Claim · 2023-03-31 · publication · Stated in source · Supported

The statement of 31 March 2023 by Gebru, Bender and McMillan-Major states that the harms of AI are real and present, that the pause letter addresses none of them, and that concern should focus on the practices of the companies building the systems rather than on imaginary "powerful digital minds".

One recorded claim. The claim panel gives its qualification, the source passages with their place in each source, and how it was checked.

What it connects

Statement from the listed authors of Stochastic Parrots on the "AI pause" letter → articulates → Present harms deserve priority

Where it appears

Arguments about catastrophic risk from advanced AI →

Claim and evidence

Statement from the listed authors of Stochastic Parrots on the "AI pause" letterarticulates ↓Present harms deserve priority

Machine-checked, not reviewed by an editorStated in sourceSupported

Supporting evidence: primary · 1 source

Date: 2023-03-31 · publication Records dated 2023 →
Role: Articulation
Register (kind of text): Nonfiction

Scope and limitsThe statement answers the FLI letter; its list of present harms is its own. It records what the statement says, not each author's views elsewhere.

The evidence 02

primary sourceSupports the claim

Statement from the listed authors of Stochastic Parrots on the "AI pause" letter

DAIR Institute blog (dair-institute.org) · 2023-03-31

Cite the original source

Cite the original document, not Selekoa. Check these details against it.

Source excerpt

“The harms from so-called AI are real and present and follow from the acts of people and corporations deploying automated systems.”

Location in source Tl;dr

How it was read Retrieved directly from the publisher

Machine-checked · 2026-10-31

Source details and check notes

Authors: Timnit Gebru; Emily M. Bender; Angelina McMillan-Major
Version: Retrieved for the candidate pack on 2026-10-29 (SHA-256 794c5c0ce1d0c8bb18d5137511abe280e3c4b2b00eb9ab550fb7bacf436829cb). Current blog page dated March 31, 2023; byline as printed on the page (three names). The cross-family check retrieved it again on 2026-10-31; the bytes differ, and the check compared the quoted passages.
Canonical address: Open the canonical source ↗
Accessed: 2026-10-29
Language: English (en)
Attribution: Timnit Gebru, Emily M. Bender, Angelina McMillan-Major, “Statement from the listed authors of Stochastic Parrots on the "AI pause" letter”, 2023-03-31.
Reuse: No open redistribution licence asserted. Bibliographic metadata, editorial paraphrases and short attributed quotations (at most 50 words each). Recheck terms before wider redistribution.
Check notes: Candidate pack passage, arguments about catastrophic risk from advanced AI (research/risk-debate). The quotation (21 words) matched the text retrieved for the candidate pack on 2026-10-29. Matching ignored differences of whitespace, case, quotation marks, dashes and Unicode compatibility forms, so the source’s typography can differ. A cross-family machine check (2026-10-31, item 60) answered the record’s question blind and agreed with its stance. No human editorial review.

primary sourceSupports the claim

Statement from the listed authors of Stochastic Parrots on the "AI pause" letter

DAIR Institute blog (dair-institute.org) · 2023-03-31

Cite the original source

Cite the original document, not Selekoa. Check these details against it.

Source excerpt

“the focus of our concern should not be imaginary "powerful digital minds."

Location in source Final paragraph

How it was read Retrieved directly from the publisher

Machine-checked · 2026-10-31

Source details and check notes

Authors: Timnit Gebru; Emily M. Bender; Angelina McMillan-Major
Version: Retrieved for the candidate pack on 2026-10-29 (SHA-256 794c5c0ce1d0c8bb18d5137511abe280e3c4b2b00eb9ab550fb7bacf436829cb). Current blog page dated March 31, 2023; byline as printed on the page (three names). The cross-family check retrieved it again on 2026-10-31; the bytes differ, and the check compared the quoted passages.
Canonical address: Open the canonical source ↗
Accessed: 2026-10-29
Language: English (en)
Attribution: Timnit Gebru, Emily M. Bender, Angelina McMillan-Major, “Statement from the listed authors of Stochastic Parrots on the "AI pause" letter”, 2023-03-31.
Reuse: No open redistribution licence asserted. Bibliographic metadata, editorial paraphrases and short attributed quotations (at most 50 words each). Recheck terms before wider redistribution.
Check notes: Candidate pack passage, arguments about catastrophic risk from advanced AI (research/risk-debate). The quotation (12 words) matched the text retrieved for the candidate pack on 2026-10-29. Matching ignored differences of whitespace, case, quotation marks, dashes and Unicode compatibility forms, so the source’s typography can differ. A cross-family machine check (2026-10-31, item 60) answered the record’s question blind and agreed with its stance. No human editorial review.

Status and meaning

Editorial status. Not reviewed by an editor. An exploratory record that no editor has accepted. This status does not say whether a person has read any linked passage. Each evidence record above shows how it was checked.

Relation. A passage of the document meets the proposition’s criterion. The record documents what the text states, in its register (fiction and satire are labelled); it is not evidence that the proposition is true and implies no influence on or from another text.

Date. Date of publication, as the source gives it.

Record ID rd-r12-dair-2023-statement