Reflecting the ethical implications of artificial intelligence and algorithmic decision-making.
Artificial intelligence is one of today's most popular buzzwords, promising to help deliver insights that were previously too complex for computer systems to calculate. And as computing power keeps growing, the technology is increasingly applied to analyse people's facial photos in order to build profiles, identify characteristics and predict behaviours.
The common view is that these developments will have a positive impact on society. However, some recent applications have shown that ethical and social impact are often only a side thought. Because indeed, what happens if algorithms make mistakes? How can we amend our own data? These questions raise the need for us to better understand the impact of these technologies on society and to reveal public attitudes and concerns.
Biometric Mirror is an ethically provocative interactive system that enables public participation in the debate around ethics of artificial intelligence. The system enables people to have their face photographed and to witness the reveal of their psychometric analysis, including attributes such as aggressiveness, weirdness and emotional instability. Ultimately, a personalized scenario of algorithmic decision-making is shown in order to stimulate individual reflection on the ethical application of artificial intelligence.
Read MoreBiometric Mirror is a research project initiated by the Microsoft Research Centre for Social Natural User Interfaces at The University of Melbourne. The project has received support from Microsoft Australia and Science Gallery Melbourne.