Show Notes on Encode Equity Organizations have flocked to data science as a means of achieving unbiased results in decision-making on the premise that “the data doesn’t lie.” Yet, as data is reflective of the biases in our culture, in our history, and in our perspectives, it is particularly naïve to assume that models will […]
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Show Notes on Retain Responsibility One of the core tenets of ethical behavior in data science revolves around the concept of needing to retain responsibility or accountability. A differentiator between our take on this and that most commonly conveyed is the distinction between the two terms. Why, then, do we use the term “responsibility” instead […]
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Show Notes on 2B-Alert The US Army commissioned a study to find the optimal amount and timing of caffeine consumption for soldiers to maintain peak alertness. I have never been more proud of my tax dollars in all my life. Now, the 2B-Alert tool has been released in a web application accessible to the public. […]
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Episode 27: Predicting Mortality – Show Notes Death comes for us all. Even for kings he comes. Robert Bolt Researchers in the UK have been able to vastly improve the capabilities to predict an early death for middle-aged patients. New algorithms were developed to be 76% accurate, even finding different indicators that were more predictive. […]
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Episode 21: Differential Pricing in Opaque Markets – Show Notes Why do some people pay $120 and others pay $650 for a seat on the same airplane? Or the same car insurance policy? Differential pricing is everywhere but it is especially prevalent in opaque, algorithm-driven markets. Is it fair to charge differently for different people? […]
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Episode 18: Train Transparently – Show Notes As algorithms are created and unleashed upon the world, it is crucial to understand not only what they are but how they came to be. The best way to accomplish this before chaos is wreaked is to train transparently – meaning to let people know what is going […]
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Episode 12: Blockchain Gives Us Hope – Show Notes In our last episode on Deepfake, we mentioned blockchain as a possible solution for identifying authentic versus altered audio and video. In today’s episode, we look at a number of ways that blockchain can and is already providing positive impact in the world. In addition to its […]
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Episode 6: Google Has a Gorilla Problem – Show Notes Google is a forerunner in many areas of data science and artificial intelligence. Yet one problem seems insurmountable for them – properly distinguishing between dark-skinned humans and gorillas. In 2015, an African-American software developer, Jacky Alciné, looking through their automatically-tagged images in Google Photos saw […]
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Episode 5: Hired by Algorithm – Show Notes Finding and applying for jobs is a painful task – made worse by hiring bias pervasive in the process. In today’s episode, we consider advances in helping to eliminate hiring bias from job description to interview. We call out a few of the biases lurking in HR […]
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Episode 3: Many Unhappy Retail Returns – Show Notes Retail returns hurt the bottom line. They cause headaches for customer service, stocking, and profitability. It doesn’t help that some people have promoted using returns policies as a way of renting items not actually needed or wanted without being out of pocket. As much as that […]
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