5 ms·

I have long argued that any act of positive discrimination results in an equal amount of negative discrimination. Be it sex, race, social background, income or

I have long argued that any act of positive discrimination results in an equal amount of negative discrimination. Be it sex, race, social background, income or any other attribute. Some argue that positive discrimination is the most efficient way to right past wrongs or that it has a net positive effect on a society but that does not negate the effect of the negative discrimination on the affected individuals. What does HN think?

hhjinks 8y ago
University enrollment is a zero sum game, but not everything is. Positive discrimination in a zero sum game will indeed result in negative discrimination, but not by virtue of discrimination being subject to Newton's Third Law.
- dandare 8y ago
  I didn't get the Newton's Third Law part.
  - Chris_Jay 8y ago
    There is a school of philosophy that newton's laws of motion apply to the political realm - "any action taken to benefit a minority group will result in an equal and opposite counter-reaction". I wouldn't be terribly far off if I described Sun Zu's "The Art of War" as Newton's laws of motion applied to game theory.
didibus 8y ago
I think the idea of positive discrimination is related to countering inherent bias. You might think A isn't as qualified as B. But it is known that inherent bias against A is very likely. So you might decide, even though I believe B to be more qualified, I will go with A, knowing that my judgement might be wrong, because of the likelihood of inherent bias. In a way, yes, the known biases, can create a new bias. I bias against my known biases. This does mean that at an individual level, I favored someone else, when I initially wouldn't have. But does it result in better outcomes? I think this is where it matters. Let me explain. If one is chosen and given opportunity over another. That choice is always going to be judgemental and opinionated. You're trying to predict who will make better use of the opportunity and contribute back the most for being given it. But predictions, like in machine learning, show that a biased data set often perform poorly. So I think part of positive discrimination is to say, diversity could actually yield better results. Yet, because we don't have diverse data, we don't know for sure. But its still okay for the person who chooses to be of the opinion that it would. I find that no different then saying, well I felt they were more knowledgeable. All of it are intractable metrics in an attempt to predict outcome. Edit: Some more thoughts related to fairness. Is it fair to give opportunity only to those who would maximise it? What if it was true, that there was a genetic quality, sex, or race, or a more specific one, like height, IQ, EQ, etc., which was the key variable to maximize the opportunity? Is it fair to say only they shall be given such opportunity, always? Or should we pick at random? Would that be more fair? Are there other scheme? What does it even mean to be fair? Your genetics aren't fair, should society be fairer then them? Clearly in the modern western world, we seem to define fairness as, whoever can maximize the opportunity the most, shall be given it. Aka, meritocracy. Is this best for our society though? If so, are we doing a good job at it? What if we try to do that, but instead have been giving opportunity to those who most resemble us? Not to those who can most maximise it? What then? Is that unfair?
- apatters 8y ago
  What if positive discrimination triggers retaliatory bias? Have you really done more good than harm? Positive discrimination is like bombing a village known to harbor terrorists. Sure, you may kill some terrorists and drive the rest underground. You'll also radicalize a bunch of villagers. Suddenly ideas that used to be relegated to the lunatic fringe are going mainstream. Sound anything like the US political situation in 2018?
  - intended 8y ago
    Nope. Evidence and facts dont support the retaliatory bias position - retaliatory bias is currently too insignificant a force in comparison to previous systemic or societal biases. Maybe if we lived in a highly equitable society in the first place, the position would make sense - the forces would be more relatively matched. Currently, all things being equal - the systemic biases are far more significant and harmful to society as a whole.
- dandare 8y ago
  You talk about a bias and judgment, that may apply to a job interview but how would it apply to written school admission exams? Judging fairness by maximizing opportunity sounds a lot like the hypothetical counter-utilitarianism argument about harvesting YOU for organs thus saving more lives. Maximizing fairness to society instead of the individual is the basis of ideologies like communism and fascism.
  - p49k 8y ago
    > how would it apply to written school admission exams? There are numerous examples of how written exams are often biased against minorities due to either using cultural references/vocabulary or to frame problems using metaphors that more apply to an average white person than an average non-white person, so there’s that.
    - dandare 8y ago
      Can you please link to one of such numerous examples?
tomp 8y ago
> effect of the negative discrimination on the affected individuals It's worse than that. What doctor would you go to, a white man, a black man, or a woman, if you knew that there's affirmative action for blacks/women, and you wanted (and could afford) the best doctor? Mind you, picking white man isn't even racist, it's rational in the Bayesian framework (the white/male had to have better exam scores to be admitted to the school than blacks/women).
- lucideer 8y ago
  > picking white man isn't even racist, it's rational in the Bayesian framework Only if you assume no inherent counter-bias, which is of course ridiculous. Without affirmative action, blacks/women would have to have equal exam scores coupled with adverse conditions (statistically, on average) to the white/male candidate. By that logic, they would need to perform much better on aggregate.
  - dandare 8y ago
    Do you assume the adverse conditions that affect black women (BW) will disappear once they are admitted to the school? If not, then it is still more rational to choose a white man (WM), who performed better in the exams and is not affected by adverse conditions during his study. Anyway, my original question was about fairness :).
    - lucideer 8y ago
      > Do you assume the adverse conditions that affect black women (BW) will disappear once they are admitted to the school? I guess the hope is that increased participation will slowly reduce the severity of adversity, but whether that is effective I'm less sure of (I don't really believe it will ever disappear completely tbh). As for it being more rational to choose the person who contends with adversity on the assumption that the adversity never disappears (and therefore continues to impair), this only works on the assumption that affirmative action is a complete, perfect remedy to adversity: otherwise those contending with adversity must still overachieve to a certain degree to get the same positions (and therefore represent a potentially better rational choice).

