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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · 7d

Love this analogy

Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · 7d

People who coax chatbots into sensible answers are basically opening and closing the fridge until it contains something you wanna eat, yes, eventually you get hungrier & eat the stuff in there. But what changed was your cognition. The fridge stayed the same. You changed your mind about the contents.

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · 8d

Perhaps not as much about how real is or is not, but this is a paper that substantially shaped my views on this topic (I have also been surprised at times about how different folks' conceptualizations of reproducibility can be) cs.uwaterloo.ca/~brecht/cour...

cs.uwaterloo.ca

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · 9d

As we prepare the camera-ready version of this paper, I am also reflecting on how to make this work handier and more useful: rigor cards to make the different facets of rigor easier to grasp? workshops to provide a forum for discussion and debates? something else that would be helpful to you?

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · 9d

This was accepted to #NeurIPS 🎉🎊

TL;DR Impoverished notions of rigor can have a formative impact on AI work. We argue for a broader conception of what rigorous work should entail & go beyond methodological issues to include epistemic, normative, conceptual, reporting & interpretative considerations

Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jun 18

We have to talk about rigor in AI work and what it should entail. The reality is that impoverished notions of rigor do not only lead to some one-off undesirable outcomes but can have a deeply formative impact on the scientific integrity and quality of both AI research and practice 1/

Print screen of the first page of a paper pre-print titled "Rigor in AI: Doing Rigorous AI Work Requires a Broader, Responsible AI-Informed Conception of Rigor" by Olteanu et al. Paper abstract: "In AI research and practice, rigor remains largely understood in terms of methodological rigor -- such as whether mathematical, statistical, or computational methods are correctly applied. We argue that this narrow conception of rigor has contributed to the concerns raised by the responsible AI community, including overblown claims about AI capabilities. Our position is that a broader conception of what rigorous AI research and practice should entail is needed. We believe such a conception -- in addition to a more expansive understanding of (1) methodological rigor -- should include aspects related to (2) what background knowledge informs what to work on (epistemic rigor); (3) how disciplinary, community, or personal norms, standards, or beliefs influence the work (normative rigor); (4) how clearly articulated the theoretical constructs under use are (conceptual rigor); (5) what is reported and how (reporting rigor); and (6) how well-supported the inferences from existing evidence are (interpretative rigor). In doing so, we also aim to provide useful language and a framework for much-needed dialogue about the AI community's work by researchers, policymakers, journalists, and other stakeholders."

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Reposted by Alexandra Olteanu

Dr. Chinasa T. Okolo @chinasa.bsky.social · 26d

"Epistemic rigor, however, does not necessarily require specific epistemological commitments or choices but rather that those commitments and choices be made explicit."

www.arxiv.org/abs/2506.14652

Rigor in AI: Doing Rigorous AI Work Requires a Broader, Responsible AI-Informed Conception of Rigor

In AI research and practice, rigor remains largely understood in terms of methodological rigor -- such as whether mathematical, statistical, or computational methods are correctly applied. We argue th...

www.arxiv.org

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jul 31

Not sure if it has what you need or if they are still collecting but this might be worth checking out archive.org/details/twit...

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jul 31

Listening to a workshop panel at #acl2025 I am realizing that we are saying more or less the same things and having more or less the same conversations for so many years

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jul 29

#acl2025 I think there is plenty of evidence for the risks of anthropomorphic AI behavior and design (re: keynote) -- find @myra.bsky.social and I if you want to chat more about this or our "Dehumanizing Machines" ACL 2025 paper

Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Mar 5

Our FATE MTL team has been working on a series of projects on anthropomorphic AI systems for which we recently put out a few pre-prints I’m excited about. While working on these we tried to think carefully not only about key research questions but also how we study and write about these systems

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Reposted by Alexandra Olteanu

Melanie Mitchell @melaniemitchell.bsky.social · Jul 21

In a stunning moment of self-delusion, the Wall Street Journal headline writers admitted that they don't know how LLM chatbots work.

