Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Projects
    • Corporate Taxation in a Globalised Era
    • US Election 2020
    • The Transformation of Work
    • The Coronavirus Crisis and the Welfare State
    • Just Transition
    • Artificial intelligence, work and society
    • What is inequality?
    • Europe 2025
    • The Crisis Of Globalisation
  • Audiovisual
    • Audio Podcast
    • Video Podcasts
    • Social Europe Talk Videos
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Shop
  • Membership
  • Ads
  • Newsletter

Machine learning should increase human possibilities

by Elena Esposito on 21st May 2020

TwitterFacebookLinkedIn

This series is a partnership with the Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society and the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung

Sociologist Elena Esposito suggests shifting the focus of artificial intelligence to machines as communication partners. Interview by Florian Butollo.

Butollo: Artificial intelligence is said to deliver answers on questions such as the right levels of taxation, reasonable urban planning, the management of companies and the assessment of job candidates. Are the abilities of AI to predict and judge better than those of humans? Does the availability of huge amounts of data mean that the world becomes more predictable?

machine learning, algorithms
Elena Esposito

Esposito: Algorithms can process incomparably more data and perform certain tasks more accurately and reliably than human beings. This is a great advantage that we must keep in mind also when we highlight their limits, which are there and are fundamental. The most obvious is the tendency of algorithms, which learn from available data, to predict the future by projecting forward the structures of the present—including biases and imbalances.

Get our latest articles straight to your inbox!

"Social Europe publishes thought-provoking articles on the big political and economic issues of our time analysed from a European viewpoint. Indispensable reading!"

Polly Toynbee

Columnist for The Guardian

Thank you very much for your interest! Now please check your email to confirm your subscription.

There was an error submitting your subscription. Please try again.

Powered by ConvertKit

This also produces problems like overfitting, which arises when the system is overly adapted to the examples from the past and loses the ability to capture the empirical variety of the world. For example, it learned so well to interact with the right-handed users it has been trained with that it does not recognise a left-handed person as a possible user.

Algorithms also suffer a specific blindness, especially with regard to the circularity by which predictions affect the future they are aimed to forecast. In many cases the future predicted by the models does not come about, not because they are wrong but precisely because they are right and are followed.

Think, for example, of traffic flow forecasts in the summer for the so-called smart departures: black, red, yellow days, etc. The models predict that on July 31st at noon there will be traffic jams on highways, while at 2 am one will travel better. If we follow the forecasts, which are reliable and well done, we will all be queuing up on the highway at 2 am—contradicting the prediction.

This circularity affects all forecasting models: if you follow the forecast you risk falsifying it. It is difficult to predict surprises and relying too much on algorithmic forms risks limiting the space of invention and the openness of the future.

Do you see political dangers in relying too much on AI? Is the current hype around the subject a sign of the loss of our sovereignty as societies?

The political dangers are there, but they are not determined directly by technology. The possibilities offered by algorithms can lead to very different political outcomes and risks—from the hype about personalisation promising to unfold the autonomy of individual users to the Chinese ‘social credit’ system, which goes in the opposite direction.


We need your help! Please support our cause.


As you may know, Social Europe is an independent publisher. We aren't backed by a large publishing house, big advertising partners or a multi-million euro enterprise. For the longevity of Social Europe we depend on our loyal readers - we depend on you. Thank you very much for your support!

Become a Social Europe Member

What are your recommendations for using AI in the right way? What should policy-makers consider when formulating ethical guidelines, norms and regulations with this in mind?

Heinz von Foerster had as ethical imperative ‘Act always so as to increase the number of possibilities’. Today more than ever it seems to me a fundamental principle. Especially when we are dealing with very complex conditions, I think it is better to try to learn continuously from current developments than to pretend to know where you want to go.

And incidentally, machine-learning algorithms also work in this way. In these advanced-programming techniques algorithms learn from experience and in a way programme themselves—going in directions that the designers themselves often could not predict.

What is a reasonable expectation of AI? What can we hope for and how can we get there?

What I expect with respect to AI is that the very idea to artificially reproduce human intelligence will be abandoned. The most recent algorithms that use machine learning and big data do not work at all like human intelligence and do not even try to emulate it—and precisely for this reason they are able to perform with great effectiveness tasks that until now were reserved for human intelligence.

Through big data, algorithms ‘feed’ on the differences generated (consciously or unconsciously) by individuals and their behaviour to produce new, surprising and potentially instructive information. Algorithmic processes start from the intelligence of users to operate competently as communication partners, with no need to be intelligent themselves.

