Now, if it so chose, Google could subtly tweak its algorithm to prioritize images of female or non-white professors over others, to even out the balance a little and reflect the society we’re aiming for, rather than the one we live in. It’s the same in the justice system. Effectively, using an algorithm lets us ask: what percentage of a particular group do we expect to be high risk in a perfectly fair society? The algorithm gives us the option to jump straight to that figure. Or, if we decide that removing all the bias from the judicial system at once isn’t appropriate, we could instead ask
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