Research
Primary research interests:
ethics of technology; data and information ethics
climate ethics
moral psychology
social and political philosophy
Publications
Weakness of Political Will, in Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy
Abstract: In this paper I defend an analogy between the motivational failings of individuals and those of collective political entities. I use theories from the weakness of will literature to develop a model of the same phenomena as it occurs in political entities and to articulate an account of political weakness of will, or political akrasia. Weakness of political will is a distinctly political concept that will apply to group agents such as governments and other political collectives. I argue that understanding weakness of political will as an analogous problem to that of weakness of will in individuals enables us to better explain why political entities often fail to do what would seem to be best.
(Some) Algorithmic Bias as Institutional Bias, in Ethics and Information Technology
Abstract: In this paper I argue that some examples of what we label ‘algorithmic bias’ would be better understood as cases of institutional bias. Even when individual algorithmic systems appear unobjectionable, they may produce biased outcomes given the way that they are embedded in the background structure of our social world. Therefore, the problematic outcomes associated with the use of AI systems cannot be understood or accounted for without a kind of structural account. Understanding algorithmic bias as institutional bias in particular (as opposed to other structural accounts) has at least two important upshots. First, I argue that the existence of bias that is intrinsic to certain institutions (whether algorithmic or not) suggests that at least in some cases, the algorithms now substituting as pieces of institutional norms or rules are not “fixable” in the relevant sense, because the institutions they help make up are not fixable. Second, I argue that in other cases, changing the algorithms being used within our institutions (rather than getting rid of them entirely) is essential to changing the background structural conditions of our society.