ReallyKinda

Why YSK: In many places it can take years for a case to come to trial. Judges have to make a decision in such cases to determine whether an accused person should be jailed in the interim. In recent years many jurisdictions have adopted algorithmic tools that essentially create a “risk profile” which assigns a value. Threshold values are used to classify the scores (for example “High Risk”). Some models include iterative algorithms (machine learning) and some do not.

The use of these models in pretrial assessments can have some major consequences. As you might know—aggregate data cannot be used to make sound predictions about individuals. What aggregate data allows you to do is model trends, correlations, and averages across groups.

We often use these profiles to help us make predictions on behalf of individuals. This is what “risk factors” in the medical sciences are usually doing. If 80% of people who are vegetarian and weigh 120 lbs have bone density issues later in life I might want to look at interventions to reduce that risk even if I could potentially fall into the 20% who have no issue.

While this seems acceptable with the intent to protect my health, I would be quite unhappy if a similarly accurate model was used to determine whether or not the state considers me a risk prior to trial. Now if I fall in the 20% I may turn out to be innocent and held against my will. Courts use similar tools to decide whether a child should be removed from a home prior to CPS investigation.

Now add in the fact that these models are fed existing criminal justice data which is often flawed and almost always contains a racial bias.

One familiar example is that black people are arrested at higher rates than other groups due to well documented racial bias in both policing policies and police themselves. A pretrial risk assessment tool that takes prior arrests into account will obviously perpetuate this bias.

Someone from the ACLU recently gave a presentation on this topic and I had never heard of it! Thought others might be interested as well.

I am working on a project made of African mahogany. It’s a wall mount for our guitars that will stay indoors. I have a water based polyurethane stain. I’m going for a darker stain. I’ve put a layer on my test piece and it’s a nice color and spreads on well but it has no shine. From what I understand, more layers with high grit sanding will get some shine, but I should also add a layer of wax, oil, or varnish. I’m having a lot of trouble deciding what to get for the final layer! Advice would be appreciated.

“In an era where the term “burka” evokes images of oppressive regimes, notably Afghanistan's coercive imposition on women, it may come as a surprise that the tapada limeña (meaning “the covered one from Lima”) was used as a cloak of female resistance to authority by the women of Lima for over three hundred years….

Women who wore them were described as “insolent vipers” by one poet, while they were even blamed for the 1746 earthquake which destroyed Lima: “God had punished the capital for the audacity of some women that everyone, native and foreign, considered to be an erotic symbol,” claimed La Vanguardia . In 1833, the feminist Flora Tristán wrote that the women of Lima were the “freest in the world” since their clothing allowed them to evade the surveillance of men.“

Has anyone experienced their prolonged anxiety just kind of disappearing? Stopped waking up anxious?

It’s constantly becoming unmapped (sometimes randomly in the middle of the day). File explorer pages close out by themselves somewhat frequently too. Just curious what might be going on in IT (they’re the ones who showed me how to re-map).

Is it possible to have RSS content automatically post to a kbin magazine? If so, how?

#kbinMeta

If I wait for my face to be completely dry before applying tretinoin (which is recommended practice afaik) my moisturizer (which is recommended to be applied on damp skin) will not be able to trap much moisture in. How do other tret users navigate this conundrum?

If Facebook made their content compatible with activity feed could I potentially subscribe and interact with (for example) my dad’s posts only so that I can keep up with family without having to visit (or have a) Facebook myself?

#AskKbin

I have a cousin, 35, Male, who has always been susceptible to conspiracy. He listened to Rush and other right wing favs when we were younger, and after a mildly messy divorce, I’m afraid he’s pivoted to blaming women for everything (including, and especially, male urges).

Along with his heroes, he’s committed to anti-intellectualism. I almost miss the tea party days.

Recently he’s been reading self published books with titles like “Analyzing the ROI on Pursuing Women,” and “Why women deserve less.” They bizarrely juxtapose tidbits from economics onto ravings about value and gender that don’t make sense. Weird that he trusts random opinions and not researchers who at least provide rigorous reasoning for their theories, but I digress.

As a lady, it’s hard to care about the dude, but I do feel like I should say -something-. Does anyone have ideas?

If my dental insurance has 100% coinsurance on preventative and basic care, 70% coinsurance on major care, a deductible of $50, and a maximum payout of $2000, does that mean I can only spend the insurance $ on major services and pay out of pocket for everything else?

How to view a feed of subscriptions only? I’ve gone into the settings and chosen the homepage drop-down that says subscriptions and saved. I’ve also chosen “subscribed ” under the drop-down next to my name in the top right while on the Home Screen. Neither seem to impact what shows up in my feed. Help?

#kbinMeta