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AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
51–60 of 357 posts
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#52Please forgive me for asking a controversial question (particularly so early in the morning), but if there are all of these biological correlations with race, what does it mean that “race is a social construct”? Is the idea that black people have greater bone mineral density (per TFA) due to social or environmental causes (e.g., diet)? For what it’s worth, I’m a staunch egalitarian and I don’t see that changing eithe…
Nature does not create "bins" to sort people or things. Some traits are clustered and we latch on the most visible clusters to define "races".
In reality, there is broad overlap and if you look up close, the whole concept becomes hairy. Someone with a father of Scandinavian descent and a mother with African lineage, what is that person, black, white, 50/50?
It's the same with gender/sex. While the biological substrate is clearly variable, the categories are social.
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
IMO it's because it's very dubious the AI is doing what the paper is maintaining it's doing. People are not 'race x' or 'race y' biologically, as if race is some discrete set of features common to a whole population. Every individual has a set of biological features inherited from their ancestors which, theoretically, could include any or all so-called 'races'. Human beings have a continuum of features that is heavil…
> Human beings have a continuum of features that is heavily interlaced amongst all the 'races'. That doesn't mean race doesn't exist any more than the fact that height is a continuum doesn't mean that short people and tall people don't exist.
"That doesn't mean race doesn't exist"
Exactly, although not in the traditional sense. There are many many overlapping genetic aspects in humans; We subdivide for political or social reasons, not strictly biological ones. To make the height comparison more fair, it would be as if we divided people into "bigs" or "littles" arbitrarily and formed political parties around it, etc. Height is one biological aspect and even then what is "tall" is subjective.
For example, the US viewpoint of white or black(~=african) is a relatively recent way of looking at race. People don't slot neatly into X or Y buckets.
I recommend reading the wikipedia article on Race [0].
0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_(human_categorization)
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
IMO it's because it's very dubious the AI is doing what the paper is maintaining it's doing. People are not 'race x' or 'race y' biologically, as if race is some discrete set of features common to a whole population. Every individual has a set of biological features inherited from their ancestors which, theoretically, could include any or all so-called 'races'. Human beings have a continuum of features that is heavil…
That race is mostly a social construct, does not abnegate the fact that it can also exist physiologically. 'Aliens' visiting Earth would immediately categorize us into groups very crudely resembling the groupings we use today, because our visible characteristics are the most immediately obvious artifacts of our existence. (Edit: when I say 'immediately' I'm indicating this would be an obvious, first order thing to do…
> 'Aliens' visiting Earth would immediately categorize us into groups very crudely resembling the grouping we use today, because our visible characteristics are the most immediately obvious artifacts of our existence.
An alien taxonomist, perhaps.
We humans go "bug! whale! snake! cow!" most of the time even for species found here on our own planet.
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#55[deleted]
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#56Please forgive me for asking a controversial question (particularly so early in the morning), but if there are all of these biological correlations with race, what does it mean that “race is a social construct”? Is the idea that black people have greater bone mineral density (per TFA) due to social or environmental causes (e.g., diet)? For what it’s worth, I’m a staunch egalitarian and I don’t see that changing eithe…
It’s biologically defined the same way as height is biologically defined, and socially defined the same way as ”tall” (180cm+) is defined.
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
It can be both real physiological differences and a social construct, as "what level of bone density tips you from x to y" becomes a question, as does "is an x person with calcium deficiency actually a y person" sort of things that are obviously not the case.
As someone with a scientific bent who is of the left, I always find it incredibly frustrating when people say “x is a social construct”, because it’s technically true, but also utterly elides the dual nature of the category. Race is a social construct that can be used to infer true things (probabilities) about the real world! Other social constructs that have this property: sociology, economics, physics… This isn’t t…
Admitting reality and statistics into conversations about race is forbidden on the left for an obvious reason.
It would require them to admit two faults they’re unable to —
1. Blacks have been destroyed by the welfare state and it’s the fault of the modern left that the black community is worse off than a few generations ago; and,
2. The reason they talk about things before 1980 is that because since then, the left has purposefully engaged in organized hate against Whites and Asians, in education and employment — and further have encouraged racial privilege, such as avowed racist Nick Cannon being celebrated in Hollywood.
The left can’t talk facts about race because facts don’t fit their narrative.
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
IMO it's because it's very dubious the AI is doing what the paper is maintaining it's doing. People are not 'race x' or 'race y' biologically, as if race is some discrete set of features common to a whole population. Every individual has a set of biological features inherited from their ancestors which, theoretically, could include any or all so-called 'races'. Human beings have a continuum of features that is heavil…
> Human beings have a continuum of features that is heavily interlaced amongst all the 'races'. That doesn't mean race doesn't exist any more than the fact that height is a continuum doesn't mean that short people and tall people don't exist.
This is an error on two counts: it conflates a spectrum on a single qualiry with spectra across multiple qualities, and it presumes the existence of people who are the “most” of their race (the way that there is a tallest and a shortest person). The first isn’t what race is, and the second is absurd.
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#59Please forgive me for asking a controversial question (particularly so early in the morning), but if there are all of these biological correlations with race, what does it mean that “race is a social construct”? Is the idea that black people have greater bone mineral density (per TFA) due to social or environmental causes (e.g., diet)? For what it’s worth, I’m a staunch egalitarian and I don’t see that changing eithe…
It's not a surprise that race effects how someone looks. It doesn't take a genius to see things like different colored skin, different nose, or height differences...
The question is what about the looks of a chest X-ray are connected to race. I agree with the research here, it's non obvious what is being extracted by the AI.
If I had to guess, maybe something about the quality of the scan itself. Perhaps one race was scanned at one particular hospital, vs a different hospital scanning a different race. Then it's just picking out the different scanner.
Re: AI Recognises Race in Medical Images
#60Please forgive me for asking a controversial question (particularly so early in the morning), but if there are all of these biological correlations with race, what does it mean that “race is a social construct”? Is the idea that black people have greater bone mineral density (per TFA) due to social or environmental causes (e.g., diet)? For what it’s worth, I’m a staunch egalitarian and I don’t see that changing eithe…
I think everyone would agree that there are some pretty obvious biological racial markers that differentiate racial groups. Skin color comes to mind :) The social construct argument just says that the specific categories and lines we draw are fairly arbitrary. Why is an afghani middle eastern (white?) but a Pakistani south-Asian? Is a Russian from Vladivostok really more closely related to a brit than a Mongolian? Id…
I think we can agree that thanks to our minds we have leaped over our physical differences encoded in our DNA. Evolutionary differences have little influence on our survival and reproduction, socio-economic constructs and technology has pretty much taken over that role.