⚡Trillion
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AI and Criminal Justice
When dealing with an inefficient system, many people look for automation opportunities. Most of the time, this approach makes sense — if we can plug in an algorithm to reduce the time and labor required to complete a task, we should.
This does not hold true for the criminal justice system. Unfortunately, algorithms are increasingly becoming an integral part of how we arbitrate fairness. The MIT Technology Review dove into COMPAS, an algorithmic risk assessment tool used in the US criminal system, to illustrate the failings of these algorithms — let’s take a closer look.
Understanding COMPAS. This algorithm is supposed to “help judges determine whether a defendant should be kept in jail or allowed out while awaiting trial.” It uses historical data on the defendant to find correlations between factors like age, history of incarceration, and whether the person was rearrested. It then spits out a “risk score” for whether the defendant will get rearrested for a new crime during the waiting period. High-risk defendants are generally left in jail, and low-risk defendants are generally released.
This should make sense, right? In theory, this should reduce judges’ bias by providing a more objective evaluation. In fact, COMPAS specifically doesn’t include race when calculating the risk scores.
Somehow, it still doesn’t work. A ProPublica investigation argued that the tool was still biased against black Americans. This group is almost twice as likely as white Americans to be labeled as high risk but not re-offend. White Americans, on the other hand, are much more likely to be labeled as low risk but go on to commit other crimes.
Can it ever work? Nope. The study offers an interactive section where a reader can try to fix the algorithm (we highly recommend checking it out). The reason is that black and white defendants are rearrested at different rates — so, black defendants will automatically have a higher rate or predicted arrest and a higher risk score. No risk score can work when the system itself is racially biased in rates of arrest.
This is worse than human bias. Despite its failings, some may argue that this is still better than relying on a biased judge. That’s not true — COMPAS is designed by a private company and the algorithm is a trade secret. Defendants cannot question its outcomes.
How to fix this. As a first step, we need to bring more public accountability into these algorithms — COMPAS and other similar algorithms cannot be held as trade secrets. Some even are questioning whether algorithms should be used to arbitrate fairness. Andrew Selbst, a law professor, agrees:
“Whenever you turn philosophical notions of fairness into mathematical expressions, they lose their nuance, their flexibility, their malleability. That’s not to say that some of the efficiencies of doing so won’t eventually be worthwhile. I just have my doubts.”
We believe in creating efficient systems wherever possible, but we are in Selbst’s camp when it comes to areas like the criminal justice system. Sometimes, inefficiency is necessary — especially when human lives are at stake.
Beating CO2 and Earning $1TN+
Yup, that’s a trillion, not a typo. It’s pretty universally understood that CO2 is heating the atmosphere and increasing climate change, but what is less widely known how useful CO2 can be. It can be an input (feedstock) to a variety of industrial processes, from concrete to plastics. This thing that’s heating up the planet is also very, very valuable.
So use it. Many climate activists want to figure out how to better incentivize industries to use more CO2 to decrease what is ending up in our atmosphere. This basic idea is called carbon capture and utilization (CCU), and the topic is hot right now.
It’s not just trees. There are other options for gathering and removing CO2. You can pull CO2 from flue gasses of industrial facilities (traditional carbon capture) or pull it directly out of the air (direct carbon capture). It can then be concentrated and used as an industrial feedstock. Let’s take a look at a few technologies:
Something you’re familiar with
Concrete building material. Cement is usually a smoothie of cement, water, and aggregates. There are a few technologies that can be used here:
Aggregates can be made by converting CO2 into solid minerals
CO2 can be used to cure concrete during mixing instead of water, which actually makes the concrete stronger (and saves water!)
Cement can be phased out in favor of a new binding agent that absorbs CO2
There is some speculative tech that could change the way the production process for cement occurs. Instead of just releasing CO2, the process creates a purified CO2 that can be easily re-injected to become entirely carbon negative. This wouldn’t just reduce emissions, it’d semi-permanently store carbon
The last option hasn’t been accomplished yet, but if all these technologies become more prominent, we could sequester billions of tons of carbon.
Something you’re less familiar with
Algae. Captured CO2 can be used to accelerate the growth of algae, which for some reason has the capacity to absorb much more and do it much faster than any other source of biomass. What do you do with all the algae you’ve grown? You can use it for food, biofuels, plastics, and even carbon fiber.
