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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

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Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#241

Post by jstarfish »

leetcrew wrote: post #175
jstarfish wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does. That's the problem. Take an 18-year old with a red Mustang and a 58-year old with a midlife crisis and a 3-series. Both drive like assholes. Both will inevitably cause an accident. The latter is more likely to be wealthy enough to be able to pay cash for repairs and keep the entire incident off the radar. No insurance claim, no citations, no evidence. The 18-year old has no choice but to make an insurance cl…

> Take an 18-year old with a red Mustang and a 58-year old with a midlife crisis and a 3-series. Both drive like assholes. Both will inevitably cause an accident. this is not a fair example; by assumption we have much more information about the 58yo than the 18yo. remove the bit about the midlife crisis and there's no reason to think the 58yo is anywhere near the same risk to insure. as a group, young people are less…

> unless you disagree that the goal of insurance is to spread risk among a bucket of people who have relatively similar risk factors, I'm not really sure where you're going with this.

I don't disagree. In this context, if older men make fewer insurance claims, they're better customers. On paper, he's less of a risk (to the insurer). In reality, they're both risks to other drivers. But only the 18-year old will be held accountable.

But assuming the under-25-and-male crowd are the worst drivers on the road based on number of insurance claims is not necessarily true, yet it's the basis for this oft-repeated assertion. That's my point. What isn't the insurance industry's data telling us when we use their data to make these conclusions? To get more accurate numbers, you need to be looking at the demographics of all body shop customers and the nature of their repairs. What demographics get the most front-end work done that isn't covered by an insurance check?

This new age of computing seems to be to make machines understand how the world works by putting blind faith in statistics, without ever stopping to question where the stats came from or how accurate they really are. The numbers aren't handed to us on golden tablets carved by God himself-- we get them from imperfect systems designed by imperfect humans. And then we teach dynamic algorithms how reality works based on this data and sell them as solutions, which we trust absolutely.

> and by the way, I'm a young male who drives a fast car.

No offense intended. I once was, too.

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#242

Post by tomp »

hannasanarion wrote: post #210
tomp wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So your argument is that Harvard is racist if it doesn’t discriminate against Asian applicants? So that they are not overrepresented among the student population?!

No, my argument is that "it's just numbers! they don't have a soul!" is not a valid defense from accusations of racism, because the statistical systems can be racist in their design, and there is no "racist meter" you can apply to check. The only way to know if a system is fair or not is to check whether the results you're getting are the ones you want.

Right, and if you look at results, you see that there's too many Asian students, relative to their proportion in the general population. So how do you solve that? One way is to up the bar at the admissions, and require Asians to score better relative to other ethnicities, in order to be admitted. Do you think that makes the system fairer?

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#243

Post by billy_beef »

hannasanarion wrote: post #206
50656E6973 wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's pseudo-social-science because it falsely assumes outcomes are solely determined by external variables and is completely ignorant of internal variables, such as differing cultural values. Some cultures value family life over money, others value money over family life, for example.

I'm sorry, this reply doesn't make sense to me. What does "different cultures are different" have to do with whether computer systems can be discriminatory or not?

you should ignore that comment, it's an incredibly disingenuous claim intended to mask the racist sentiment that 'non-white people are over-represented in american prison populations because they don't value not being in prison as much as white people do'.

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#244

Post by forgottenpass »

Nasrudith wrote: post #2

I thought we got over "the computer is never wrong" fallacy by the end of the 90s. Anyone involved with computing should know GIGO - Garbage In Garbage Out.

People want easy answers and discard uncertainty as soon as they get an indication that's stronger than the noise floor.

See also: Anyone who (despite the fact most people understand a 1-in-4 chance perfectly well when handed a 4-sided die) looks at FiveThirtyEight's election predictions as anything more than a fun curiosity.

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#245

Post by weberc2 »

dbt00 wrote: post #155
weberc2 wrote: post #7

Of course ML algorithms can be biased; rather than engaging an Internet layperson who tried to contradict AOC with a silly argument, it would be more interesting if the article engaged the more salient counterpoint to claims like these--attempts to eliminate bias can introduce bias as well. Anyway, the article is not written in good faith; it's only a step above "BOOM AOC owns Internet conservatives!". There's an int…

ML models are created and driven by human intervention. Humans are biased (in various directions). All models are biased in one way or another. Now, you say this article should engage this counterpoint, but you haven't actually made a point. You've simply narrowly constructed "all models contain bias" to view only attempts to balance known bias with skepticism. You also fail to take a position on what we should do ab…

Why do you think I need to have a solution to the problem in order to call out a bad faith article? How do you get from "weberc2 doesn't have a solution" to "readers are forced to believe weberc2 favors the status quo"? Does AOC need to have a solution in order to call out the status quo? If so, what is her position? I didn't see it in the article.

