FAIRFAX, Va., May 1 -- George Mason University issued the following news release:
A paradox hovers over our increasingly AI-dependent world. On the one hand, artificial intelligence can make the world a better place (or so we're told). On the other hand, algorithms have no imagination or consciousness, and thus can know only the status quo-as reflected in the data they are trained on. And our current world is far from perfectly meritocratic or fair.
Jingyuan Yang, assistant professor of information systems and operations management at Costello College of Business at George Mason University, suggests that the paradox is compounded by conventional thinking around AI. "The standard view is that fairness is a tax on efficiency. The way conven...