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arXiv · 2101.10098

The Slodderwetenschap (Sloppy Science) of Stochastic Parrots -- A Plea for Science to NOT take the Route Advocated by Gebru and Bender

Michael Lissack
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Abstract

This article is a position paper written in reaction to the now-infamous paper titled "On the Dangers of Stochastic Parrots: Can Language Models Be Too Big?" by Timnit Gebru, Emily Bender, and others who were, as of the date of this writing, still unnamed. I find the ethics of the Parrot Paper lacking, and in that lack, I worry about the direction in which computer science, machine learning, and artificial intelligence are heading. At best, I would describe the argumentation and evidentiary practices embodied in the Parrot Paper as Slodderwetenschap (Dutch for Sloppy Science) -- a word which the academic world last widely used in conjunction with the Diederik Stapel affair in psychology [2]. What is missing in the Parrot Paper are three critical elements: 1) acknowledgment that it is a position paper/advocacy piece rather than research, 2) explicit articulation of the critical presuppositions, and 3) explicit consideration of cost/benefit trade-offs rather than a mere recitation of potential "harms" as if benefits did not matter. To leave out these three elements is not good practice for either science or research.

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Michael Lissack. 2021-01-11. The Slodderwetenschap (Sloppy Science) of Stochastic Parrots -- A Plea for Science to NOT take the Route Advocated by Gebru and Bender. https://arxiv.org/abs/2101.10098

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