Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Absolutely Right About Racist Algorithms

Post by tomp » Wed, Jan 23, 2019, 8:47 PM UTC

hannasanarion wrote: post #162

maceurt wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I get from people on the left is that an unequal outcome is indicative of racism, however subtle that racism is. The only other explanations for an unequal outcome are biological differences between races (do not want to get into that) and races haves advantages over others from past history.

Unequal outcome is not indicative of racism, it is racism. That's the point: racism is an outcome, not an intent. An unknowing, unfeeling beurocratic system can be racist, even if there isn't a speck of racial bias in the hearts of the practitioners and designers, simply due to historical quirks as you point out, or design mistakes.

Post by 50656E6973 » Wed, Jan 23, 2019, 8:47 PM UTC

tomp wrote: post #146

kauffj wrote: post #11

There is no design of AI that can be simultaneously utilitarian, procedurally fair, and representatively fair. I'm going to repeat this again, since many people struggle with this. It is _literally impossible_ to achieve the best utilitarian outcome, the most procedurally fair outcome, and a representatively fair outcome. Anyone designing algorithms will have to make tradeoffs along this frontier. For a far better ar…

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…

Post by leetcrew » Wed, Jan 23, 2019, 8:49 PM UTC

jstarfish wrote: post #135

leetcrew wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How'd you like paying more for insurance than your parents because some system decided men are bad drivers, and doubly so when they're young? Triply so when they happen to be driving a red car? isn't this how it already works? young males cause a disproportionate amount of insurance claims so they get assessed higher rates. they'll even bump your premiums for driving the performance version of a given car. being a…

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…

Post by BeetleB » Wed, Jan 23, 2019, 8:50 PM UTC

tunesmith wrote: post #157

BeetleB wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haidt's book The Righteous Mind does touch on this - he'll likely have references to the studies in his book. What he says the studies show: Conservative ideology: Fairness is about guaranteeing everyone equal rights. If different people have different outcomes, the question is: Did one person have more rights than the other? If so, let's correct for it. If not, it is because the person did not fully utilize his/her…

If his studies basically equated liberal ideology with communism (equal outcomes), I think I'm a lot less inclined to read his book. You know, what I'd really like is for parties or candidates to identify what they think the appropriate GINI coefficient should be for the US.

Post by sangnoir » Wed, Jan 23, 2019, 8:50 PM UTC

kauffj wrote: post #27

sam0x17 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it is possible to make one that is representatively fair first and foremost, with procedurally fair and utilitarianism at 2nd and 3rd priorities.

Yes, it is. But if you're designing an algorithm that assesses credit risk and you do this, you will lose money compared to a company that does not do this.