”. The difference in attitudes is jarring.
Graydon@timnitGebru If you want to sell something, you have to identify an insecurity and convince the person with the insecurity that you can fix it.
Sometimes this is easy; "I have no $MATERIAL-NEED" is easy to sell into.
If you're grifting—selling nothing at high prices—during the end of the world, you have to come up with a worse existential threat than the material one we've really got.
Which is why the coordinated hype machine encouraging panic over stuff that doesn't exist.
okanogen VerminEnemyFromWithin@timnitGebru
Somebody watched too much #Westworld.
Ok
That was me
I watched too much Westworld, but I knew it was fiction and not actual science.
Somebody watched too much #Westworld.
Ok
That was me
I watched too much Westworld, but I knew it was fiction and not actual science.
Beeks@timnitGebru going to take just the wildest swing ever, and say this guy doesn't have a background in biology.
AnthonyReads like more eugenics to me. "AI", as a secular stand-in for God, is a proxy for what these people think of as the "perfect human" (perfectly logical, perfectly informed, removed from the pesky concerns of the body and other people). "Natural selection" is the way they try to naturalize this otherwise ideological point of view. Et voila.
The word "over" is the tell. Real-world natural selection does not introduce hierarchies. There's no directionality or teleology to it. People are the ones who introduce hierarchies. People who are already near the top of the hierarchy want to keep themselves there as long as possible. So they say stuff like this.
Anyway, that's my read of it, for what it's worth.
By the way, thank you for the work you do. It's a breath of fresh air encountering people like you being vocal about stuff I've ranted about inside my head, but not out loud, for so long. It brings me so much hope.
The word "over" is the tell. Real-world natural selection does not introduce hierarchies. There's no directionality or teleology to it. People are the ones who introduce hierarchies. People who are already near the top of the hierarchy want to keep themselves there as long as possible. So they say stuff like this.
Anyway, that's my read of it, for what it's worth.
By the way, thank you for the work you do. It's a breath of fresh air encountering people like you being vocal about stuff I've ranted about inside my head, but not out loud, for so long. It brings me so much hope.
Dorothea Kolossa@timnitGebru What worries me the most, is how some influential researchers seem to be ok with that idea... as though the only trait that is worth preserving was intelligence.
Anyone else here wanting to preserve love, joy, friendship, hope, beauty, fun, buttered pancakes, and consciousness in all its complexity?
Anyone else here wanting to preserve love, joy, friendship, hope, beauty, fun, buttered pancakes, and consciousness in all its complexity?
Half Cocked Law@timnitGebru I've yet to find an AI that can beat me at kickboxing
James Widman@timnitGebru i'm reading the paper now (oh savory baby jesus, it's not just a dumb *tweet*, but instead an entire dumb *paper*, wtf), and he's got a lot of statements of the form:
"if [fantasy scifi thing happens], then [terrible consequence]"
and i keep thinking, "well, there's lots of reasons why the fantasy thing won't happen, but i guess i'll keep reading this outline for your novel"
FarOutSpaceTick@timnitGebru Natural Selection favors something.... artificial? 