TwitterFacebookLinkedIn
Home ・ Machine learning should increase human possibilities

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: AI: society

About Elena Esposito

Elena Esposito is professor of sociology at the University of Bielefeld and the University of Bologna. Her current research on algorithmic prediction is supported by a five-year advanced grant from the European Research Council.

Partner Ads

Most Popular Posts

sovereignty Brexit and the misunderstanding of sovereignty Peter Verovšek
globalisation of labour,deglobalisation The first global event in the history of humankind Branko Milanovic
centre-left, Democratic Party The Biden victory and the future of the centre-left EJ Dionne Jr
Covid 19 vaccine Designing vaccines for people, not profits Mariana Mazzucato, Henry Lishi Li and Els Torreele
eurozone recovery, recovery package, Financial Stability Review, BEAST Light in the tunnel or oncoming train? Adam Tooze

Other Social Europe Publications

US election 2020
Corporate taxation in a globalised era
The transformation of work
The coronavirus crisis and the welfare state
Whither Social Rights in (Post-)Brexit Europe?

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

Read FEPS Covid Response Papers

In this moment, more than ever, policy-making requires support and ideas to design further responses that can meet the scale of the problem. FEPS contributes to this reflection with policy ideas, analysis of the different proposals and open reflections with the new FEPS Covid Response Papers series and the FEPS Covid Response Webinars. The latest FEPS Covid Response Paper by the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz, 'Recovering from the pandemic: an appraisal of lessons learned', provides an overview of the failures and successes in dealing with Covid-19 and its economic aftermath. Among the authors: Lodewijk Asscher, László Andor, Estrella Durá, Daniela Gabor, Amandine Crespy, Alberto Botta, Francesco Corti, and many more.


CLICK HERE

Social Europe Publishing book

The Brexit endgame is upon us: deal or no deal, the transition period will end on January 1st. With a pandemic raging, for those countries most affected by Brexit the end of the transition could not come at a worse time. Yet, might the UK's withdrawal be a blessing in disguise? With its biggest veto player gone, might the European Pillar of Social Rights take centre stage? This book brings together leading experts in European politics and policy to examine social citizenship rights across the European continent in the wake of Brexit. Will member states see an enhanced social Europe or a race to the bottom?

'This book correctly emphasises the need to place the future of social rights in Europe front and centre in the post-Brexit debate, to move on from the economistic bias that has obscured our vision of a progressive social Europe.' Michael D Higgins, president of Ireland


MORE INFO

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

Renewing labour relations in the German meat industry: an end to 'organised irresponsibility'?

Over the course of 2020, repeated outbreaks of Covid-19 in a number of large German meat-processing plants led to renewed public concern about the longstanding labour abuses in this industry. New legislation providing for enhanced inspection on health and safety, together with a ban on contract work and limitations on the use of temporary agency employees, holds out the prospect of a profound change in employment practices and labour relations in the meat industry. Changes in the law are not sufficient, on their own, to ensure decent working conditions, however. There is also a need to re-establish the previously high level of collective-bargaining coverage in the industry, underpinned by an industry-wide collective agreement extended by law to cover the entire sector.


FREE DOWNLOAD

ETUI advertisement

Social policy in the European Union: state of play 2020

All chapters of Social policy in the EU: state of play 2020 consider the consequences of the unfolding public-health crisis. Contributors were asked not only to analyse key developments in the EU social agenda during 2019 but also to describe the initial Covid 19-driven EU and domestic policies between January and July 2020. The European Social Observatory (OSE) has again worked closely with the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI) and renowned scholars to draw up this edition. We aim to contribute to the debate among policy-makers, social stakeholders and the research community, while providing accessible information and analysis for practitioners and students of European integration. This year’s Bilan social complements the 20th-anniversary issue of the ETUI’s Benchmarking Working Europe, a state-of-the-art analysis of the impact of the pandemic on the world of work.


FREE DOWNLOAD

Eurofound advertisement

Industrial relations: developments 2015-2019

Eurofound has monitored and analysed developments in industrial relations systems at EU level and in EU member states for over 40 years. This new flagship report provides an overview of developments in industrial relations and social dialogue in the years immediately prior to the Covid-19 outbreak. Findings are placed in the context of the key developments in EU policy affecting employment, working conditions and social policy, and linked to the work done by social partners—as well as public authorities—at European and national levels.


CLICK FOR MORE INFO

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Find Social Europe Content

Search Social Europe

Project Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

.EU Web Awards