We now know what happens when we take the algorithmic lens — floods of data, powerful devices, and years of innovation in algorithm design — and set it to the task of predicting and controlling human behavior. The results are not pretty: algorithms have turbocharged the delivery of biased and unjust outcomes, in law enforcement, employment, education, medical care, and virtually every place where people come in contact with tech-assisted decision making. But technology is malleable. We can build the solutions we want as long as we make sure to bring people – and their concerns – to the forefront, and shift the focus of tech design away from efficiency or cost and towards justice and inclusiveness. We must repair the algorithmic lens so it can empower us – and all of us – in our full humanity.
Professor Venkatasubramanian will talk about the new Center for Tech Responsibility at Brown and how it seeks to carry out this vision of building technology that serves the needs of all — and especially those that tech has left behind.