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jul 19

Who is attending @aclmeeting.bsky.social in Vienna? Reach out or find me there if you want to chat! #acl2025nlp

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Reposted by Alexandra Olteanu

Luke Stark @lukestark.bsky.social · Jul 17

My university has announced a fund to essentially poach doctoral students from US institutions. DM me if you do work on the history/social impacts of AI and are interested in being poached 😂

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jul 16

Not sure who needs to hear this but what people want AI systems to do, what AI systems do, and what people believe AI systems do are not the same thing. Just because one wants or believes AI systems do or can do certain things, doesn't mean they actually do those things.

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Reposted by Alexandra Olteanu

Hanna Wallach @hannawallach.bsky.social · Jul 15

If you're at @icmlconf.bsky.social this week, come check out our poster on "Position: Evaluating Generative AI Systems Is a Social Science Measurement Challenge" presented by the amazing @afedercooper.bsky.social from 11:30am--1:30pm PDT on Weds!!! icml.cc/virtual/2025...

ICML Poster Position: Evaluating Generative AI Systems Is a Social Science Measurement ChallengeICML 2025

icml.cc

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Reposted by Alexandra Olteanu

David Rothschild @davmicrot.bsky.social · Jul 10

Do you have strong programming skills but need research experience doing meaningful & exciting CSS projects before heading off to a top graduate school for computational social science PhD? Apply now to predoc with me,
@dggoldst.bsky.social @jakehofman.bsky.social www.microsoft.com/en-us/resear...

Predoctoral Research Assistant (Contract) – Computational Social Science - Microsoft Research

Are you a recent college graduate wishing to gain research experience prior to pursuing a Ph.D. in fields related to computational social science (CSS)? Do you have a deep love of “playing with data”—...

www.microsoft.com

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jul 7

tiny but perhaps in their defense Cailler is probably the best chocolate in the world 🍫

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Reposted by Alexandra Olteanu

Maria Antoniak @mariaa.bsky.social · Jul 4

Someone asked me today how to get better at scientific writing. I'm not the best person to ask because I find my own writing very inadequate! But the tips I thought of were:

1. Practice, and practice with co-authors who are better writers than you. Observe how they make edits and copy them.

(1/n)

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jun 27

Congrats Koustuv! So well deserved! ❤️

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jun 27

I think the community's ability to look inwards and be self-critical is part of what makes it special, and this is something I believe is important to preserve even when there is disagreement on how to do things or perhaps just different theories of change #facct2025

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jun 27

FAccT is such a special community & many of us have invested a lot of service time/effort to support it over the years. I do believe engaging with uncomfortable questions & dialogue is important even when there is criticism (which can be hard to hear, can feel unfair/demotivating & sucks) #facct2025

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Reposted by Alexandra Olteanu

Haley L. @haleyhaala.bsky.social · Jun 21

Flattered and shocked for our paper to receive the #facct2025 best paper award.

ACM FAccT @facct.bsky.social · Jun 20

🏆 Announcing the #FAccT2025 best paper awards! 🏆

Congratulations to all the authors of the three best papers and three honorable mention papers.

Be sure to check out their presentations at the conference next week!

facct-blog.github.io/2025-06-20/b...

Announcing Best Paper Awards

The Best Paper Award Committee was chaired this year by Alex Chouldechova and included six Area Chairs. The committee selected three papers for the Best Paper Award and recognized three additional pap...

facct-blog.github.io

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jun 25

Two years after the craft session on theories of change in responsible AI, I am glad to see this discussion taking central stage as a keynote panel #facct2025

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jun 23

There is a lot of talk and effort to figure out how genAI is different (I am also guilty of this!) -- the reality is that genAI is not that different and genAI is not that new either; it was hard to evaluate in the past, and it is still as hard to evaluate now #facct2025

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Reposted by Alexandra Olteanu

Asia Biega @asiabiega.bsky.social · Jun 22

Your #FAccT2025 General Chairs @sciorestis.bsky.social, @metaxa.net, and I, reporting from the venue.

We're looking forward to welcoming you to the Athens Conservatoire or online!

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Alexandra Olteanu @aolteanu.bsky.social · Jun 22

That would be awesome! See you soon!