CHAPTER 7Circus of Misguided Analysis
Source: Twitter, Inc.
The big moneymakers in Silicon Valley years ago deemed artificial intelligence (AI) the greatest innovation in our lifetime. Our global society has bought this premise and is perpetuating this human decision. The social control that has been unleashed with this one decision continues to boggle many of us critiquing tech. Nevertheless, our society engrosses itself in leveraging, operationalizing, powering, and monetizing AI under misguided notions of increasing profits, enhancing a person's or a company's cool factor, and making everyday life easier for the average person. Leaning into AI'ing has brought the world automated decision systems. Touted as a valuable application of AI, automated decision systems only increase the quantity of decisions made, not the quality of those decisions. And all of us have seen, read, or experienced the fallacy of AI-powered algorithms, and not people, making decisions. Unraveling what the AI and other automated decision systems have done quickly becomes impractical, and it's clear that we need to focus on preventive approaches.
In this chapter, we take a close look at how we work with data. We discuss the wide band of what falls under data analysis, not just AI; how the statistical, algorithmic, process, and systemwide choices we make as data practitioners can lead to harm; and what ...
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