Bias, Misc

While standard forms of discrimination are widely considered morally wrong, philosophers disagree about what makes them so. Two accounts have risen to prominence in this debate: One stressing how wrongful discrimination disrespects the discriminatee, the other how the harms involved make discrimination wrong. While these accounts are based on carefully constructed thought experiments, proponents of both sides see their positions as in line with and, in part, supported by the folk theory of the moral wrongness of discrimination. This article presents (...) a vignette-based experiment to test empirically what, in the eyes of “folks”, makes discrimination wrong. Interestingly, we find that, according to folks, both disrespect and harm make discrimination wrong. Our findings offer some support for a pluralistic account of the wrongness of discrimination over both monist respect-based and monist harm-based accounts. (shrink)

People often discriminate based on negative or positive stereotypes about others. Important examples of this are highlighted by the theory of ambivalent sexism. This theory distinguishes sexist stereotypes that are negative (hostile sexism) from those that are positive (benevolent sexism). While both forms of sexism are considered wrong towards women, hostile sexism seems intuitively worse than benevolent sexism. In this article, we ask whether the difference between discriminating based on positive vs. negative stereotypes in itself makes a morally relevant difference. (...) We suggest that it does not. By examining a number of prominent accounts of what makes discrimination wrong, we defend the Moral Irrelevance View according to which stereotype valence is irrelevant to the moral evaluation of discrimination, all else equal. (shrink)

Statistical fairness criteria are widely used for diagnosing and ameliorating algorithmic bias. However, these fairness criteria are controversial as their use raises several difficult questions. I argue that the major problems for statistical algorithmic fairness criteria stem from an incorrect understanding of their nature. These criteria are primarily used for two purposes: first, evaluating AI systems for bias, and second constraining machine learning optimization problems in order to ameliorate such bias. The first purpose typically involves treating each criterion as a (...) necessary condition for fairness. The second use involves treating criteria as sufficient conditions for fairness. Since the criteria are used for both roles, some researchers have treated them as both necessary and sufficient conditions, i.e., as definitions of algorithmic fairness. However, serious problems have been raised for the use of these fairness criteria. Under ordinary circumstances, it is impossible to satisfy multiple criteria at the same time. Moreover, there are counterexamples to both the sufficiency and necessity for fairness of each criterion. I argue that we should instead understand fairness criteria as merely providing evidence of fairness. In other words, satisfaction (or violation) of these criteria should be understood as potential evidence of fairness (or bias). Whether a criterion counts as evidence in a particular case will depend on stakeholders' background knowledge and the specific features of the system's task. This evidence account of fairness conditions provides guidance for recognizing both the appropriate uses and the limitations of fairness criteria. (shrink)

The principle of total evidence says that all relevant information should be considered when making an inference about a hypothesis. In this article, we argue that the criminalist’s paradox from the literature on the methodology of forensic science constitutes a counterexample against the principle of total evidence. The paradox arises, for example, when a forensic scientist uses the results from other forensic procedures to inform their own analysis. In such cases, their results can become more reliable, but at the same (...) time also dependent on those other forensic results and therefore less useful for decisions in court cases. Consequently, such influences are generally avoided in forensic science. We argue that structurally similar problems plague also other scientific disciplines, anticipate an objection to the counterexample, and propose two new versions of the principle of total evidence that do not fall prey to the criminalist’s paradox. (shrink)

Across Europe, countries are reducing CO2 emissions and energy demand by lowering the temperature in public office buildings. These measures affect men and women unequally because the latter prefer and, indeed, perform better under higher temperatures than the standard temperature. Lowering the temperature thus further increases an already existing inequality. We show that the philosophical literature on discrimination provides an interesting theoretical approach to understanding such measures. On prominent understandings of what discrimination is, the policy would be considered direct discrimination (...) against women if it could be shown to reflect a broader inattentiveness to the needs of women in society. Alternatively, and more straightforwardly, the policies can be considered indirect discrimination because of their disparate effects on men and women. The final part of the paper shows that the policies are also wrong for the reasons it is often argued that discrimination is wrong—to wit, that it harms or disrespects those who are discriminated against. The final section suggests a range of measures to offset the discriminatory aspects of the policy. (shrink)

