DailyPost 2982
LYING ABOUT TECHNOLOGY
Every single milestone of technology in the last quarter of a century was a major leap from the earlier one. At times it was supposed to be the ultimate with not great tectonic change in sight. At other times we found it to be crazy, in bits and pieces beating the best of sci-fi. Artificial intelligence broke everything beyond a point that the past could not even be recognized by the uninitiated. It has created an information, productivity and creativity smokescreen which is extremely difficult to fathom out. Nebulous AI is already being treated with finality seems to be our misfortune.
A recent tech headline on SFGATE, Stanford expert on ‘lying and technology’ accused of lying about technology and put the academic world in a quandary. The case / issue in question pertains to Minnesota state’s ban on deepfakes and the court case emanating out of it. Republicans were up against it. They sued to block the ban, the argument being that the ban is an unconstitutional limit on free speech. Given the complex nature of technology there was a need felt by the court to take an expert opinion. The expert was a well-known and oft-cited researcher, Jeff Hancock who leads Bay Area school’s Social Media Lab.
Hancock the expert was in favour of the law and defended its declaration. He explained “how artificial intelligence makes it easier to fabricate videos and discussed deepfakes’ psychological impact.” So far so good, it makes complete sense from a technical point of view, in defence of the law. The problem started with the cited references. The 15 references were mostly research papers related to deepfakes and their impacts. Strangely, two of the 15 sources do not appear to exist. It is said that the journals cited are real as are some of the two citations authors. Ironically, the “journal archives show no sign of either paper.”
The referenced journals have different articles. Even SFGATE was not able to find the cited papers on Google Scholar either. The missing papers are; “Deepfakes and the Illusion of Authenticity: Cognitive Processes Behind Misinformation and Acceptance” and “The Influence of Deepfake videos on Political Attitudes and Behaviour.” Links show an error screen. Can a mistake of this nature happen with a professor whose prominence stems from years of research and measured discussions? Naturally, the Minnesota litigants are trying to make the best out of this gaffe. Their attorney argued that Hancock’s declaration should be excluded from the legal consideration of whether to give a preliminary injunction against the law’s enforcement. “The citation bears the hallmarks of being an AI hallucination.” The entire document becomes suspect now.
THE AI WORLD POSES A NEW THREAT EVEN TO THE EXPERTS.
Sanjay Sahay
Have a nice evening.