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

The Slodderwetenschap (Sloppy Science) of Stochastic Parrots - A Plea for Science to NOT take the Route Advocated by Gebru and Bender By Michael Lissack (Michael.lissack@isce.edu 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. Introduction The work of what is referred to as the "Ethical AI" group at Google was brought into some prominence in the public sphere due to events concerning the lead Google author of a paper titled "On the Dangers of Stochastic Parrots: Can Language Models Be Too Big?" (hereafter the "Parrot Paper"). That author, Timnit Gebru, went public at the beginning of December 2020 with complaints about censorship, harm to minorities, systemic racism, and her resignation/termination from Google.