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Can counterfactual explanations of AI systems’ predictions skew lay users’ causal intuitions about the world? If so, can we correct for that?
Get PDFCounterfactual (CF) explanations have been employed as one of the modes of explainability in explainable artificial intelligence (AI)—both to increase the transparency of AI systems and to provide recourse. Cognitive science and psychology have pointed out that people regularly use CFs to express causal relationships. Most AI systems, however, are only able to capture associations or correlations in data, so interpreting them as casual would not be justified. In this perspective, we present two experiments (total n = 364) exploring the effects of CF explanations of AI systems’ predictions on lay people’s causal beliefs about the real world. In Experiment 1, we found that providing CF explanations of an AI system’s predictions does indeed (unjustifiably) affect people’s causal beliefs regarding factors/features the AI uses and that people are more likely to view them as causal factors in the real world. Inspired by the literature on misinformation and health warning messaging, Experiment 2 tested whether we can correct for the unjustified change in causal beliefs. We found that pointing out that AI systems capture correlations and not necessarily causal relationships can attenuate the effects of CF explanations on people’s causal beliefs
‘Time’ for ‘the People’: reflections on ‘Psychoanalysis for the People: Free Clinics and the Social Mission of Psychoanalysis’
Get PDFThis article offers some reflections on two important conferences held at the Freud Museum in London during 2021, which has resulted in the publication of a remarkable special issue of Psychoanalysis and History. The conferences aimed at providing a new space to re-engage a long history of debate, started by Freud himself, about psychoanalysis as not only a form of mental health treatment, and a theory of mind, but a social and political project aimed at emancipation. Descriptions of pioneering ‘social clinics’ from São Paulo to south London that maintain psychoanalytic thinking about social suffering, and offer psychoanalysis as a critical analytic tool to understand such suffering, render these projects ‘psychosocial’. The article reflects on the temporal nature of these clinics – their particular uses of time as part of healing, as well as their temporariness that is linked to the precarity of projects that are often underfunded, and rely on the passion and commitment of founders, practitioners and patients. Somehow many of them ‘stagger on’, contributing to the preservation of the social mission of psychoanalysis, started over 100 years ago. The author offers a perspective from the ‘Waiting Times’ research project that investigates the relation between time and care, by turning to Isabelle Stengers’s ‘care of the possible’ as a way to conceptualize the work of these psychoanalytic social clinics
The “right to the city centre”: political struggles of street vendors in Belo Horizonte, Brazil
Get PDFThe article aims to investigate the relations between work and urban space, focusing on the struggles of street vendors for the “right to the city centre” in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. We join critical debates on Brazil’s internationally praised urban reform by focusing on informal workers. Beyond lacking the protection of labour laws, the “right to the city” (RttC) of such workers has been consistently denied through restrictive legislations and policies. In the context of the “crisis” of waged labour, we explore the increasing centrality of urban space for working-class political struggles. Looking at Belo Horizonte, the article traces the relation between urban participatory democracy and the development of legal-institutional frameworks that restricted street vendors’ access to urban space in the city. In the context of an urban revitalisation policy implemented in 2017, we then explore the use of legal frameworks to remove street vendors from public areas of the city and the resulting political resistance movement. The discussion focuses on the emergence of the Vicentão Occupation, a building squatted by homeless families and street vendors in conflict with the local state. Through this case, we explore the radical potential of contemporary articulations of Henri Lefebvre’s framework emerging from the confluence of diverse local urban struggles for “the right to the city centre”. Ultimately, we argue for an understanding of the RttC as a process and a site of continual struggle whose terrain is shaped, but cannot be replaced by, legal frameworks that need to be constantly contested and evolving to reflect the shifting socio-spatial relations
Franz Böhm: private law society and lessons for our age