Something you may not have heard of
Carbon composites, graphene, etc. The team at C2CNT is using “molten electrolysis” to transform CO2 into carbon nanotubes, which are stronger than steel and highly conductive. They’re pretty expensive to make and are only used in high-end applications. However, if the cost to produce these tubes can be decreased, they could be put into virtually every application of electricity.
Also, carbon sequestration could eventually replace steel. Steel, the most commonly used metal in the world, is responsible for 7-9% of global emissions. If carbon-based materials substituted steal, it could reduce billions of tons of CO2 emissions.
If you want to see other technologies such as liquid fuels and chemicals/plastics, go here.
As a result of the enormous growth potential in these markets, some with the ability to grow ten- or twenty-fold in the upcoming years, the annual revenue of the combined markets are estimated to be between $800 billion and $1.1 trillion by 2030. This dollar value would result in a 10% global cut of carbon emissions. Unlike the usual sustainable mantra of “use less,” this operates differently: “The more you use, the less you emit.”
Bonus: Scientists just engineered bacteria to eat CO2.
China is Mapping Faces
Chinese researchers are using blood from Uighurs in their internment camps to try to figure out how DNA samples could be used to re-create an image of a person’s face.
What? It’s not science fiction. It’s a real process and emerging technology called DNA phenotyping. It looks at your genes associated with traits like ancestry, skin color, and eye color, and predicts what you might look like. If you’ve ever watched the History Channel, the 3D models of ancient humans are educated guesses sometimes built using this process.
No, I mean … what? Ethicists fear that China will use this process as another tool to crack down on Uighurs. Yes, what the government is building is:
“…essentially technologies used for hunting people,” according to Mark Munsterhjelm from the University of Windsor in Ontario.
It’s unlikely there is proper consent, especially as the subjects are being held captive in internment camps. Even worse, European scientists at institutes in Germany and Netherlands are listed as coauthors of the paper that detail the research, and respected institutions in Europe have funded part of the research.
Future fears. Will the Chinese government link this technology with the mass surveillance and facial recognition systems it’s building? Experts say it’s possible. They can feed images produced from a DNA sample into their surveillance systems and track dissidents and protestors as well as criminals.
Short Takes
Check out the social entrepreneurs on the Forbes 30 Under 30 2020 list. Congrats to everybody here!
China criticized the US UIGHUR Act of 2019. Yesterday, the House of Representatives approved the Uygur Intervention and Global Humanitarian Unified Response Act.
Anti-Michael Bloomberg ads were run on Bloomberg.com by the NRA. How did this happen?
Macron uses toddler reverse psychology to fool Trump into supporting NATO.
Tomorrow Today: Intro to Unconventional Activism
🎟️ Thursday, December 5
SOLD OUT
Change cannot be achieved alone, only together. In that spirit, we are kicking off community events at our space in New York City. Eat some food, learn from some seasoned, unconventional activists, and meet others aspiring to change the world!
Our speakers:
Anjali Chandrashekar: Anjali is the founder of Picture It, a global social project that uses artivism to raise funds and awareness for various health, humanitarian, and environmental causes. Her projects have been featured by the UN, and she had the opportunity to present her work at the World Economic Forum at Davos in 2011. Anjali also works as an innovation strategy consultant at Doblin.
Karen Mac: Karen is a Business Development Associate at Acumen, an impact investment fund that invests in social enterprises that serve low-income communities in developing countries around the world. Before Acumen, Karen worked at the Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship and has also spent time supporting female artisans in Bolivia and improving sanitation usage in India.
Why are we hosting this?
For us, community is the center of everything. In an age of prolific digitization, there's a great need for greater human connection. It's almost necessary to carve out time and space to purposefully engage in person. While it's amazing to be able to discuss and interact with multiple people online and exchange stories and insights, we don't think anything beats the experience of sharing a meal.
Igniting Tomorrow
💰 $100k-$250k Pre-Seed Funding
UPDATE: We’ve already had multiple people reach out and share their ideas. It gets us super excited to learn more about the projects and companies everyone is working on. Please keep reaching out. We’ll be releasing more information around this in the upcoming year.
Many of you are either already working on a number of world-changing things or have ideas bursting out of you every day. Our goal is to see unconventional activists like you succeed. Let us help connect you into the space and access the financing you need to get started. If you’d like to share your ideas (or know a friend working on something exciting), please reply to this email!
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