Last week, as part of the EmTech Digital AI conference on artificial intelligence held in San Francisco, Google’s vice president for global and legal affairs, Kent Walker, announced the list of members that were to become part of its newly formed advisory board. of ethics in AI (officially, External Advice of Advice in Advanced Technologies or ATEAC).
The reason for creating this body is that the company’s projects have suffered several accusations of bias (especially of a racial nature) in recent times and, as a result of the growth of the power and versatility of this technology, the directors of the company They are afraid to enter the blind on what they have sometimes called an “ethical minefield”.
Google + working team
Therefore, the search engine company was confident that the appointment of 8 experts in the fields of mathematics, ethics, bioengineering, psychology, philosophy, politics, foreign relations and artificial intelligence itself was well received within and outside Google for its ability to monitor your projects and mark, if necessary, red lines.
However, Google has seen how the selection of such experts caused the outbreak of a new controversy. And it is that within the company has been very unwelcome the inclusion in the ATEAC of Kay Coles James, who was high in the administrations of the two presidents Bush and who for a year and a half is the first African-American woman to hold the presidency of the Heritage Foundation, one of the most influential conservative think tanks in the United States.
(Other) Internal Rebellion in Google
But the first critics to the inclusion of James not only have not been extinguished, but that they are going to worse. Above all after establishing a platform of employees of the company who call themselves “Googlers against Transphobia and Hate”, who claim that James’s record of opinions “against the rights of trans people, of the rest of LGBTQ people and of immigrants “should invalidate her as a member of ATEAC.
The accusations of ‘transphobia’ are the result, above all, of statements made by James a month ago, when he said that the Equality Bill that the Democrats have proposed at the federal level “would open every toilet and female sports team to the biological men. ”
To increase the echo of its demands, this platform of employees has begun to spread a letter of protest among the employees of the company, which at the start of today already exceeded 2100 signatures, and had the support of dozens of professors and activists In the letter, they argue that
“James’ views are not only contrary to Google’s values, but are also against the project to ensure that the development and application of AI prioritize justice over profits.”
The letter also states that, by making this appointment, Google is “endorsing James’ views” and implying “that his is a valid perspective that deserves to be included in the decision-making, which is unacceptable.” They also charge against the argument made by the company that they chose it to guarantee freedom of thought: “That means using the language of diversity as a weapon”, they say.
List of original ATEAC members
Shortly after the election of the members of the ATEAC, one of the members chosen to be part of it, the behavioral economist (and specialized in issues related to privacy) Alessandro Acquisti, quickly announced on Twitter that he would not occupy Your chair in it:
“I would like to communicate that I have rejected the invitation to be part of this council, although I am dedicated to researching key ethical issues such as impartiality or inclusion within the AI, I do not think this is the right forum for me to participate.”
Since then, Acquisti has refused to clarify if the controversy that arose around James has been the reason for his abandonment. On the other hand, Joanna Bryson, professor of mathematics at the Univ. Of Bath, did confirm that, despite everything, she had agreed to be part of ATEAC because
“I believe that the integration of technological giants in global governance is one of the most pressing problems on the planet [and] I firmly believe that the world will be a better place if Google has access to what I know and I am willing to share. openly progressive [but] if she is in the same room when I speak with Google, what I will do next will be to try to learn from her, as I would with the whole world, and try to convince her of my point of view, as I would Anyone”.
But an employee signing the letter said in an anonymous statement to The Register that he disagrees with Bryson: “People who have expressed prejudicial opinions like James’s should not influence the development of the AI of a global company, whose technology will be used by many entities including our own government. ”
The company has not given to understand by now that it is willing to change of idea, not even after the beginning of the collection of signatures between the employees. But it would not be the first time that Google gives way to an internal activism campaign: only a few months ago decided to renounce a millionaire contract with the Pentagon (the Maven Project) for this same reason, which led to some strained relations with the Pentagon, who accuse Google of having less scruples when it comes to working with the Chinese army.
Does Silicon Valley exclude conservative views?
The fit of conservative ideas on Google was already the subject of debate in the summer of 2017, following the dismissal of James Damore, the author of the controversial manifesto on the multicultural and gender policies in force at the company.
Damore ended up suing his former company for mistreating and separating, according to him, those employees who “express opinions that deviate from the majority opinion of Google”, at least in those “political issues that arise in the workplace and that are relevant to Google’s policies and business, such as hiring and diversity policies, or social justice”.
But the problem goes beyond Google: “The exclusion of ideas that depart from leftism in ethical debates in the US is not, unfortunately, a novelty,” explains Miguel Ángel Quintana Paz, professor of Ethics and Social Philosophy at the European University Miguel de Cervantes.
“In fact, organizations such as the Heterodox Academy, a group of teachers concerned about the shortage of conservative voices in the university, have been founded, which Gross and Simmons calculated 13 years ago that represented only 9% of the cloisters While in 39% of American universities, the number of conservative teachers is zero, behind such controversies lies the problem that more and more university graduates are leaving their studies without ever having faced different ideas. The leftists, therefore, come out with few skills of ethical dialogue, which is why they resort to the path of exclusion, prohibition and dehumanization of those who think differently (for few more dehumanizing things have to be denied to another opportunity to provide your point of view) “.
For Quintana Paz, we have already reached “that Orwellian paradox, then, of being exclusive with someone because we call ourselves inclusive”.
But, he points out, it is not the only paradox of the controversy that concerns us: the worst thing is that “despite being race and gender the two issues that have raised the most in relation to AI, Google employees are mobilizing … to kick out the only African-American woman on the advisory board”.
But … what if so much confrontation is for nothing?
We already had the ‘greenwashing’ … is the ‘ethics-washing’ coming now? (Image of Cory Doctorow via Flickr)
Let’s not forget that Google is not the only company with an ethics committee of this kind: for example, its London subsidiary dedicated to AI, DeepMind, already has one, although it has never revealed exactly what it is doing; Microsoft, meanwhile, founded its AI ethics committee last year, while Facebook went on to co-found an AI ethics research center in Germany.
But Ben Wagner, professor at the Vienna Univ. Of Economics and Business, says that all the paraphernalia around the ethical advice for AI is a mere “ethical washing” or “ethics-washing”, aimed at avoiding regulation. by the government; a mere excuse to affirm, when another controversy arises around the biases of AI, that “they are already doing something” …
… even if the conclusions of these new committees are not binding and will not prevent, therefore, that large technology companies will continue to do what they were doing. For Wagner, the ethical reflection and debate staged by these bodies are a mere ‘substitute’ for real political change.
Also published on Medium.