A former Meta employee, Awomosu was explaining to Baratunde Thurston why her writing on AI mixes mysticism, psychology and science. She says she brings in voices big tech has ignored, and argues that product names like Gemini and Palantir are used to shape how people think.
…is a specific Yoruba tribe. And the name itself denotes a lineage of people who come from, you know, being involved in the mysteries or, you know, the Baba Lawos or people who are the keeper of knowledge and sacred wisdom. So yeah, I really like my name. And yeah, that's the meaning behind it.
…behind it, the way they name their services, their products, their machines, the language of smart assistance and everything. And how do you think about the mission, the instruction, the power in your name as it intersects with the naming traditions of our modern hyper-capitalist world in tech?
…naming things. Like if you look at a lot of the names for the products we see, like Gemini or Palantir or different things like that, they're using language a lot to kind of almost massage you into the tour and even semiotics and things like that. So a lot of the way I write, if you notice the way I write, I sometimes verge on this mystical to scientific papers to psychology, different things. There's a lot of a humanities lens because I feel what they're doing in tech world is not actually tech. It's very much ideology. And I think you have to fight ideology with ideology. So a lot of my work is actually bringing the different voices who are pretty much silent in the big tech realm. So neurodivergent people, you know, black people, people of color, women, and really bringing the knowledge that was disregarded that they have to offer a different lens into the tech world. Because I think that's what's missing. A lot of the issues we have with safety or all the…
You, oh, you are my sister. So for the people tuning in live, if you have thoughts that you would like us to be aware of, put them in the chat. If you have prompts or questions for us, put them in the chat. We're going to be talking for the next little bit and we'd like to bring you in as much as…
It's the echo of
Christianity, et cetera, and industry and nature as a resource. When you talk about bringing other voices in, the one that just hit hardest, the reason we're talking is because I stumbled upon your piece part one of two, where is the mother?