BU Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar: Accountability, Ethics, and Algorithms

Thursday, March 15, 4:00 PM – 3:30 PM
Center for Integrated Life Sciences and Engineering
610 Commonwealth Avenue

Ethics and law are implicated in efforts to make the design and implementation of algorithms accountable. Philosophical questions arise at the start: how do the notions of responsibility, jurisdiction, accountability, bias, abuse, and authority figure in a new world of technology, where mixed responsibility among a variety of actors, as well as evolution of systems of information over time, is the new normal? If a set of parameters are used, e.g., in sentencing guidelines, what are we to say and do if a) a longstanding underpowered group suffers differentially or if b) a newly emergent effected group, not recognized as such before, comes before our eyes? How are data on, e.g., gender inequity in pay to be aggregated across a wide range of institutions without incurring legal liability on the part of institutions that house that aggregation and/or violating privacy norms? How is responsibility to be negotiated, even in cases where there is no theoretical way to engineer disaggregation? How may cryptography help engineer openness and inclusion—and how may it provide a backdoor for the end user to run around traditional realms of authority and jurisdiction? How might individuals be incentivized over time to share information of a “private” sort and then have it de-linked or buried? What can be done about cyber-abuse of individuals? Who should decide answers to these questions? Professor Susan Schneider (Philosophy, Cognitive Science University of Connecticut; Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NY Ethics and Technology Group, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics) will speak at a Thursday public event followed by a Friday triple rountable of faculty from the Boston area (limited seating, a call for participation will go out to BU and Boston-area faculty). Co-sponsored with Rafik B. Hariri Institute of Computing. The three roundtable themes will be: Algorithms in the Criminal Adjudicative Process, Privacy and AI and the Internet of Things. Mellon visitors will join Boston University Faculty in a discussion of frontiers in this important set of areas.