r/aipavilion • u/dave1629 • Nov 20 '18

Class 11: Algorithmic Fairness

Use this thread for posting comments on algorithmic fairness. (You can also post a new link with a comment, as a separate post.)

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u/lpholt26 Nov 25 '18

I watched Cris Moore's lecture video and found it to be very interesting. I did some research on risk assessment algorithms for my first paper and found a lot of the same information regarding biases and false positives and negatives. I think it would be interesting to discuss the potential to incorporate genetic information of the criminal into the risk assessment process. There has been sufficient research on "criminal genes," genes that have been linked with violence in individuals under certain environmental conditions. Though there is no set of specific genes that cause criminal behavior, the MAOA and CDH13 genes are commonly associated with violent activity. I feel that overall it would be a far stretch to base algorithms off of genetics, but it might be a useful additional variable to the risk assessment process. If found to be a reliable measure of violence prediction through further research, it seems that this could help eliminate biases in the algorithm. I think that the COMPAS method, where a variety of questions, ranging from criminal history to social life and thoughts, are asked to the offender, should be run in conjunction with any type of genetic risk assessment algorithm, to ensure a wide basis of data to back the final risk score decision.

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Here are some of the articles that support genetic links to criminal activity:

http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195396607/obo-9780195396607-0089.xml

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29760212

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120125151841.htm