On Mon, Jan 27, 2025 at 3:09 PM Jason Moore <[email protected]> wrote: > > Dear Aaron, > > Paul does raise numerous specific issues in his post and just saying "there > is nothing to worry about" doesn't allay any concerns that may form from > reading his post, at least not for me. If you look at existing organizations > that are 501(c)(6) orgs, none really give off any warm fuzzy feelings nor do > they come off as altruistic. So that does warrant concern.
I'm sorry for not being more specific. LIke I said, the summit was several months ago so I don't remember details. I can say there I had some of the same concerns as you and had a lot of conversations about these things there with various people, and based on those conversations, my personal concerns were assuaged. You can take that for whatever it's worth. I can't blame you if you if me not being concerned doesn't allay your own concerns. That's why I suggested you should reach out to someone from NumFOCUS who knows more about the details (it's also possible that things have changed since September). I suggested Andy Terrel because I know him and trust him, and he's an old SymPy contributor so I know he cares about this project. But do reach out to others as well if there is someone else deeply involved in NumFOCUS right now who you trust. I think as long as we are relying on hearsay (including my own hearsay) we are just spreading FUD, so it would be better to get the facts. Aaron Meurer > > And, as for the legality of generative AI tools, that will be decided by > courts around the world at some point. I just listened to this recent > Freakonoimcs: https://freakonomics.com/podcast/how-to-poison-an-a-i-machine/ > and the professor pointed out the standard strategy of many companies, which > is to do something that is legally ambiguous, but do it fast and broadly so > people are hooked on it before the ligation system can even evaluate it, then > by the time the courts do get to it, they rule in the company's favor because > it is too ingrained to undo. The software licenses I apply to my open source > code say that my license must be carried along with any copied and reworked > versions of that code. I don't think the companies or people using the tools > are following these licenses. If they don't have to follow them, then why > does anyone at all have to follow them? > > Jason > moorepants.info > +01 530-601-9791 > > > On Mon, Jan 27, 2025 at 10:21 PM Aaron Meurer <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> On Sun, Jan 26, 2025 at 1:40 AM Jason Moore <[email protected]> wrote: >> > >> > Hi, >> > >> > I was browsing Paul Invanov's blog today and came across this article: >> > >> > https://pirsquared.org/blog/numfocus-concerns.html >> > >> > We are part of NUMFOCUS, so I'd say it is important to at least be aware >> > of this. I do not have an opinion yet myself, but wanted to share. >> >> I love Paul, but I think that blog post is mostly FUD and these >> concerns about the 501c6 are not something to be worried about. I had >> many discussions with various people about this and related issues at >> the NumFOCUS summit last year and I'm confident that everything is OK. >> The 501c6 is more or less just a way for NumFOCUS to raise more money, >> as it makes it easier for some types or organizations to give. But the >> whole thing is being set up so that it does not affect the >> relationship with the projects (like SymPy). Unfortunately the summit >> was several months ago so I don't remember all the details, but maybe >> some more details have been posted publicly since then. But the >> biggest high level takeaway I had from the summit is that NumFOCUS >> really does care about the open source projects and has their best >> interests as community run projects at heart, and also that it is >> probably the only fiscal sponsorship organization that fits that >> description (i.e., moving away from NumFOCUS would be a bad idea). >> >> If you're still concerned about this, I would suggest emailing Andy >> Terrel about this (or maybe we can get him to respond here). He is on >> the NumFOCUS board and also is a (from a long time ago) contributor to >> SymPy. >> >> > >> > Also, this is what attracted me to his blog today: >> > https://pirsquared.org/blog/current-challenges-in-free-software-and-open-source-development.html >> > and is food for thought about whether we should have some policy to not >> > accept AI generated code due to the likelhiood of OSS licenses being >> > violated. There are examples of open source projects implementing such >> > rules. >> >> I personally don't think LLM outputs violate OSS licenses. The closest >> something might come to being an issue is if an LLM generated a >> significant block of code that is verbatim copied from something else. >> That's not only unlikely in general due to the way LLMs work, but it's >> unlikely for SymPy because most code that would be written for SymPy >> is not something that would already have appeared somewhere else. >> >> At any rate, the ship has basically sailed on this. I would expect a >> large fraction of SymPy contributors already make use of LLMs in some >> form or other, whether it's using code completion from something like >> GitHub copilot or prompting a tool like ChatGPT or Cursor to help >> refactor or write a function. Frankly if you're not using LLMs at all >> to help you code you should because they are very useful tools. >> >> Looking at some other projects, scikit-image added "no ai >> contributions" policy and they ended up having to remove it >> https://github.com/scikit-image/scikit-image/pull/7429. scikit-learn >> has a policy disallowing completely automated contributions >> (contributions that have no human in the loop) >> https://github.com/scikit-learn/scikit-learn/blob/main/doc/developers/contributing.rst#automated-contributions-policy. >> I think that's a good policy, but also I don't know if it's something >> we need to write down unless it starts to become an issue (has it?). >> >> There's also, separately, the question of the quality of LLM generated >> code. I think that we need to use the GitHub review process we have >> always been using to ensure the SymPy code remains high quality >> regardless of its source. This means the usual things: good, thorough >> tests that check for correctness, readable code, avoiding various >> antipatterns, etc. LLM generated code won't always fit these >> parameters, especially if not prompted correctly. >> >> I think the biggest concern here is contributors (especially newer >> contributors) contributing code that exclusively comes from an LLM >> without any thought from the contributor themselves. This is >> especially likely from potential GSoC applicants. This we should >> disallow, because LLMs are not good enough to do this right now, and >> in the case of a GSoC applicant, it tells us nothing about their >> coding ability. Basically, any contributor to SymPy should be >> responsible for all the code they contribute. This especially makes it >> harder to evaluate GSoC applicants, but that's unfortunately the world >> we live in and we just need to learn how to evaluate people better >> (happy to discuss ideas for this. Should we do video call interviews >> with top GSoC applicants?) >> >> Aaron Meurer >> >> >> >> Aaron Meurer >> >> > >> > Jason >> > moorepants.info >> > +01 530-601-9791 >> > >> > -- >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> > "sympy" group. >> > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> > email to [email protected]. >> > To view this discussion visit >> > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/sympy/CAP7f1AjsFmZv%2BZGB2RVH9%3DS4KcaR%2B%2B0QtG8hJ1hwKYKLOXg%3D9w%40mail.gmail.com. >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "sympy" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to [email protected]. >> To view this discussion visit >> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/sympy/CAKgW%3D6J97CtZNyN4qkx_%3DyEaj67yGB%3Dx%2BLLXx9gS2KKmtwKjcg%40mail.gmail.com. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "sympy" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To view this discussion visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/sympy/CAP7f1AgYpWdQE%3DbYXi0Mq2Fqq4aGF_yCcqfsKQydvG3MX4ww8w%40mail.gmail.com. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "sympy" group. 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