In “Racial Prejudice and Friction,” John Dewey writes: “Too often we try to discuss race prejudice morally before we have dealt with it scientifically. That is, we justify or condemn it before we understand it.” Dewey’s remark applies well to contemporary work on the epistemology of prejudiced belief, in which there are dueling tendencies either to condemn or to justify these beliefs without sufficient care. In this dissertation, I chart a middle path between these extremes. I first critique Amia Srinivasan’s (...) radical epistemology, according to which judgments about the epistemic status of morally and politically problematic beliefs should be guided by considerations of moral and political utility. I argue instead that we must uphold the priority of the epistemic, keeping separate epistemic evaluations of problematic beliefs and concerns about the utility of our epistemological judgments. I then examine the role of testimony in the formation of prejudiced belief. I defend testimonial reductionism, which holds that hearers must have sufficient positive reasons to regard speakers as trustworthy in order to be justified in believing what they say. I then argue that while prejudiced testimonial beliefs can be epistemically justified, this is true most often when these beliefs are formed in highly isolated and evidentially impoverished environments. Most prejudiced agents in societies like our own, however, are not in such dire epistemic straits. So, although perhaps not all prejudiced beliefs are epistemically unjustified, there is prima facie reason to regard such beliefs with suspicion. Finally, I discuss prejudiced beliefs based on biased perceptual experiences, disputing Susanna Siegel’s position that biased experiences can be irrational and, when they are, this irrationality transmits to beliefs formed on their basis. Drawing on Anil Gupta’s Conscious Experience, I present a coherentist account on which the epistemic status of an agent’s perceptual beliefs depends on the epistemic status of her antecedent view that in part gives rise to her experiences. I then apply this to prejudiced beliefs based on biased experiences that result from prejudiced antecedent views, concluding that in a restricted range of cases agents can be epistemically rational in forming these beliefs. (shrink)

Error Management Theory (EMT) suggests that cognitive adaptations evolve to minimize the cost of false negative and false positive errors in detections of consequential environmental conditions. These adaptations manifest as biases tailored to specific environmental conditions. This paper proposes that the same selection pressure fostered the evolution of a self-biasing ability, allowing us to minimize such costs based on experience and culturally transmitted information. The research indicates that this ability specifically applies to productions of belief or doubt about the existence (...) of an environmental condition that is not adequately perceptible to the senses, e.g., doubt that the man is being honest. A model of this self-biasing process, rooted in signal detection theory, is developed and its explanatory reach is demonstrated through many diverse examples from epistemological and social psychological literatures. These examples feature an evidentiary standard for belief that appears too high or low, or seems to have modulated. This study aims to correct and to significantly enhance EMT by introducing this evolved self-biasing ability. (shrink)

En este artículo, se presenta una crítica ético-política hacia una propuesta tecnológico-militar que llamaremos “Corredor Energético-Militar México-Estados Unidos”. Nuestro enfoque será el medioambiente y cómo este podría ser afectado por el Corredor Energético-Militar México-Estados Unidos, pero la migración también se tendrá en cuenta. Mientras se dé la lógica del desarrollo económico con el estilo universal en la arquitectura y una estrategia militar basada en la supuesta seguridad nacional estadounidense, habrá consecuencias ecológicas negativas hacia el medioambiente y la dominancia económico-militar estadounidense (...) continuará en esta frontera internacional. Esto tiene consecuencias para la migración y aunque estas dependen de posibles modificaciones a la infraestructura futura y sus reglamentos gubernamentales, la propuesta actual no favorece a la migración. Fundamentalmente, si el Corredor Energético-Militar México-Estados Unidos es construido en su esquema actual, las consecuencias migratorias del norte de México hacia el sur de Estados Unidos serán negativas. (shrink)

Over the last hundred years, competing and incompatible positions in relation to basic problems of knowledge and the use of the verb ‘to know’ have multiplied; and the prospect of a consensus solution emerging with respect to any of the problems has not seemed particularly good. We have a Gordian knot. Even so, I suggest that we also have a way to cut it. This will involve identifying why the cognitive mechanism that produces our intuitions of knowing evolved and was (...) maintained (by natural selection), i.e., identifying the ‘teleonomic function’ of that cognitive mechanism. Also, it will involve predicting, on the basis of this teleonomic function, the triggering-conditions of these natural knowledge intuitions. In this thesis, I develop a general theory of the origin, function and triggering-conditions of knowledge intuitions that will allow us to cut that knot. That theory follows basic biological theory (including that which pertains to natural altruism) and also signal detection theory. -/- My theory identifies a number of different circumstances under which the triggering-conditions of knowledge intuitions are different. Strikingly, these different circumstances (and their associated triggering-conditions) map onto the different competing and incompatible epistemological positions to which I referred. This suggests that these positions are all correct within the boundaries of one of the circumstances that my theory identifies; and that the Gordian knot is largely the result of epistemologists claiming universal applicability of a theory that in fact only applies under particular circumstances. We cut the knot by specifying the different circumstances under which each of the different epistemological positions will hold, and the reason we should expect it to hold in just these circumstances, in light of the teleonomic function of knowledge intuitions. (shrink)