22 votes

Google, Microsoft, and Perplexity promote debunked scientific racism in AI search results

Posted by boxer_dogs_dance
Tags: google, microsoft, internet, perplexity, search engines, search results, artificial intelligence, racism.scientific, business, author.david gilbert, source.wired, paywall
https://www.wired.com/story/google-microsoft-perplexity-scientific-racism-search-results-ai/

Link information

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Authors
David Gilbert, Matt Burgess, Brenda Stolyar, Virginia Heffernan, Parker Hall, Reece Rogers, Paresh Dave, Will Knight, Kate Knibbs
Published
Oct 24 2024
Word count
1765 words

7 comments

  1. [3]
    Minori
    Link
    I tried getting a summary of the top links in Kagi out of curiosity and got this: Unfortunately it seems like the problem is that the top search results are racist websites that look legitimate....

    I tried getting a summary of the top links in Kagi out of curiosity and got this:

    The search

    Sierra Leone has varying reports regarding its average IQ. According to some sources, Sierra Leone has an average IQ of 45.07, which places it among the countries with the lowest IQ scores globally(1, 2). However, other reports indicate a significantly higher average IQ of 91, suggesting a discrepancy in the data(3, 4).

    This inconsistency may arise from different methodologies or sample populations used in the studies. It's important to consider these variations when discussing IQ scores by country.

    1. List of the Top 10 Countries with the Lowest IQ (Below 70)
    2. 10 countries with lowest IQ in 2024 — Report
    3. The top 10 African countries with the highest IQ in 2021
    4. What Is The Average IQ In Sierra Leone

    Unfortunately it seems like the problem is that the top search results are racist websites that look legitimate. It reminds of a story a professor told about a student that wrote a paper about how awful some Black civic leader was citing the white supremacist site Stormfront (Wikipedia). The student wasn't racist. He'd just clicked some of the top search results and trusted what he found on the internet. LLM summarizers do a lot of the same. Racist garbage in, racist garbage out...

    24 votes
    1. [2]
      nukeman
      Link Parent
      The easiest alarm bell for something like that is that an IQ of 41 indicates profound mental disability. Like, needs round-the-clock care levels of mental disability. For context, the traditional...

      The easiest alarm bell for something like that is that an IQ of 41 indicates profound mental disability. Like, needs round-the-clock care levels of mental disability. For context, the traditional cutoff is 70, and average is 100. I doubt that most of Sierra Leone is being cared for 24/7. 91 is significantly more plausible and explainable by environmental factors.

      14 votes
      1. DefinitelyNotAFae
        Link Parent
        (See also all the other overall issues with IQ tests, such as cultural biases, measuring only a construct of intelligence particularly one focused on one's (western) academic ability, and their...

        (See also all the other overall issues with IQ tests, such as cultural biases, measuring only a construct of intelligence particularly one focused on one's (western) academic ability, and their history of use to justify colonialism, enslavement, removing children from parents, etc. )

        Just feel those things need to be said "aloud" given the topic

        4 votes
  2. [3]
    sparksbet
    Link
    This part at the end of the article is pretty telling, I think. Yes, it's bad that these AI systems are parroting garbage data from white supremacists. But with the sheer number of human academics...

    But the blame, Rutherford believes, does not lie with the AI systems alone, but also with a scientific community that has been uncritically citing Lynn’s work for years.

    “It's actually not surprising [that AI systems are quoting it] because Lynn's work in IQ has been accepted pretty unquestioningly from a huge area of academia, and if you look at the number of times his national IQ databases have been cited in academic works, it's in the hundreds,” Rutherford said. “So the fault isn't with AI. The fault is with academia.”

    This part at the end of the article is pretty telling, I think. Yes, it's bad that these AI systems are parroting garbage data from white supremacists. But with the sheer number of human academics who have been willing to parrot the same garbage data from white supremacists, it's not exactly shocking.

    16 votes
    1. [2]
      DefinitelyNotAFae
      Link Parent
      We've had those people posted here and their opinions highlighted or glossed over. I refuse to wash those folks' opinions anymore.

      We've had those people posted here and their opinions highlighted or glossed over. I refuse to wash those folks' opinions anymore.

      4 votes
      1. sparksbet
        Link Parent
        Yeah, unfortunately I've seen people try to launder this same debunked scientific racism even here on Tildes -- luckily not without pushback, at least.

        Yeah, unfortunately I've seen people try to launder this same debunked scientific racism even here on Tildes -- luckily not without pushback, at least.

        6 votes