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Comment by indigochill | Hacker News Reader

I'd lean more towards emphasizing the importance of explainability. If a system is opaque, it cannot be trusted. This goes both for AI producing stupid results and for software that relies on security-by-obscurity.

If AI is made explainable, then confidence in AI should more closely map to actual capability (that is, bad AI will not be trusted because its flaws are on display, while good AI will be trusted because its strengths are on display). It will also provide AI developers with a better grasp of what they need to work on.

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Can you explain what goes on in human brains?

No, but human brains weren't engineered by humans, and so it is reasonable that we don't currently understand them even as reverse-engineering efforts continue.

AI, by contrast, is engineered by humans, so why is it humans can't explain it?

> human brains weren't engineered by humans

If this was true, the phenomena of feral children would not exist [1]. Human brains are socially engineered by an array of informal (family, friends, social context) and formal (schooling, governments) institutions.

[1] https://zenodo.org/record/901393

A deep learning network consists of hundreds of thousands of nodes, and it is becoming more (I didn't look up the actual number).

You can show the weights of the connections between the nodes, but that wouldn't really help anybody to understand it.

I don’t really care if an algorithm can tell someone why it concluded x about me. There are some x for which I don’t want any algorithm concluding about me and there isn’t any context that could be provided that would justify it or make me comfortable with it.

If x is true, you have no right to prevent anyone else concluding it about you. Truth is the ultimate defense against all this anti-science FUD.

so in your opinion, we should have no right to privacy?

I broadcast my face expression every time I walk outside. I have no right to tell other people they can't look at my face and draw conclusions about me.

You have a few issues here with science and its application in society.

If I develop an application that can tell if you're gay or not, is it my imperative to report you to the authorities so you can be rounded up and disposed of?

I say you can very well develop such applications if you want to, using them especially against society at large is a privilege afforded to you, and one that can be revoked. Lots of other pseudo-scientific bullshit has been hoisted on the public such as eugenics causing massive amounts of damage, and i'm not looking for the next generation of this that will trend the same way.

What does it mean to use something "against society"? If I run a service that analyses images that people upload and people have the lawful right to upload these images, that's my business. Neither you nor anyone else gets to have a say in private transactions between me and someone else no matter what form of analysis of a being offered. My algorithms do not require your approval.

You may think that I not anyone else has any right to interfere with your private business transactions, but you are wrong.

You, and me alike exist at the whims of society and when our behaviour displeases enough people you will find yourself imprisoned or worse.

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