hhjinks 8y ago

University enrollment is a zero sum game, but not everything is. Positive discrimination in a zero sum game will indeed result in negative discrimination, but not by virtue of discrimination being subject to Newton's Third Law.

dandare 8y ago
I didn't get the Newton's Third Law part.
- Chris_Jay 8y ago
  There is a school of philosophy that newton's laws of motion apply to the political realm - "any action taken to benefit a minority group will result in an equal and opposite counter-reaction". I wouldn't be terribly far off if I described Sun Zu's "The Art of War" as Newton's laws of motion applied to game theory.

didibus 8y ago

I think the idea of positive discrimination is related to countering inherent bias. You might think A isn't as qualified as B. But it is known that inherent bias against A is very likely. So you might decide, even though I believe B to be more qualified, I will go with A, knowing that my judgement might be wrong, because of the likelihood of inherent bias. In a way, yes, the known biases, can create a new bias. I bias against my known biases. This does mean that at an individual level, I favored someone else, when I initially wouldn't have. But does it result in better outcomes? I think this is where it matters. Let me explain. If one is chosen and given opportunity over another. That choice is always going to be judgemental and opinionated. You're trying to predict who will make better use of the opportunity and contribute back the most for being given it. But predictions, like in machine learning, show that a biased data set often perform poorly. So I think part of positive discrimination is to say, diversity could actually yield better results. Yet, because we don't have diverse data, we don't know for sure. But its still okay for the person who chooses to be of the opinion that it would. I find that no different then saying, well I felt they were more knowledgeable. All of it are intractable metrics in an attempt to predict outcome. Edit: Some more thoughts related to fairness. Is it fair to give opportunity only to those who would maximise it? What if it was true, that there was a genetic quality, sex, or race, or a more specific one, like height, IQ, EQ, etc., which was the key variable to maximize the opportunity? Is it fair to say only they shall be given such opportunity, always? Or should we pick at random? Would that be more fair? Are there other scheme? What does it even mean to be fair? Your genetics aren't fair, should society be fairer then them? Clearly in the modern western world, we seem to define fairness as, whoever can maximize the opportunity the most, shall be given it. Aka, meritocracy. Is this best for our society though? If so, are we doing a good job at it? What if we try to do that, but instead have been giving opportunity to those who most resemble us? Not to those who can most maximise it? What then? Is that unfair?

apatters 8y ago
What if positive discrimination triggers retaliatory bias? Have you really done more good than harm? Positive discrimination is like bombing a village known to harbor terrorists. Sure, you may kill some terrorists and drive the rest underground. You'll also radicalize a bunch of villagers. Suddenly ideas that used to be relegated to the lunatic fringe are going mainstream. Sound anything like the US political situation in 2018?
- intended 8y ago
  Nope. Evidence and facts dont support the retaliatory bias position - retaliatory bias is currently too insignificant a force in comparison to previous systemic or societal biases. Maybe if we lived in a highly equitable society in the first place, the position would make sense - the forces would be more relatively matched. Currently, all things being equal - the systemic biases are far more significant and harmful to society as a whole.
dandare 8y ago
You talk about a bias and judgment, that may apply to a job interview but how would it apply to written school admission exams? Judging fairness by maximizing opportunity sounds a lot like the hypothetical counter-utilitarianism argument about harvesting YOU for organs thus saving more lives. Maximizing fairness to society instead of the individual is the basis of ideologies like communism and fascism.
- p49k 8y ago
  > how would it apply to written school admission exams? There are numerous examples of how written exams are often biased against minorities due to either using cultural references/vocabulary or to frame problems using metaphors that more apply to an average white person than an average non-white person, so there’s that.
  - dandare 8y ago
    Can you please link to one of such numerous examples?

tomp 8y ago

> effect of the negative discrimination on the affected individuals It's worse than that. What doctor would you go to, a white man, a black man, or a woman, if you knew that there's affirmative action for blacks/women, and you wanted (and could afford) the best doctor? Mind you, picking white man isn't even racist, it's rational in the Bayesian framework (the white/male had to have better exam scores to be admitted to the school than blacks/women).

lucideer 8y ago
> picking white man isn't even racist, it's rational in the Bayesian framework Only if you assume no inherent counter-bias, which is of course ridiculous. Without affirmative action, blacks/women would have to have equal exam scores coupled with adverse conditions (statistically, on average) to the white/male candidate. By that logic, they would need to perform much better on aggregate.
- dandare 8y ago
  Do you assume the adverse conditions that affect black women (BW) will disappear once they are admitted to the school? If not, then it is still more rational to choose a white man (WM), who performed better in the exams and is not affected by adverse conditions during his study. Anyway, my original question was about fairness :).
  - lucideer 8y ago
    > Do you assume the adverse conditions that affect black women (BW) will disappear once they are admitted to the school? I guess the hope is that increased participation will slowly reduce the severity of adversity, but whether that is effective I'm less sure of (I don't really believe it will ever disappear completely tbh). As for it being more rational to choose the person who contends with adversity on the assumption that the adversity never disappears (and therefore continues to impair), this only works on the assumption that affirmative action is a complete, perfect remedy to adversity: otherwise those contending with adversity must still overachieve to a certain degree to get the same positions (and therefore represent a potentially better rational choice).