Thursday, August 19, 2010
Is Google Search Text Prediction Racist?
This has been going around the Internet lately. If you are in Google search and type in the phrase "I am Terrified of...." you get the following search results. I have highlighted the ones in yellow that could be construed as potentially racist:
This naturally begs the obvious question: Is the Google search engine racist or is it the people that use Google? Google uses algorithms to determine what people might type next based on previous usage so the answer to me is clearly the people who use Google which is the collective we. Not to single Google out I experienced similar results using Yahoo! search. Sometimes the World Wide Web shines a light on human behavior in ways that are not too flattering. Search engine patterns can reveal patterns of human thought. This revelation thus would indicate to me that in terms of creating a more tolerant planet (in the words of Virginia Slims Cigarettes) "We have a long way to go baby".
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