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#246

Post by rtkwe »

50656E6973 wrote: post #173
tomp wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More to the point, “procedural fairness” or “equality of opportunity” (if I understand it correctly) is directly opposed to “representative fairness” or “equality of outcome”. In many situations, prioritising one will compromise the other. As an example, Harvard admission of Asian students. Perspectives differ on which one is more important. Personally, I’m absolutely for the former, but it increasingly seems I’m a p…

Equality of outcome seems like a mechanistic concept of the industrial age of standardized mass production. Equality of opportunity seems much more organic/humanistic because it allows for the natural variation in people's values and personality

The problem is equality of opportunity is it's invariably applied in a way that ignores some very racist and uneven starting conditions and the effects of the past. Consider as a small example how schools are funded in the US, which is largely by local property taxes, so poorer places have poorer schools. These areas are heavily skewed towards minority populations because of some extremely racist issues in our past like redlining which kept blacks and other minorities out of the housing boom which drove a lot of middle class wealth growth through the 60s to 00s. So we build on this cycle generation after generation where kids in poor areas go to poorly funded schools and experience poor educational outcomes.

Even if we solve the funding problem it's still not actually equal opportunity because the poorer kids don't get the same support outside of school due to parents working longer hours at lower paying jobs because they got a bad education or living in a crummy house with lead paint (because that's all your parents could afford) or living in a town with contaminated water (Flint is just the one to grab headlines cities all over the country have abysmally high lead levels). Even if you want to blame community culture for some of these issues the question becomes where do you think that culture comes from, perhaps just maybe it comes from decades of lack of opportunity and systemic abuse?

How do you possibly hope to close the gap in our system where wealth almost invariably builds on wealth?

tl;dr: Equality of outcome doesn't mean everyone has to have the exact same exact life, it's just acknowledging our opportunities are directly tied to the outcomes of the generation before us.

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#247

Post by ceejayoz »

BeetleB wrote: post #228
ceejayoz wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The short person still has the right to look over the fence. They just have practical difficulties on exercising it. Similar cases: Voter ID laws with disproportionate impact on minorities, gay people having "equal" right to marry someone of the opposite gender, people in impoverished school districts having "equal" rights to an education, etc.

Your last two examples are ones where a conservative ideologue would look and say "No, they aren't being granted equal rights". In the former, you have judges refusing to follow the law. In the latter, you have children who are not getting access to the same public education their peers in wealthier districts are. >The short person still has the right to look over the fence. They just have practical difficulties on e…

> Your last two examples are ones where a conservative ideologue would look and say "No, they aren't being granted equal rights".

Unless we're "no true Scotsman"ing things here, conservative ideologues in the US (and a variety of other countries) have strongly and consistently opposed gay marriage, often arguing they had the "same rights" as others and that allowing same-sex marriage would be "special treatment".

Before that, the same was true for conservatives and interracial marriage.

The point of the cartoon is not to advocate for the right to watch a baseball game. It's an analogy showing how the binary "you either have to have an unfair situation or give someone preferential treatment" isn't always the only two options.

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#248

Post by EpicEng »

benj111 wrote: post #122
EpicEng wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there exists a scenario where it fails then yes, it is impossible. Just because something works the way you intend it to in some specific case doesn't mean it works in the general case (and the general case is what matters here.)

If it works in a specific case it isn't impossible. I agree that its the general case that matters. Impossible is a very strong word though. How wide do you want to cast the 'general' net? You can still have limited scenarios that are useful. You don't have to model the entire universe.

The GP's claim is that yes, it is _literally_ impossible. He cites a source[1]. If you have a disagreement with that theorem then by all means, share. Right now you're just saying "Nah I don't think so", which isn't very convincing.

[1]: https://www.chrisstucchio.com/pubs/slides/crunchconf_2018/sl...

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#249

Post by tomp »

malcolmgreaves wrote: post #213
tomp wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More to the point, “procedural fairness” or “equality of opportunity” (if I understand it correctly) is directly opposed to “representative fairness” or “equality of outcome”. In many situations, prioritising one will compromise the other. As an example, Harvard admission of Asian students. Perspectives differ on which one is more important. Personally, I’m absolutely for the former, but it increasingly seems I’m a p…

In order to create a situation where people have equality of opportunity, it's often necessary to ensure that the individual had an equal outcome that creates the necessary starting state.

In theory I agree but in practice that often leads to racism. For example, some people support discrimination for blacks (& against whites) at e.g. college admissions, purportedly to offset their (statistically) worse family background (in terms of education and wealth). Clearly, that's a terrible and racist solution, with the better and obviously correct solution being... to support people from worse family backgrounds! Instead of targeting the proxy for the problem, you solve the problem itself.

Re: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

#250

Post by tomp »

rtkwe wrote: post #246
50656E6973 wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Equality of outcome seems like a mechanistic concept of the industrial age of standardized mass production. Equality of opportunity seems much more organic/humanistic because it allows for the natural variation in people's values and personality

The problem is equality of opportunity is it's invariably applied in a way that ignores some very racist and uneven starting conditions and the effects of the past. Consider as a small example how schools are funded in the US, which is largely by local property taxes, so poorer places have poorer schools. These areas are heavily skewed towards minority populations because of some extremely racist issues in our past l…

By changing the way schools are funded, and helping poor students. No racial discrimination necessary.
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