No full textBook synopsis: Since the financial crisis of 2008, ordoliberalism emerged from relative obscurity to become one of the crucial terms of analysis across a wide range of academic literatures and public discussion. In fact, it became the main reference for a number of issues, including assessments of the attempted resolution of the Eurozone crisis, arguments about German hegemony in Europe, debates over the future of economic liberalism and controversies about authoritarian liberalism. What is striking about ordoliberalism is its pronounced ambiguity, as some view it as a more refined and potentially progressive variant of neoliberalism, while others cast it as a blueprint for a regime of austerity reigning over a society of competition with only rudimentary democratic institutions. And while ordoliberalism is often portrayed as a quintessentially German tradition, its impact has not been confined to the German context, extending all the way to the unlikely case of China. In short, ordoliberalism is a phenomenon of arguably considerable influence that remains poorly understood, as it is mystified by its proponents and vilified by its critics. The Oxford Handbook of Ordoliberalism contains a selection of chapters written by an international cast of experts on ordoliberalism that aim to elucidate and analyze the latter in all of its many facets. From the intellectual origins and prime exemplars to its main theoretical themes and practical applications up to the most recent debates taking place across a range of disciplines, this volume offers the first comprehensive account of ordoliberalism for the English-speaking world
Calculation of Fermi energy and bulk modulus of metals
No full textThis work proposes new assumptions in place of some basic erroneous assumptions of free electron theory to determine n, the number of highest energy electrons, and Fermi energies are recalculated accordingly. The bulk modulus of metals are calculated using both the number of highest energy electrons in atoms proposed in this work and original free electron theory assumptions. When compared to measured values there is a much better agreement with values determined by this work than those using the original free electron theory assumptions. There is fairly good agreement between Fermi energies calculated by the standard theoretical equation and estimates using an approximation proposed by this work
A hapless government produces an unlikely hero
No full textAmong the many unpleasant features of British politics since the Brexit vote have been the persistent attacks by Conservative politicians on the country’s independent public institutions. The BBC and the Supreme Court were perhaps the most high-profile targets, but we have also seen the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards undermined and criticised. And if the Civil Service ever thought that it was an independent public institution, it has learned that it is not.
It has been hard for these bodies to defend themselves in the face of the Conservatives’ populist embrace of the claim that a mandate from voters trumps everything else. It is easy to portray senior officials and judges as part of a stuffy and out-of-touch elite. The public, it often seemed, shared the idea that elected representatives have the right to do whatever they were supposedly elected for, despite the ambiguities that surround any election mandate.
Then came the short-lived Truss government with its ill-fated mini-budget. One of its remarkable achievements was to elevate the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) from dull forecasting body to central pillar of fiscal responsibility. The OBR is an unlikely hero. It is relatively young: its first forecasts were produced in 2010 at the request of then-Chancellor George Osborne. Unsurprisingly, Osborne’s motives were opportunistic. One of the factors limiting the traction of the fiscal rules favoured by Gordon Brown was that they could be tweaked with optimistic forecasts. Osborne recognised that independent forecasts would protect the government from accusations of gaming the fiscal numbers, even if the forecasts then turned out to be wrong, as they often do
Transgender children: from controversy to dialogue
No full textIn March 2021, Hannah Wallerstein and Jordan Osserman facilitated a live dialogue over Zoom on the subject of transgender young people, with four psychoanalytic clinicians and thinkers. The conversation draws on short essays submitted in this section of The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child as a springboard for discussion. It has been transcribed and edited for length and clarity, and is reproduced here. Questions explored include the differences surrounding gender identity in childhood versus adulthood, the use of medical interventions for children experiencing gender dysphoria, the tension between psychoanalytic neutrality and affirmation, and the ethical stakes of working in this field
Making progress? What progression means for people serving the longest sentences
Get PDFThis report presents the findings of a prisoner consultation carried out by PRT’s Building Futures programme. Around 100 responses were received from people in prison to four questions relating to their progression.
The report looks at what is meant by risk reduction and assessment, and progression both in terms of offending behaviour courses and the personal progression of prisoners. It also examines the relationship between risk and progression, and the lack of clarity felt by prisoners.
The report identifies missed oportunities for the progression and development of long-term prisoners but makes recommendations to improve the system
Courir sur place: Le sujet otage du néolibéralisme
No full textDans notre société, les individus subissent des pressions constantes pour faire mieux et plus vite que les autres, à la fois dans le travail et dans la vie personnelle et pourtant, on a souvent l’impression de courir sur place. À travers des histoires de la vie de tous les jours, ce livre illustre comment l'idéologie du néolibéralisme affecte nos vies : en augmentant nos anxiétés, en déclenchant de nouveaux symptômes, en modifiant notre conception du travail de l’éthique, de l’amour, de la parentalité, de la génétique, et donc ce qui engage notre futur
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