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United Nations: Siri and Alexa Are Encouraging Misogyny
We already knew humans could make biased AIs — but the United Nations says the reverse is true as well.
Millions of people talk to AI voice assistants, such as Apple's Siri and Amazon's Alexa. When those assistants talk back, they do so in female-sounding voices, and a new UN report argues that those voices and the words they're programmed to say amplify gender biases and encourage users to be sexist — but it's not too late to change course.
The report is the work of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and its title — "I'd blush if I could" — is the response Siri was programmed in 2011 to give if a user called her a "bitch."
[...] "It is a 'Me Too' moment," Saniye Gülser Corat, Director of UNESCO's Division for Gender Equality, told CBS News. "We have to make sure that the AI we produce and that we use does pay attention to gender equality."
Also at CNET.
[Back in 2013 in Germany, Siri's voice could be selected as either male or female.
Possibly one of the earliest and best-known "computer voices" was that of Majel Barrett from ST:TOS, although a case could be made for HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey. --Ed.]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by acid andy on Sunday May 26 2019, @06:45PM (7 children)
A major reason female voices should be, and are, used for these devices is it's easier to make out the words. If you become hard of hearing, that's all the more important.
Oh, do men not blush then?
A voice assistant ought to maintain a certain degree of submissiveness, I think. Its been designed to serve its user, after all (or at least that's how it's marketed. If the user is the product, maybe not). I mean, if it started trying to dominate or threaten the user, I imagine it could get pretty sinister, especially when you consider the kind of power these things yield via their net connections and parent organizations.
Submissiveness is part of the assistant's role. It's not inherent to the gender. Just think of a male butler, for example. Perhaps the researchers are therefore revealing some gender biases of their own?
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by meustrus on Sunday May 26 2019, @07:50PM (3 children)
Fun fact: British Siri's name is Daniel, and he's male [telegraph.co.uk]. Supposedly the British are more comfortable with a male personal assistant because of butlers.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 26 2019, @10:27PM (1 child)
Thanks God it's not Jenkins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 26 2019, @11:23PM
Should be Jeeves, but they certainly couldn't live up to it.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by choose another one on Monday May 27 2019, @08:09AM
> Fun fact: British Siri's name is Daniel, and he's
Yeah, but even when configured to be male "he" answers to "Siri" not "Daniel", and doesn't complain about it either, there appears to be no "boy named Sue" hang-up built in so "Siri" must have been intended to be gender-neutral from the start.
Which kind of busts the article's point really - the voice isn't "amplifying our gender biases" when our (the user) biases are defining the voice in the first place.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday May 26 2019, @08:29PM (2 children)
I have to disagree with your "hard of hearing" claim. Most people lose the upper frequencies first. You can lose a lot of your hearing, and still hear bass and baritone voices, while higher pitches are just gone. If you know any older guys who are losing their hearing, check the settings on their equalizer. Bass is lowered, and treble is cranked up.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 26 2019, @11:25PM (1 child)
In noisy environments it is easier to distinguish mid-to-high frequencies.
(Score: 3, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Monday May 27 2019, @03:51AM
Not for older people, which was GP's point. Hearing loss associated with age begins with high frequencies, which first leads to decreased ability to differentiate certain consonants (which often rely on high frequencies in their production). As the loss increases, sensitivity in the upper range of vocal formants makes it increasingly difficult to understand high voices, particularly women and children.
This is all well known. Look up presbycusis (the term age-related hearing loss).