*It’s no big secret who they are, but I wasn’t there as a reporter. I simply took note of some passing remarks that sounded to me like the zeitgeist in Europe in the summer of 2018.
“In this crazy climate of suspicion, there’s an incentive to be a black box.”
“If you get funding from across the ocean, you’re instantly accused of being on the Google payroll.”
“Google is throwing around too much money and that’s a fact that we have to deal with.”
“We’re always on the border of the suicidal and the feasible.”
“Being at the margin of your discipline is dangerous, but if you stay in the center you can only do incremental work.”
“Technologies are not only things; they mean something.”
“I promise this is the last time I will talk today.” “But we like you talking! Don’t be so Turinese!”
“AI gives the illusion of easy access to scientific concepts.”
“Do your ethics of fairness in algorithms apply to killer robots?”
“Our AI is not a tool, it’s a community.”
“The problems you are trying to tackle are unsolvable at this level of generality.”
“We used to get funding to build tools, but now we get funding to put out fires.”
