Dena Hoffman posted

Would inclusion of more humanities grads in tech projects reduce their biases?

One of the frequent criticisms of tech platforms that mimic human systems is that they contain social biases.  While such biases are unintended, their creators are criticized for not doing enough to eliminate them. Some think the inclusion of more humanities graduates in tech project teams would reduce platform biases. Others think they would just add development inefficiency. What are some of the benefits and challenges of adding the "humanities" to tech projects? Do you have any examples from projects you have worked on (good or bad!) What is your opinion?   
  • No.  The problem is that development engineers are measured on development time and code performance.  Better design goals are needed.
  • No.  Development engineers are better qualified to test for, and eliminate, social biases.
  • Yes. Development engineers too often consider bias reduction to be someone else's responsibility.
  • Yes. Humanities majors would focus on eliminating social bias because they are unable to contribute much