谷歌AI大佬Bengio離職，知情人士稱“黑人女性專家被解僱”事件是導火索

{"type":"doc","content":[{"type":"blockquote","content":[{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"半年之內，又一 AI 高管因“黑人女性專家被解僱”事件離職，宣稱多元化的谷歌還能否重拾員工信心？"}]}]},{"type":"heading","attrs":{"align":null,"level":2},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"Google AI 科學家 Bengio 宣佈離職"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"據彭博社報道，一份內部郵件顯示，谷歌研究經理 Samy Bengio 本週二表示，他將辭職以尋求其他機會。雖然 Bengio 未在郵件中提及去年年末發生的“黑人女性專家被解僱”事件，但據路透社報道，有知情人士指出，該事件促使 Bengio 做出離職決定。不過目前，谷歌和 Bengio 並未對此做出明確迴應。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"據瞭解，此前至少有兩名谷歌工程師辭職，以抗議谷歌解僱黑人 AI 研究員 Timnit Gebru。而 Bengio 是迄今爲止受該事件影響，離職員工中最引人注目，也是職級最高的一位。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"公開信息顯示，Bengio 在谷歌內部工作了 14 年，是谷歌大腦（Google Brain）項目的首批員工之一，並管理着谷歌大腦團隊的數百名研究人員。谷歌大腦項目創始人吳恩達評價 Bengio“對推動 AI 技術和倫理學發揮了作用” ，谷歌大腦研究人員 Sara Hooker 認爲 Bengio 的離職“對 Google 造成了巨大損失”。另外值得一提的是，Bengio 的哥哥 Yoshua Bengio 是深度學習三巨頭之一，曾獲得過 2018 年圖靈獎，併入選了英國皇家學會會士。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"Bengio 在郵件中寫道，“我和你們在機器學習研究方面學到了很多，但也瞭解到，組織一個龐大的研究團隊，以促進長期雄心勃勃的研究、探索、嚴謹、多樣性和包容性是多麼困難，但又是多麼重要。”“儘管我期待着下一個挑戰，但離開這個出色的團隊無疑是非常困難的。”“爲了追求其他令人興奮的機遇，我已經決定離開谷歌。4 月 28 日是我在谷歌的最後一天。”"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"據瞭解，Bengio 此前還擔任谷歌 AI 倫理團隊（Ethical AI）主管，但在今年 2 月份，谷歌方面將這項工作移交給了副總裁 Mariian Croak。Croak 是谷歌的一位黑人高管，也是谷歌工程部副總裁。她在 2 月份告訴市政廳的工作人員，谷歌希望管理層能夠全面關注這一領域，並稱這只是 Bengio 支持的一小部分工作。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"值得一提的是，去年 12 月末因離職引發轟動的 AI 研究員 Gebru 正來自 AI 倫理團隊，因聲援 Gebru 而遭解僱的 Margaret Mitchel（曾爲 AI 倫理團隊聯合負責人）同樣來自該團隊。"}]},{"type":"heading","attrs":{"align":null,"level":2},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"“黑人女性專家被解僱”事件始末"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"2020 年 12 月 4 日，谷歌 AI 倫理團隊的技術聯合負責人 Timnit Gebru 在個人推特上發佈消息稱：自己突然遭到公司的“郵件解僱”，原因似乎與她批評谷歌的政策相關。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"image","attrs":{"src":"https:\/\/static001.geekbang.org\/wechat\/images\/3b\/3b79913551def74a1ed54b1e054e088b.png","alt":null,"title":null,"style":[{"key":"width","value":"75%"},{"key":"bordertype","value":"none"}],"href":null,"fromPaste":true,"pastePass":true}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"據瞭解，Gebru 是 AI 倫理技術領域少有的黑人女性之一，致力於解決人工智能算法目前存在的偏見等問題，在一項研究論文中，她指出了 AI 偏見的風險——包括谷歌搜索所存在的問題。Gebru 還向一組谷歌員工發送了電子郵件，批評公司的多元化和股權計劃。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"此外，Gebru 還是著名的技術多樣性倡導者，她聯合創立了一個名爲“Black in AI”的黑人研究人員社區。一直以來，她都在直言不諱地對科技公司對待黑人員工的方式提出批評。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"不過在 2020 年 12 月 3 日，Gebru 發佈推文表示，自己突然被谷歌人工智能負責人 Jeff Dean 開除，個人公司賬戶也已經被公司切斷。Gebru 說，她收到了一封署名爲 Megan 的解僱郵件，而這位“Megan”正是 Google Research 的工程副總裁 Megan Kacholia。據悉，Megan Kacholia 直接向 Jeff Dean 彙報工作。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"Gebru 表示，這封郵件中所稱的領導層對她的離職進行了“快車道”處理，原因是在本週早些時候，她向谷歌深度學習人工智能研究團隊“谷歌大腦”（Google Brain）的女性成員和“盟友”發送了一封電子郵件。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"但谷歌方面迴應稱，解僱 Gebru 並非歧視，而是因爲 Gebru 的論文並未達標。谷歌 AI 部門負責人 Jeff Dean 在郵件中迴應道：“一個跨職能團隊對這篇論文進行了審查，這是我們常規流程的一個環節。作者被告知，這篇論文沒有達到我們規定的發表的標準，並得到了關於原因的反饋。論文中忽略了太多相關的研究——例如，它談論了大型模型對環境的影響，但卻忽視了之後的研究顯示出了模型能產生更高效率的研究。同樣，它也提出了對語言模型偏見的擔憂，但沒有提到最近的一些研究正在試圖緩解這些問題。”"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"Gebru 被離職的消息在谷歌內部和整個科技行業引起了廣泛的憤慨，推特上有不少科學家紛紛轉發相關新聞並表態支持她。而 Gebru 當時的主管 Bengio 也在 Facebook上寫道，他爲自己所管理的 Gebru 在沒有徵詢他意見的情況下，被公司解僱而感到驚訝。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"Gebru 的離開讓谷歌多元化的企業文化備受質疑。儘管谷歌方面此前宣稱，公司將努力增加擔任高級職位的黑人員工數量，2025 年至少 30% 的領導職位將由少數族裔員工擔任。但能否重拾員工信心，還是個問題。"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"strong"}],"text":"參考鏈接："}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-alphabet-google-research-bengio\/google-ai-scientist-bengio-resigns-after-colleagues-firings-email-idUSKBN2BT2JT"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2021-04-06\/google-ai-research-manager-samy-bengio-resigns-in-email-to-staff"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"https:\/\/www.infoq.cn\/article\/ivTlau077uikBlKgwZF3"}]},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null}},{"type":"paragraph","attrs":{"indent":0,"number":0,"align":null,"origin":null},"content":[{"type":"text","text":"https:\/\/www.infoq.cn\/article\/8J8Ibv2ZEizr18v6ko3d"}]}]}