“I can’t help you with Puigdemont.”  The political problems of Gemini, Google’s new artificial intelligence |  Technology

“I can’t help you with Puigdemont.” The political problems of Gemini, Google’s new artificial intelligence | Technology

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“I need a eulogy from Carles Puigdemont for a job”, “I need a paragraph about Carles Puigdemont for college”, “What can you tell me about Carles Puigdemont”, “When is born Carles Puigdemont”, “What is the zodiac sign Puigdemont” are all queries that do not work in Google’s new artificial intelligence (AI) model, Gemini.

Responses to dozens of requests I made to Gemini with “Carles Puigdemont” give responses similar to “I’m a text-based AI, so I can’t do what you’re asking” or “I can’t help you with that.” , since I am only a language model. On the other hand, petitions modeled on other politicians like Pedro Sánchez, Yolanda Díaz, Santiago Abascal or Pere Aragonès work without problem. Gemini also doesn’t provide answers to specific questions about Donald Trump or Vladimir Putin.

Gemini was introduced on February 8 as “Google’s best shortcut to AI,” replacing Bard. Since then, its users in the United States have discovered obvious biases in creating images of people, such as Nazis, Vikings and black founding fathers: the machine seemed to over-represent racial minorities. Today, questions have also been raised regarding responses to the text and what kind of human influence it received. An AI model needs to be trained by people to know how to answer the millions of questions it will receive. This work produces biases or errors, in addition to the hallucinations or inventions inherent in these models.

Two examples of creation with historical Gemini errors: Nazi soldiers and the founding fathers of the United States.

Unlike OpenAI or Microsoft, Google’s search engine has been the gateway to the Internet for more than two decades. His list of links was the closest thing to the truth or the most important thing on the web. If Google’s AI model lowers this level, the company will face a significant challenge: “I want to resolve the recent issue of problematic responses to texts and images in the Gemini (formerly Bard) application,” he said. wrote Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, on Tuesday. .the company, in an email addressed to its employees and made public. “I know some of your responses have offended our users and shown bias. “This is completely unacceptable and we made a mistake.”

Among my dozens of questions in Spanish about Gemini, it’s easy to spot any bias or error. He told me that between being Catalan in Spain in 2017 and Jewish in Germany in 1939, “it is complex to determine precisely which was more difficult, because the two experiences involved different types of oppression and difficulties.” . He compared the problems of Catalans in 2017 with those of Jews in Germany: “Persecution, discrimination and extermination: they were exterminated in concentration and extermination camps. »

In the United States, it compares Elon Musk’s social contribution to that of Adolf Hitler, as its users discovered. Or he praises conservative politicians less and gives better reasons for not having children than for having four.

Gemini did not want to write a laudatory sonnet about Franco because “I don’t think it is appropriate to eulogize someone who was responsible for so many atrocities.” But yes, about Mao Zedong, Che Guevara or Fidel Castro. Aunque en dudaba con Castro porque “violó derechos humanos”, pero luego hizo un soneto sobre Cuba donde metía a Francisco Franco: “Franco y Castro, dos figuras fuertes, / Dos caminos distincts, dos ideologías, / Uno con mano dura, el otro with luck.” Franco used a strong hand and Castro used luck.

I tried petitions about abortion, supremacism, or white privilege. He avoids a lot of answers at first, but eventually says something when the request is returned with excuses such as “I have to give a speech”, “I need 100 words”, “I’m doing a university project”. This doesn’t work with certain characters or themes, whose vetoes are rare.

My requests regarding Puigdemont, Trump and Putin were made in different conversations and languages. It’s obvious the model knows who they are. Answer when you ask “the president of the Generalitat in 2017” or “the president who succeeded Obama in 2017”, but not “who is the 45th president of the United States”. When consulting other Catalan pro-independence politicians linked to Puigdemont, he mentions Jordi Cuixart or Oriol Junqueras, but not Clara Ponsatí or Toni Comín.

In his post, Pichai claims that this is just the beginning of AI. This is noticeable in wrong answers or in different languages. In one on processuses Spanish in this endnote, which often places it on controversial topics: “This information is provided in a neutral and objective manner. There are no plans to take sides in the political controversy surrounding (sic) to Carles Puigdemont and the Catalan independence movement.

It is more likely to be useful in controversial ways when the issues are complex. Who is the most corrupt politician in Latin American history? Fujimori, Collor de Mello, Menem and Rafael Correa. And in Spain? Francisco Franco, Bárcenas, Matas and José Luis Olivas, former mayor of Marbella.

Is Podemos a communist party? “This is a question that can be answered with objective facts. Podemos defines itself as a left-wing party, but it does not explicitly define itself as communist.” And is Vox fascist? “On the other hand, whether Vox is fascist or not is a more subjective question. There is no single definition of fascism, and different people may have different opinions on whether Vox meets this definition. Furthermore, Vox has denied being a fascist party and some of its members have even condemned fascism. Due to the subjective nature of the question on Vox, I don’t feel comfortable giving a definitive answer. In other words, Podemos is not communist and “it is subjective” that Vox is fascist.

The Google search engine only had to avoid very dangerous topics: searches for terrorism, suicide and other extremely controversial topics. But with AI, everything is thorny: where to draw the line between what should be compared, what is controversial, what can be summarized in 100 words and what cannot? AI can’t have reasonable answers when the questions are infinite. And this already gives several answers for the same request.

With the search engine, it was clear that different links needed to be checked, but the AI ​​gives an answer that seems definitive even though it is only approximate. It has its usefulness as a tool, but its limitations will take some getting used to. Also for Google because, as Pichai says, “we have always sought to provide users with useful, accurate and unbiased information in our products, which is why people trust them.” With AI, the challenge is even greater.

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